Providing technical assistance and direction for RWJF's Systems for Action research program, 2020-2021

The Foundation initiative, Systems for Action: Services and Systems Research to Build a Culture of Health, was designed to form the evidence base for the alignment and integration of financing and delivery systems across public health, medical care, and the social- and community-service sectors needed to build a Culture of Health by: (1) supporting and promoting research that addresses priority areas of the Systems for Action (S4A) research agenda and real-world applications of that research; (2) supporting the S4A Collaborating Research Centers throughout the United States, which will provide additional capacity to identify, develop, and oversee new and emerging areas of research within the field; and (3) supporting investigator-initiated research that contributes to the S4A body of work.The Foundation launched the Systems for Action (S4A) research program in September 2015 as part of its efforts to expand scientific knowledge about activating the Culture of Health Action Framework to improve health and health equity for all. The National Coordinating Center (NCC) will continue to provide overall scientific direction, coordination and administrative guidance for the S4A research program. The Coordinating Center transitioned its operations from the University of Kentucky to the University of Colorado beginning in June 2019 with the move of program director, Glen Mays. The NCC will engage in five program activities during the grant period: (1) solicit, select and launch up to eight new extramural research studies through a COVID-19 focused call for proposals (CFP) process and a subsequent open-topic CFP process; (2) develop specifications for a targeted request-for-proposals (RFP) process to identify a Systems Alignment Innovation Hub to help under-represented, community-based organizations engage in systems alignment research and use research findings to align systems; (3) launch a cross-grantee initiative to develop common metrics of system alignment that can be implemented and synthesized across multiple studies; (4) expand intramural research activities that collect and use a new 2020 wave of the National Longitudinal Survey of Public Health Systems linked with other multi-sector data sources to address S4A research priorities not addressed by extramural grantees, including COVID-19 resiliency studies and studies of law enforcement engagement in multi-sector health equity initiatives; and (5) strengthen opportunities to engage policy and practice stakeholders in using evidence from S4A studies to align delivery and financing systems, including through co-sponsored Systems Alignment Workshops and other evidence dissemination and translation strategies.