Background

The Promotion/Prevention Task Force was formed originally to determine how the Alliance might best shift from an emphasis on treatment and long-term management in the children's mental health sector to a stronger focus on prevention. Over time it became clear through the combined experience of the members, and their reviews of the professional literature, that an emphasis on promoting healthy development in the general population, as opposed to one on the prevention of specific disorders, was more likely to prove useful.

As they worked together, they began increasingly to shift from an exclusive focus on services to one that emphasized a broader range of strategies to promote the well-being of children and youth. The result was a Working Paper for the Promotion/Prevention Task Force entitled The Primary Needs of Children: A Blueprint for Effective Health Promotion at the Community Level, prepared by Dr. Paul Steinhauer for the Task Force, October 1995.

Since 1996, the Task Force has been working collaboratively with the Funders Alliance for Children, Youth and Families to produce a guide on healthy child development. The project was sponsored jointly by the Promotion/Prevention Task Force of the Sparrow Lake Alliance and the Strategic Funding Task Group of the Funders Alliance for Children, Youth and Families. The Resource Guide for Healthy Child Development is now available to the public on the Internet.

The address of the website is:
» http://www.growinghealthykids.com.

The Guide is intended to link current knowledge about optimum child outcomes/determinants/ and effective strategies. Bookmarks and fact sheets have now been printed. Funding for these fact sheets and for French language translation has been provided by Health Canada.

For specific information on the child development project which led to the creation of the web site, please contact one of the members of the project's advisory committee:

Charleen Gorbet, Health Canada,
Tel: 416.973.1804;
Fax: 416.973.0009;
Email: » Charleen_Gorbet@hc-sc.gc.ca;

Beverley Koven, Canadian Mothercraft Society, Tel: 416.920.4054, ext. 102;
Fax: 416.920.5983;
Email: » bkoven@planeteer.com;

Craig Shields, Human Services Consultants,
Tel: 905.764.3387;
Fax: 905.764.5964;
Email: » craigshields@sympatico.ca.

Current Activities

The Resource Guide has been a massive project that has resulted in an excellent product for broad public distribution. With the completion of the this project, the involvement of the Sparrow Lake Alliance ends. The Promotion/Prevention Task Force has begun to meet with the addition of new members and a new Chair: Graham Clyne. Ideas for new projects are currently being developed.