NEW YORK, NY (September 2, 2022) — Today CAI announced that it has once again been funded by the New York State Department of Health to serve as the statewide Training Center for the New York State Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC).
For more than a decade, CAI has administered the Training Center, which builds the skills and capacity of WIC staff to provide nutrition education, breastfeeding support, nutritious foods, and referrals to income-eligible families at more than 90 agencies throughout the state.
CAI will conduct webinars, hold in-person training and workshops, and offer online webinars and self-paced training for staff at all levels of the organizations. They will also provide technical assistance and a training guide for local coordinators to use in their work.
“CAI has a particular strength in training multidisciplinary teams and utilizing a variety of training modalities to reach people with different backgrounds, skills, and responsibilities effectively,” said Michelle Gerka, Vice President for Community Health.
As part of this project, CAI will facilitate a learning community based on the Institute for Health Improvement model, in which agencies identify a problem or gap and apply a continuous quality improvement approach to address it. This could include issues like outreach, caseload, and retention. CAI will also hold workshops for managers that address topics such as supervision, managing data, and facilitating programmatic changes in WIC.
“The national WIC program has been the premiere family nutrition and obesity-prevention program in the United States for more than 50 years. CAI has been proud to partner with WIC in New York State over the last decade, and we are looking forward to continuing to work together in the coming years,” said Gerka.
The New York State WIC Training Center is one of several CAI projects that address maternal and child health.