E-learning course on Health Outcomes and the Poor
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Call for Nominations
12 May - 25 June 2004
6 Weeks - 8 to 10 hours per week
Participants: (Health) Professionals involved in the Poverty Re-
duction Strategy Papers process either as PRSP authors or as ad-
visors to the government
Course Fee: US$ 500; fees waived for Bank Staff
Organizers: The Health, Nutrition and Population Program in
WBIHD and HDNHE
Language: English only
General Course Contact:
Jo Hindriks
Tel.: +1-202-473-6425
mailto:jhindriks@worldbank.org
To apply: Please go to the online application form at:
http://wbln0018.worldbank.org/wbi/WBiCatalogue.nsf/ExtApp?OpenForm&code=HNP382-34-034&trail=ByTopic
(Make sure you copy the entire URL, starting from "http" to
"=ByTopic")
Background of the Course:
Since the launch of the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper process
(International Monetary Fund 1999 and World Bank 2000), many
countries have taken on the challenge of centering their devel-
opment agenda around poverty reduction and have engaged in con-
sultative and analytical work to support policy development. To
date, almost 50 countries have developed and published Interim
Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (I-PRSPs), and more than 30
countries have produced full PRSPs.
One of the main features of the PRSP process is an emphasis on
country leadership and ownership. This means that there is no
set template or framework for countries to follow. Moreover,
there is no guarantee that health would even be addressed in
each PRSP as the decision on which sectors to include is en-
tirely up to the authors (typically the government). The absence
of an imposed structure or format by the International Financial
Institutions increases the likelihood of country ownership and
that the strategies identified address the real needs of each
country and may lead to more individualized and creative ap-
proaches. Since there are no set guidelines or rules to write
PRSPs there is clearly an advantage in learning from past at-
tempts at writing them. The course is intended to fill a need
for training on what some of the options are for writing the
health component of the "Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers". The
key question is: "What is the basic relationship between poverty
and Health, Nutrition and Population (HNP) and how do they in-
fluence each other?" This course is intended to provide the
tools for PRSP authors and reviewers focusing on Health, Nutri-
tion, and Population. The course will cover (i) typical problems
faced by the poor and the diagnostic tools that can be used to
identify and analyze them; (ii) pro-poor health sector policies
with examples from existing PRSPs; and (iii) Pro-poor actions
and policies outside the health sector. Objectives The overall
course objective is to improve the health of the poor and vul-
nerable through analytical work that leads to pro-poor policies,
actions and expenditures. The operational objectives are to as-
sist PRSP authors to improve the analysis and the policies in
the health sector; and PRSP reviewers to advise authors on how
to improve the quality of health inputs into PRSPs.
Course Structure
As mentioned, the course is structured along the logical frame-
work underlying the PRSP sourcebook chapter on health. The dia-
gram Pathways to Improved Health Outcomes outlines the relation-
ships between the actors inside and outside the Health Sector
which influence the health outcomes.
The course will be organized in an Introduction and five inter-
linked modules:
Introduction to the 'Pathways to Improved Health Outcomes' dia-
gram
Module 1: The health system (delivery and financing)
Module 2: The roles and constraints of households and communi-
ties
Module 3: Factors beyond the health sector
Module 4: Outcomes
Module 5: An Integrated Policy Framework
Course Format
You will take this course entirely through the internet (World
Wide Web). Upon acceptance as participant you will be given a
course ID and password, with which you will be able to access
the course site. The format of the course relies heavily on 'ac-
tion learning' which means that you will be required to actively
participate in all online activities, which will mainly consist
of reading the course content and posting assignments and react-
ing to other participant's postings. As most of the weeks' as-
signments are based on team work and joint products, it is im-
perative that you are able to log in and work on the course
regularly so that your team can effectively produce the team
products, and that you can adhere to deadlines. There will be
minimum participation requirements to qualify for receiving a
completion certificate.
The working language of the course will be English. Because of
the nature of internet based learning, you will have to have
good to excellent English writing skills, since all the communi-
cation within the course will be in written format.
Since this is an e-learning course there will be no travel in-
volved. We require that you be able to set aside 8 to 10 hours
per week to devote to the training. It is important that you get
your manager's approval for this time commitment prior to apply-
ing to this course. We advise spreading the workload out over
the week, working everyday on it for an hour or two, rather than
doing it all in one day. This will enable you to actively par-
ticipate in all discussions and respond to your fellow partici-
pants' postings in a timely manner and thus satisfying the com-
pletion requirements for this course. The course targets
(health) professionals involved in the Poverty Reduction Strat-
egy Papers process either as PRSP authors or as advisors to the
governments. It focuses on people working on PRSPs, either in
the countries writing them or in agencies that are assisting in
the writing or who are reviewing/assessing the documents.
Applications
The course is open to Bank Staff in addition to donor agencies'
staff and participants from client countries. Therefore, on be-
half of the course organizers, we take great pleasure in invit-
ing you, or a member of your staff, to participate in this
event. Please feel free to forward this announcement to anyone
you think might be interested to participate or nominate a par-
ticipant. (Please let us know if you need a text only version of
this announcement to send outside of the World Bank, send an
e-mail to Jo Hindriks or call x36425).
We would also like to invite you to nominate participants from
countries you work with. We are particularly interested in re-
ceiving nominations from the country PRSP teams, Ministries of
Health, Finance/Planning, Women's Affairs, Parliament, etc, as
well as NGOs, private sector organizations, the donor community
and others working in this field. We encourage teams from each
country to participate and collaborate in this course.
Please apply online for the November offering at
Non-World Bank participants: apply by going to:
http://wbln0018.worldbank.org/wbi/WBiCatalogue.nsf/ExtApp?OpenForm&code=HNP382-34-034&trail=ByTopic
(Make sure you copy the entire URL in your browser, starting
from "http" to "=ByTopic")
If you have problems locating the electronic application form,
please send an e-mail to Jo Hindriks <jhindriks@worldbank.org>
Upon acceptance you will receive information how to log on to
the course.
For more information you can visit the introductory course web-
site at:
http://www.worldbank.org/wbi/healthandpopulation/brochure/index.htm
For any other information contact
Jo Hindriks
Tel.: +1-202-473425
mailto:jhindriks@worldbank.org