Infusing Cultural Competence into the SPF

Step 1: Assessment of Needs and Capacity

• Work with the community
• Use a culturally-competent evaluator
• Ensure a mechanism for collecting cultural competence-related information/data
• Gain community approval for data collection methods and analysis
• Ensure data is culturally-responsive and appropriate
• Create process for identifying culturally-relevant risk and protective factors and other underlying conditions
• Formulate culturally-based assumptions of change
  • Identify change from a community perspective
  • Gain community approval of product      

Step 2: Capacity Mobilizing and Building

• Examine community resources and readiness
• Provide a safe and supportive environment for all participants
• Examine breadth and depth of cultural competence
• Check cultural representation (e.g., language, gender, age)
• Develop policies (i.e., recruitment and retention, training, communication and community input) to improve cultural competence
• Ensure that tools and technology are culturally competent
• Identify and mobilize mutually acceptable goals and objectives

Step 3: Developing Strategic Plan

• Make sure community is represented in the process
• When selecting programs and strategies, consider their fit with:
  • Community culture
  • Existing prevention efforts
  • Past history

Step 4: Implementation

• Involve community in the implementation of strategic plan
• Create a feedback loop for communicating efforts and successes

Step 5: Evaluation

• Make sure the community is represented in the evaluation process
• Ensure that data collection tools reflect community culture
• Use a culturally-competent evaluator