skip to navigation : skip to content

SPHCM Strategic Plan

Approved: August 2000

The main body of the Strategic Plan is now in PDF format (137KB).

Executive Summary

Background:
The University of Washington School of Public Health and Community Medicine (UW-SPHCM) occupies a unique position of regional, national, and international leadership in public health research and education, achieved through three decades of successful growth and expansion. The School now faces the challenges of maintaining and building upon these successes amidst growing institutional complexity, changing public health needs, and an explosion of scientific and educational opportunities and costs. Surmounting these challenges requires the School to make informed, strategic decisions about its future direction as an academic public health institution.

Recognizing the need to chart a direction for the future, the School initiated a comprehensive strategic planning process in July 1999. This process was designed to review the School's overarching mission and performance; to examine the School's priorities and activities in relation to national and state health objectives and to address the need for a comprehensive plan to guide the School's institutional decision-making. The strategic planning process was also undertaken pursuant to seven University-wide objectives identified in the Board of Regents' 1999-2000 strategic plan: (1) enhancing program quality and national competitiveness; (2) ensuring continued distinction in research; (3) expanding outreach and public service; (4) increasing student, faculty, and staff diversity; (5) reallocating resources toward the strongest programs and new initiatives; (6) improving and utilizing technology to increase productivity and extend education; and (7) increasing private support for research and educational initiatives.

Methods:
In July 1999, a committee comprised of faculty, staff, and students was appointed to advise the design and conduct of the strategic planning process. The committee formulated key questions about the School's internal mission, organization, and performance, and about its external opportunities and threats. During October 1999, these questions were used in facilitated discussions with faculty in each department, as well as with staff, students, and alumni. All of these stakeholders were asked to comment candidly on specific institutional strengths and weaknesses, as well as situational opportunities and threats. Comments were also solicited by e-mail, a web site, regular mail, and telephone. A second round of facilitated discussions based on an initial draft of the strategic plan occurred in April 2000.

Input and feedback were also obtained from a number of external sources. The Dean met with key leaders in public health and health care to determine their views of the School's current and future roles. Visits to each of Washington's 34 local public health jurisdictions are being conducted by the Dean and the Associate Dean for Public Health Practice to explore the School's current and potential roles in providing outreach and support to the state's public health workforce. Visits to other educational institutions were conducted to explore possibilities for collaboration in public health education.

The strategic plan developed through this process is a living document that will be updated and modified continuously in response to feedback from the School's constituents. This current version of the strategic plan summarizes and synthesizes input from all who contributed to the dialogue to date and reports on a set of priorities to guide the School over the next five years.

Principal Findings:
The School is remarkably successful in the eyes of both internal and external constituents, and remains committed to its institutional mission: "to promote better health, prevent illness and injury, and ensure more efficient and cost-effective health care, through education, research, and service." To fulfill this mission, the School pursues four interrelated goals:

  • to advance knowledge in the public health sciences;
  • to develop highly competent researchers in the public health sciences;
  • to train able and effective public health practitioners; and
  • to promote health through involvement with communities.

The School's institutional strengths include a highly-skilled faculty whose expertise has fostered the development of strong educational programs in both scientific and professional disciplines and research methodologies in the areas of biostatistics, epidemiology, environmental health, health services, pathobiology, nutritional sciences, and public health genetics. The School maintains productive relationships with other academic units within the University, and with public health and health care institutions operating at local, state, and national levels.

The School's institutional weaknesses include a chronic shortage of office and laboratory space, which limits its ability to pursue new research opportunities. The School faces unstable funding sources for educational programs, which compromises the School's ability to develop programs strategically and pro-actively in response to professional needs and market demand. Additionally, the School suffers from a lack of expertise in distance learning programs and technologies, which hinders its progress in developing new training and outreach programs for practicing health professionals. The School also lacks a strong locus of faculty expertise in several disciplines that are of growing importance in the academic and practice environments of public health, including behavioral sciences, infectious disease epidemiology, social epidemiology, environmental policy, and health economics. Finally, the School has little racial and ethnic diversity in its student, faculty, and staff populations, which compromises the School's ability to address population-based disparities in health and disease through educational, research, and practice initiatives.

External opportunities for enhancing the School's leadership in public health research and education are abundant, particularly in view of the School's expertise and reputation. Key among these is the growing interest of public health and medical care organizations in evidence-driven, population-based strategies for improving quality and health outcomes. This interest creates opportunities for the School to forge new community-based research initiatives in partnership with these organizations. Another imminent opportunity stems from the growing biotechnology industry and its interest in supporting new research and educational initiatives in molecular epidemiology and public health genetics. A third opportunity exists in the growing federal and state interest in improving the skills and competencies of the public health workforce, which potentially translates into support for new education, training, and outreach programs for practicing health professionals. These opportunities are countered by a host of external threats, including growing competition from well-resourced institutions for top faculty and students; a lack of understanding about the importance of public health research and education among public officials and members of the public; and mounting demands from state and local public health agencies for consultation and assistance.

Recommendations for Action:
Based on input from its stakeholders, the School will pursue a strategic agenda that leverages its existing strengths to create new opportunities for improving population health through leading-edge scientific discovery and health professions education. The School's strategic agenda will emphasize three basic goals: (1) building the science base for health protection and improvement, by focusing core scientific resources on the most promising avenues for health improvement; (2) strengthening educational opportunities through research and service, by blending research and service activities in ways that enhance the learning process for students, health professionals, and community members; and (3) developing new alliances to bridge science and practice, by pursuing partnerships that facilitate the exchange of information, technologies, and ideas with public and private stakeholders within the health system.

A primary internal strategy for achieving these goals will be the development of new and expanded interdisciplinary research initiatives in several key areas, including: (a) public health genetics and genomics; (b) application of social and behavioral sciences to health protection and promotion; (c) public health informatics and bioinformatics; (d) global health protection and improvement; (e) prevention of chronic, emerging infectious, and non-infectious diseases; (f) health risk assessment and risk communication; (g) health disparities and social determinants of health; (h) healthy life spans including maternal and child health, prenatal effects, and aging; (i) cost and outcomes research for patient care, disease prevention and health promotion; and (j) nutritional sciences applied to public health. Another internal strategy will be the development of new and enhanced educational programs for priority disciplines, including an integrated, community-oriented MPH practice program; a PhD program in health services research; an enhanced program in global health; and an expanded public health curriculum for undergraduates. Supporting all of these initiatives will be a targeted effort to strengthen the School's research and educational infrastructure through staff development programs and capital improvement campaigns.

The School's external strategies will include the development of community-based research and educational partnerships with relevant public health agencies and health care delivery organizations. Similarly, the School will pursue development of a public health leadership training institute in collaboration with public health organizations at local, state, and national levels. A third external strategy will involve the expansion of education and research initiatives maintained jointly with other academic units within the University, including programs in public health law, public affairs, and student health. Finally, the School will strengthen and coordinate its marketing and public relations activities to better communicate the value of public health research and professional practice to its various external stakeholders.