Sustainability

Overview

Since 2010, CPHSS has developed, refined, and is now disseminating a tool (the Program Sustainability Assessment Tool or PSAT) designed to measure program capacity for sustainability. This work is funded by the CDC, Office on Smoking and Health. Recognizing sustainability is a major challenge for all kinds of programs, we created a tool that staff, managers, funders, and evaluators can use to measure their program’s sustainability. To develop the tool, we conducted a comprehensive literature review and used expert-informed Concept Mapping. We also obtained expert input from researchers, funders, and state and local program managers from four primary chronic disease program areas: tobacco control, obesity prevention, heart disease and stroke prevention, and injury prevention. The resulting framework and tool identified a range of critical factors affecting program sustainability capacity.

The Sustainability Framework and Assessment Tool have been reliability tested and can be used by programs in a variety of levels and settings to better understand and plan for their sustainability.

We have developed a website, sustaintoool.org, that allows users to take the assessment online, receive immediate results, and access resources on sustainability planning. We also offer webinars, workshops and technical assistance to support programs to complete our Program Sustainability assessment and planning process.