By Dr. Ni Zhang, Assistant Professor, Department of Public Health & Recreation

A dozen enthusiastic public health students attended the electrifying 11th Annual CSU Health Policy Conference in Sacramento from April 15th to 17th. Over two action-packed days, they connected with legislators, public health professionals, advocates, lobbyists, and legislative analysts. When asked to share the most exciting highlights and key takeaways from the speakers, the students said:

• I like when the Secretary of State, Dr. Weber said, ‘if there are no seats at the table, bring your own chair.’ I took this to mean that you need to advocate for yourself when you believe you deserve better and to create your own path when it comes to finding a career. — Suodaba
• When Mayor of Sacramento, Darrell Steinberg, said “be hard on the issues, be easy on the people and enrich your knowledge about the world by reading.” I also really liked what Ash Kalra said “don’t forget where you came from.” — Raveena
• Dr. Aragon mentioned that when you’re talking to someone who shares different values or a different perspective on an issue you should: Listen and ask yourself 3 things: What can I learn about this person, what can I learn about myself, and what can I learn about the issue. — Angelica
• From Dr. Weber: You should make people afraid to lose your support and your voice. By voting and advocating, people will listen to you because they are afraid of your power. – Reagan
• Policy is not just about passing bills, it is about working to make the future better in order for other people to not go through the same struggles we did. — Dana
• One thing that stuck with me would be hearing Wendy Carillo speak about how legacy is planting a seed for a tree that we will not see because it made me reflect and think about the future I want to create for those that will come after me and it solidified why I want to go into public policy. — Micole

SJSU has been active in planning and participating in this conference from the beginning. The conference is a unique convening of public health students and faculty across the CSU, all committed to government service and public health.

Dr. Chulwoo ‘Charles’ Park has been awarded the National Institutes of Health (NIH) SuRE-First Award (R16) for a 4-year research period from August 2023 to June 2027. In his research, the population is on Asian/Asian American immigrant young adults learn multiple languages, being exposed to English as an additional language (L2) in the United States after mainly using a first language (L1) from their country of origin. The study population is also multilingual 1.5 generation Asian/Asian American immigrant young adults aged 18-25 years in the San Francisco Bay Area. In this grant, Dr. Park is investigating the impact of learning an additional language, namely, the dominant language of the community, on the mental health and psychological well-being of Asian/Asian American immigrant young adults. The study also explores its influence on their sense of acceptance, inclusion, and ethnic identity in the United States. This study will provide suggestions to address the structural drivers of mental health disparities among immigrant populations, such as results of the experience of racism, discrimination, and anti-Asian hate crime, which are linked to individual’s own multilingual language identity and skills.

By: Dr. Andrew Carter

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has reified and exacerbated historical and structurally-rooted health inequities across the country. In Santa Clara County, the pandemic and its wider impact has had a disproportionately negative impact on the health of Black, Latinx, and low-income communities – particularly in East San Jose, Gilroy, and pockets throughout the County.  To address this crisis, Santa Clara County Supervisor Cindy Chavez proposed the establishment of a Health Equity Agenda in June, 2021. The goal of the Agenda is  to establish a Steering Committee of county leaders, determine key health equity metrics for the County, and propose recommendations to address health inequities. Driven by Steering Committee members from Working Partnerships USA, The Health Trust, Santa Clara Family Health Plan (SCFHP), Behavioral Health Contractors Association, Black Leadership Kitchen Cabinet, Santa Clara County Department of Public Health, and Community Health Partnership, the Agenda incorporates both grasstops and grassroots approaches to represent multi-level perspectives from the public, academic, professional, and community sectors.

Establishing such a lofty agenda is no easy task. The Steering Committee sought out consultants to support the development of the Agenda, rooted in the Bay Area Regional Health Inequities Initiative (BARHII) model toward achieving racial health equity (which prioritizes an upstream, justice-oriented approach). The Redstone Strategy Group, a leading social impact consulting firm  has spearheaded the effort to examine health inequities in the County identifiable through existing data sources, facilitate dialogue with the Steering Committee to understand priorities grounded in their organizations’ expertise, and delve into literature and best practices around potential policies and programs to address inequities.

