Page 84 - Cultural Competence in Health Education

62 Cultural Competence in Health Education and Health Promotion
conditions, and serving as a resource for information. In essence, following a model or
a framework, the health educator ’ s progress toward cultural competence evolves
through diverse activities encountered in training, experience, guidance, and self -
evaluation (Jackson - Carrol, Graham, & Jackson, 1996).
The task of becoming culturally competent is enormous when one considers the
desire, the commitment, and the training that are needed and the resources that are only
marginally available. If health educators and the health education profession fail to rec-
ognize, support, and build cultural competence, a void will continue to exist in the
health education process. Nevertheless, making personal efforts to become culturally
competent and forging partnerships and collaborations with governmental agencies and
other organizations at the professional level to encourage cultural competence are wor-
thy strategies to extend the quality of life of all cultures, to reduce health disparities,
and to make health care and services available, accessible, and afforded to all.

CONCLUSION

This chapter has examined diverse meanings of the term cultural competence, has
addressed basic principles and practices to be considered in the application of cultural
competence in different health care and health education settings, and has described
the importance of cultural competence training and the acquisition of cultural compe-
tence skills. Cultural competence is recognized as a strategy that can be used to
increase the effectiveness of health education programs and to reach the nation ’ s health
goals. Health education programs are more effective when they are designed and
delivered with a specific culture in mind, using basic principles and practices appro-

priate for the intended audience.

POINTS TO REMEMBER

This chapter examined the need for cultural competence in health education as a strat-
egy to meet the goals of the Healthy People initiative. Selected models, frameworks,
and constructs have been used to exemplify and integrate related and basic principles,
practices, and training needs for the health educator.

CASE STUDY
Chris graduated from a big Eastern university with a degree in health education over
twenty years ago. He then spent twenty years working as program coordinator for
college health education in a Midwestern university. Recently, Chris was hired as the
program coordinator for the patient health education department in a large hospital
in Nevada that serves a largely working - class and diverse population. Chris ’ s new
staff consists of three young, well - educated health educators — a Hispanic man, an
African American woman, and a white man. These three individuals have a lot of

enthusiasm but not much experience in the field of health education and health

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