Research shows that up to 80% of physical and mental/behavioral health outcomes are determined by social determinants of health. These are the conditions in the environments where people are born, live, learn, work, play, worship, and age. They include a person’s economic circumstances, education access and quality, neighborhood and environment, social and community context, their personal behaviors, and healthcare accessibility and quality. They hold the key to reversing health disparities.  

CoPH focuses solely on educating the current and future health workforce in New Mexico to identifying and addressing social determinants of health. Our classes and certificates enrich the educations of students across campus and working professionals, building a nimble and competent health workforce. 

In a state where physical and behavioral health have remained significant challenges for decades, it is urgent that health care providers, community health workers, and health policy makers across disciplines are able to understand and implement research-backed methodology that will effectively address social determinants of health. Population health can be a primary focus or a specialty for professionals who provide mental and behavioral health services, as well as policy makers who decide how insurance, managed care, and policy can best attune to people’s needs. 

$2 million of philanthropic funding will help us recruit and retain CoPH students. 

CoPH has 50 outstanding faculty who are recognized nationally, internationally, and by health systems experts in New Mexico as leading practitioners of population health research and methods. In 2023, we increased the number of our full-time faculty from 13 to over 40 at the behest of the Governor’s Office and the State Legislature to prepare the College to become a School of Public Health in the near future.  

Our research faculty are conducting more than 72 projects while engaging students in research that finds and evaluates strategies to reduce health disparities in New Mexico. They leverage philanthropic support to bring funding from the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and other federal grants into our state.  

Current research projects include evaluations of farming and ranching capabilities in our state; direct interventions to prevent and treat diabetes and substance use, especially for children and young people; improving access to physical healthcare facilities, especially for rural New Mexico; increasing access to behavioral and mental healthcare across the state; maternal-child health; and more. 

$1 million of philanthropic funding will help us establish endowed chairs, professorships, and post-doctoral fellowships. 

Our faculty are leading practitioners of effective, cutting-edge population health research and methods. We partner with the DOH and HSD to conduct research analysis and make recommendations for policy changes that can improve the health of New Mexicans. We have two research and analysis institutes that partner with these state departments to directly impact health services provisions in ways that will increase access, improve engagement with the health system, and improve outcomes for our citizens. 

During this 10-year campaign, CoPH priority research areas for New Mexico include diabetes prevention and treatment, substance use prevention and substance use disorder treatment, mental and behavioral health (especially for children, adolescents, Native Americans, and people at risk of suicide), and maternal-child health. 

$1.5 million of philanthropic funding will support current and emerging research areas.

One way our students identify and improve current health equity issues, improve healthcare delivery, and increase health information access for New Mexicans is by working with faculty to conduct community health assessments throughout the state. These assessments utilize convenient locations to provide immediate, personal health status information to New Mexicans.  

Assessments and data analysis touch on environmental health, food access, mental/behavioral health, substance use, Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), and maternal-child health, to name a few areas. In addition, we can identify social determinants of health and barriers to access. Equipped with this information, we make policy recommendations to DOH and HSD for immediate implementation to improve access and reduce health disparities. 

$500,000 of philanthropic funding will help to provide students and faculty with opportunities to have an immediate impact on the lives of New Mexicans and help students improve their practical skills. 

To effectively and securely store and analyze the social determinants of health information, research, and data that CoPH students and faculty gather, we need robust, current hardware and software that will allow us to safely store data from across the state and that will enable advanced computing to analyze this data. In addition, our students and faculty lack access to national databases and membership-only data sets. Subscriptions to these services will provide us with existing and emerging data sets applicable to our work and reduce the need for conducting certain research that has already been done.  

By having access to datasets, students and faculty will be able to submit data to the repository that can be used by others conducting similar research. This enables increased cross-pollination with researchers in other UNM departments; at other New Mexico colleges and universities; and at nearby schools of secondary education such as Diné College, other tribal schools, and schools throughout the country. New Mexico’s data can help researchers throughout the U.S. as the country’s population demographics shift to a higher proportion of Latinos and people of color.  

$292,000 of philanthropic funding will help to develop a statewide population health network.