We lead a grant-funded partnership network among private philanthropy and community leaders to spur the development of age-friendly community initiatives in New Jersey. Part of our role as engaged researchers has been studying how community leaders advance age-friendly community change.
The Aging and Health Services focus area of the Hub explores pressing population health issues related to innovative community-based care, end-of-life issues, and vaccine equity in later life. This focus area of the Hub draws on a robust data infrastructure, including multiple national databases of health outcomes data related to older adults.
The RU Taskforce on Aging works to educate and inspire students to become more age inclusive in their future professional roles. Launched from a Rutgers IDEA Innovation Grant, this service-oriented and student-focused taskforce strives to advance age inclusivity across the university.
This project is a national initiative to engage Village members and leaders in the design of future research projects on how Villages promote healthy aging. It is led in partnership among the Rutgers Hub for Aging Collaboration, Village to Village Network, and the RAND Corporation.
The Hub's Age-Friendly Research Team is consulting with the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing at University of California-Davis in their role providing evaluation and technical assistance for the California Department of Aging's Local Aging & Disability Action Planning Grant program.
Hub affiliate Rebecca Martin helps administer IHC, led by the NJ Division of Disability Services, Department of Human Services, in partnership with the Rutgers Bloustein School. IHC aims to enhance accessibility, quality of life, and care for people with disabilities across NJ's diverse communities.
Nine food pantries across New Jersey offer The Food, Hope, Health (FHH) Program, which consists of health screenings for diabetes, hypertension and obesity, and participation in nutrition education classes and food box pick-ups. We partner with program leaders to understand the impact of the program on clients’ health and quality of life.
In partnership with the University of Massachusetts, Boston, this project aimed to develop program theory for dementia-friendly community initiatives by centering the voices of on-the-ground leaders and examined the association between healthcare outcomes and living in a community with more dementia-capable senior centers.
This proof-of-concept pilot GIS mapping project demonstrated the power of integrating planning with aging services at the County level. The interactive mapping tool provides a visualization of key age-friendly resources and supports within geospatial communities to support diverse subgroups of older adults as they age in place.
A partnership-based project to strengthen the foundation for a comprehensive network of senior center professionals to spur innovation, best practices, and collaboration among senior centers and related community-based programs.
The inaugural InnovAGING NJ 2024 Summit, held March 22, 2024, brought together 250 people in a virtual showcase of innovative programs and partnerships that are changing norms for aging and improving the lives of older adults in New Jersey.
The Hub is proud to organize events for Careers in Aging Month, a national initiative of the Gerontological Society of America. Past events from 2024 have included a roundtable on aging education, a career fair on aging, and a statewide virtual summit featuring innovations for aging. Stay tuned for March of 2025!
The 2022 New Jersey Age-Friendly Virtual Fair convened individuals doing work related to age-friendly communities throughout the state into one virtual space to learn from and connect with one another. Presentations featured local community and county initiatives, statewide coalitions, allied efforts, and more.
This NIA-funded program of research addresses how social-ecological contexts from childhood influence later life cognition. Our work has focused on family, school, and neighborhood environments. We also attend to life course linkages of risk and resilience in the context of structural racism.