On the academic and community side, Drs. Vicky Gomez and Rachel Berkowitz, along with a team of four SJSU undergraduate and graduate Public Health and Recreation students, have been tapped to engage with the local community to understand and elevate the priorities of residents and community leaders regarding the Health Equity Agenda. Drawing on their backgrounds in community health education, participatory action research, and place-based community development, Gomez and Berkowitz have conducted 15 interviews with key stakeholders from diverse organizations (including Destination:Home, AACI, Saratoga Area Senior Coordinating Council, Indian Health Center of Santa Clara Valley, Latinas Contra Cancer, and many more) and are preparing to host a number of community conversations to learn the locally-constituted, context-specific perspectives of Santa Clara County residents. Information from the interviews and conversations will be integrated with Redstone’s proposed metrics and recommendations to establish a multifaceted Health Equity Agenda. Additionally, the SJSU team will work to  develop several digital stories  (i.e., a community-based participatory method that incorporates short-form, digital media production to center marginalized voices) to illuminate and make real the experiences of county residents related to health inequities.

The Health Equity Agenda constitutes a multi-year, four-phase plan to develop, implement, and evaluate county-wide health equity interventions over the next 5-10 years.  Mirroring national and global calls to incorporate intersectional and intersectoral approaches in addressing health inequities, the Health Equity Agenda represents an important step toward improving and ultimately rectifying structural health disparities experienced by local Santa Clara County residents. If you have specific questions or would like more information, please contact:

Dr. Vicky Gomez     vicky.gomez@sjsu.edu

Dr. Rachel Berkowitz    rachel.berkowitz@sjsu.edu

By: Dr. Anji Buckner

Nearly two dozen Public Health students attended the one-day CSU-Health Policy Conference.  There were about ten different CSU programs and nearly 250 students who attended one of the two regionally hosted events. The SJSU delegation attended the Northern-California conference at CSU East Bay, where we started with a conversation with the Secretary of Health and Human Services for California, Dr. Mark Ghaly and concluded with a panel of leaders from the California Department of Public Health. The afternoon began with an impressive in-person panel of local public health leaders including: the Director of Public Health, Policy, and Planning from San Mateo County, Marc Meulman; the Deputy Public Health Officer for Santa Cruz County and Interim Health Officer for San Benito County, David Ghilarducci; Alameda County Public Health Department Director, Kimi Watkins-Tartt; and Contra Costa County Health Services Director, Anna Roth.  We followed with sessions about careers in policy development, social justice and community advocacy, and applying for graduate school. We wrapped up the day with networking and cross-campus socializing.

Thank you PHR Chair,  Dr. Iwasaki and CHHS Dean Shillington for supporting these events and introducing our NPHW guests. To everyone who participated – thank you for joining and we hope to see you next April for NPHW 2023 and the annual CSU-Health Policy Conference.  Our gratitude to The Career Exploration Committee (Anji Buckner, Josh Bauer, Catherine Doyle, Marcelle Dougan, and Vicky Gomez) of the Public Health and Recreation Department who hosted and participated in two exciting April events.

By: Dr. Anji Buckner

Four events took place this year  in honor of National Public Health Week. The theme, “Public Health is Where You Are”, was explored in different ways through each event. We began with learning how to visualize our communities in a GIS mapping workshop, led by our own Russ Bartlett (PHR Lecturer). Next we had our keynote presentation with Dr. Anthony Iton (Senior Vice President, Building Healthy Communities, California Endowment). Dr. Iton, led us on a data-driven journey to see systemic injustices and the impacts on population health. We closed the week with two networking events: a workshop with Kristin Keller (SJSU Career Center) and Networking with Professionals, where eight professionals, all working to promote and improve population health in our communities, joined us for an hour of virtual networking. NPHW 2022 was a success. We had 640 people attend our four incredible events. If you are curious, we invite you to explore the materials and recordings will remain on our NPHW 2022 Events page and available as a resource.