We developed three new community health assessment tools – the MAPP Community Context Assessment, the MAPP Community Partner Assessment and the MAPP Power Primer – for local health departments and others to use during Community Health Improvement processes.
Mobilizing for Action through Planning and Partnerships (MAPP) is a community-driven strategic planning process for improving community health. Developed by the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) and facilitated by public health leaders, the MAPP framework helps communities apply strategic thinking to prioritize public health issues and identify resources to address them. MAPP is not an agency-focused assessment process; rather, it is an interactive process that can improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and ultimately the performance of local public health systems.
Following a national evaluation of MAPP, NACCHO launched an extensive revision process to better center equity across all MAPP processes and better meet current field needs and trends around community health improvement (CHI). In 2021, NACCHO hired Human Impact Partners to develop two of the three new assessment tools to be used as part of the MAPP revision and a supplemental Power Primer. Each of those tools is described below:
- The Community Context Assessment (CCA) is a qualitative data assessment tool aimed at harnessing the unique insights, expertise, and perspectives of individuals and communities directly impacted by social systems in order to improve the functioning and impact of those systems.
- The Community Partners Assessment (CPA) is an assessment process that allows all of the community partners involved in MAPP to critically look at 1) their own individual systems, processes and capacities and 2) their collective capacity as a network/across all community partners to address health inequities.
- The MAPP Power Primer is a user-friendly guide to complement the MAPP 2.0 Handbook that provides MAPP facilitators with resources for a deeper dive into addressing power as they conduct MAPP. Specifically, the Power Primer explains why and how to address power dynamics within MAPP, acknowledge societal power imbalances as a root cause of health inequities, and support building community power through MAPP and community health improvement.
Each of the tools was developed in consultation with experts on health equity, community health improvement, organizing and power building, and local health department practice. These tools and the new MAPP Handbook (to be released in July 2023) will be used by hundreds of local health departments and CHI communities across the nation.
To download the complete tools and other related webinars and resources, you must sign up to be a member of the MAPP Network. Signing up is free of charge and just takes two minutes. Follow these instructions to join the MAPP Network and access resources.
To learn more, reach out to Lili Farhang at lili@humanimpact.org or Victoria Davis at victoria@humanimpact.org
