The Wisconsin Partnership Program at UW-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health is awarding $4 million to initiatives to improve health and health equity in Wisconsin.
The grants awarded through Community Impact Grant Program each total $1 million over five years and are supporting large-scale, evidence-based, community-academic partnerships aimed at achieving health equity across the state.
The four awardees are Sixteenth Street Community Health Center, Nehemiah Community Development Corporation, Inc., Supporting Families Together Association (SFTA) and Employ Milwaukee.
According to Andrea Dearlove, the Wisconsin Partnership Program senior program officer, the endowment came from the Blue Cross & Blue Shield to grant institutions with funds to help diminish inequality in systems of health.
“[During the application process we focused] heavily on the ideas that showed significant promise on changing the system,” Dearlove said.
Dearlove said that the Wisconsin Partnership Program — which is committed to improving health through investments in research, education and community partnerships — selected organizations that were strongly community-led, emphasized health equity and had a strong interest in a community-academic partnership.
The money awarded to Sixteenth Street Community Health Center will be used to address health issues by examining housing inequality and insecurity among members of the Latinx community living below the federal poverty line in Southside Milwaukee.
Nehemiah Community Development Corporation, Inc. will work toward closing the health gap in the African-American communities in Dane County through Promotion of Social Connection, which addresses structural racism.
The STFA will implement early childhood education to promote social and emotional health and address disparities in rates of expulsion among children in Wisconsin.
Employ Milwaukee will improve health outcomes affected by incarceration by having a stronger re-entry system to support individuals.
