June, 2011
Six VISTA Volunteers Selected and Matched with State Sites

On June 29th, Donna Johnson, Director of the NERHRT VISTA Initiative, announced that the full contingent of VISTA volunteers has been selected and matched with our six New England state partner sites. The recruitment, interviewing, selecting and matching process has been a nearly two month collaborative effort by key members of each state sponsoring team and Round Table staff. The now complete and incredible group of six VISTAs -- graduates of Auburn University, Bates College, Bowdoin College, Connecticut College, University of Massachusetts-Amherst and the University of Vermont-- will carry out the RoundTable's Advocacy and Leadership Project.

The RoundTable received a Cox Foundation grant last Fall to expand its advocacy efforts, contingent upon our December 2010 approval to become a multi-site VISTA initiative. Our VISTA members will carry out activities to promote practical changes for state and regional rural health access and health coverage. Each VISTA member will be the state lead and key liaison to the RoundTable and will focus on state-specific rural health issues as well as issues that reflect regional and national concerns. One of the key goals of the Initiative is to assure that health networks within each state are linked through a host of communication approaches to the RoundTable. State-specific issues include:

• CT - Access to behavioral/mental health services for children and families.
• MA - Economic impact of the health care sector.
• ME - Rural health innovation pilot.
• NH - National health reform impact analysis.
• RI - Medical homes and community health workers.
• VT - Farm health task force and rural health quality task force.

Sponsored by the federal Corporation for National and Community Service, Pre-Service Orientation (PSO) training for the NERHRT VISTAs, along with hundreds of other newly selected VISTAs from across the country, will take place in Philadelphia from August 8-11. At the PSO the selected VISTAs are officially sworn in as VISTA members. Our VISTA team of 4 women and 2 men travel soon thereafter to begin their year of service at partner sites on August 15th. We will also be implementing August on-site orientation information and experiences for the VISTA members as well as including them in both our September Rural Oral Health Conference and our Annual Rural Health Symposium in October.

Stay tuned for future updates on our website and in our newsletter about the process and progress of this exciting new initiative for the NERHRT.

May, 2011
Cox Foundation Awards $50,000 to RoundTable for
Advocacy/Leadership Initiative

VISTA Program to Provide Six Volunteers
The RoundTable has received a grant of $50,000 from the Jessie B. Cox Charitable Trust to fund an advocacy/leadership initiative, designed to provide leadership on health policy issues in rural New England.

Six AmericCorps VISTA volunteers, with one volunteer assigned to each state, will carry out the work. Primary aim is to increase access to health care and health coverage for residents of rural New England through increased regional, state and local collaboration.

Donna Johnson to Coordinate Work of VISTA Volunteers
Donna Johnson has been hired to coordinate the work of the VISTA volunteers. Before her retirement in 2010, Donna was Director, Division of Primary Care and Health Access, Massachusetts Department of Public Health.

Host sites for the VISTA volunteers are:

• Maine: Maine Rural Partners, Orono, ME. Key contact is Mary Ann Hayes.

• New Hampshire: North Country Health Consortium, Whitefield, NH. Key contact is Martha McLeod.

• Vermont: VT Program for Quality in Healthcare, Montpelier, VT. Key contacts are Sharon Williams, Executive Director and Margaret Caudill-Slosberg.

• Massachusetts: Berkshire Health Systems, Pittsfield, MA. Key contact is Ed Perlak.

• Connecticut: CT State Office of Rural Health, Winsted, CT. Key contacts are Barbara Berger and Mary Winar.

• Rhode Island: Rhode Island Parent Information Network, Cranston, RI. Key contact is Laura Jones.

For more information, please contact: Marion Pawlek, Executive Director, New England Rural Health RoundTable.