About Us

The University of South Florida, in partnership with the Agency for Health Care Administration and the Department of Children and Families, is conducting an evaluation of existing strategies and structures that have been implemented at the state and local levels to enhance inter-agency communication, collaboration, and coordination (CCC). This project is being conducted through the Interagency Collaboration Subcommittee of the Children's Mental Health System of Care Statewide Expansion Core Advisory Team.

The project has three goals:

• Document, track and disseminate information about existing strategies and structures at the state and local levels that enhance inter-agency communication, collaboration, and coordination in the delivery of services to children with mental health problems and their families;
• Understand the impact of a managed care environment on state and local inter-agency communication, collaboration, and coordination; and
• Analyze an exemplar community to identify the strategies and structures they implemented to minimize barriers to effective inter-agency communication, collaboration, and coordination as reported in the literature.

Project activities include:

• Completion of a literature review on interagency communication and collaboration
• Interviews with the subcommittee members to gather data on their perceptions regarding the facilitators and challenges to interagency collaboration
• Use of a template to collect key data on interagency initiatives at the state and local levels
• A case study of an exemplar local level interagency initiative