The National Immunization Coalition TA [technical assistance] Network
Circa 2011

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This was the original website for the Immunization Coalitions Technical Assistance Center. In 2011, when the team of experts from the Family Health International and the Academy for Educational Development (AED) came together to create a more comprehensive site: FHI 360, this website was no longer necessary and its domain registration was allowed to expire. Consequently, the site disappeared from the web.

WELCOME

Welcome to the Immunization Coalitions Technical Assistance Center, a comprehensive online source of information for immunization coalition members and advocates. This Web site is designed to help immunization coalition members quickly and easily access knowledge and tools to help them accomplish their goals. For more information about the Immunization Technical Assistance Project, which this Web site supports

 

WHO WE ARE

Founded in 1961, AED (www.aed.org) is an independent, nonprofit organization committed to solving critical social problems and building the capacity of individuals, communities, and institutions to become more self-sufficient. AED works in all the major areas of human development, with a focus on improving education, health, and economic opportunities for the least advantaged in the United States and developing countries throughout the world.

AED has notable experience in increasing immunization rates internationally, including the introduction and application of modern methods of communication and marketing to support routine immunization as well as special initiatives, such as polio eradication. We supported the Global Alliance on Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI) by helping them to strengthen policies and procedures and increase attention to field perspectives and behavior-change approaches.

AED's domestic immunization experience includes providing technical assistance to five coalitions implementing CDC's Racial and Ethnic Adult Disparities in Adult Immunization Initiative (READII). Since 2002 we have:

• Provided organizational development and partnership assistance to the grantees
• Supported community-based media strategies targeting African American and Hispanic Seniors
• Facilitated networking and information sharing between program staff and immunization experts.

 

AED's Support to Immunization Coalitions Project

In June 2004, AED was awarded a cooperative agreement by CDC's National Immunization Program to provide technical assistance and training to immunization coalitions. In the start-up of this project, AED conducted a rapid needs assessment through interviews with coalition members and content experts nationwide. You can view the needs assessment report and the slides from AED's presentation to the Sixth National Conference on Immunization Coalitions. Based on that assessment AED developed a project plan designed to meet the needs identified in a manner that effectively reaches the largest number of coalitions.

Immunization coalitions face huge challenges- overwhelming needs pressing against a scarcity of resources, changing vaccine recommendations across the lifespan, and a public that is confused about the value and safety of vaccines. In order to help coalitions address these challenges, AED currently envisions a technical assistance system, grounded in results from the situation analysis, which has four interacting components:

• An overarching National Technical Assistance System designed to reach the largest possible audience with up-to-date tools and resources;
• Site Specific and Regional Efforts delivering targeted and interactive technical assistance;
• A system empowering National Partners to enhance and extend AED's technical assistance efforts; and,
• A system of Ongoing Coordination and Collaboration to manage and respond to the evolving needs of the national immunization network.

For more information about the Support to Immunization Coalitions Project, please contact Jim Bender, project director at 202-884-8737 or [email protected] or Katherine Shrout, project associate at 202-884-8652 or [email protected].

You can find out more about the AED Center for Health Communication at: chc.aed.org.

 

 

FAQ

 

What is the National Immunization Coalitions TA Network?
The National Immunization TA Network is a growing community of new and seasoned coalition members from across the country who have come together to exchange information and ideas.

What is the Immunization Coalitions TA Center?
This online resource is one of the many tools offered to immunization coalitions who are a part of the National Immunization TA Network. The Web site includes everything from research on best practices in provider outreach to research in best practices in organizational development.

What do I have to do to become a member?
Take 3 to 5 minutes to fill out a short survey and registration form at: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=48566604556

What do I receive when I become a member?
As a network member, you will have access to many valuable resources, including:

• A Web site offering research on best practices;
• Semi-monthly TA e-mail updates, which will alert you to upcoming meetings, TA opportunities, and valuable resources for your coalition;
• Moderated listservs on emerging issues of interest to your coalition;
• Free monthly technical assistance phone calls moderated by recognized experts in the immunization field;
• Access to your colleagues across the country, with whom you can discuss issues of mutual concern, share ideas, and allocate responsibility for working on emerging or challenging issues;
• Invitations to skill-building seminars in your region or at national meetings (like NIC, NCIC, and Registry Conference) that you already attend.

What do I have to do to stay active in the Network?

We hope that you take advantage of all the resources we offer; to remain an active network member, however, all you have to do is complete a survey once each quarter. These surveys will provide us with feedback from you regarding our current TA resources and services, and will also be designed to collect information on emerging needs your coalition would like us to address.

Who can join the Network?
Anyone who is a current member of an immunization coalition or plans to form one in the near future can join the network. And yes, more than one person from a coalition may join the Network.

I am not part of an immunization coalition, but I still want to be part of the Network. Can I join?
Yes, when you register via the survey, identify yourself as a "friend of/advocate for immunization coalitions" in your answer to Question 1c, and answer as many of the other questions as possible.

How do I register if I am a member of more than one coalition?
If you wish, you may complete the survey for each coalition. However, please use the same e-mail address for each survey to avoid getting duplicates of e-mails we send.

 

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More Background On IZCoalitionsTA.org

 

The National Immunization Coalition Technical Assistance Network and Its Lasting Impact

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Introduction

Before the age of social media and instant online health communication, one pioneering website served as a vital hub for professionals, coalitions, and advocates working to increase vaccination awareness across the United States. That site was IZCoalitionsTA.org, home of the National Immunization Coalition Technical Assistance (TA) Network.

Active mainly between 2004 and 2011, this initiative represented one of the most organized, collaborative, and well-funded efforts to strengthen community-based immunization coalitions. It was developed by the Academy for Educational Development (AED) under a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and it provided technical assistance, education, and communications training for hundreds of organizations working to improve immunization rates.

Although the site has long since disappeared, its model of coalition support, knowledge-sharing, and health-communications capacity-building remains deeply influential. The story of IZCoalitionsTA.org offers insight into the evolution of public health infrastructure, online collaboration, and community-based vaccine promotion in the early digital era.

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Founding and Institutional Partnerships

AED and CDC Collaboration

The Academy for Educational Development (AED) was an independent nonprofit organization founded in 1961, known for addressing global issues in health, education, and social development. By the early 2000s, AED had become a recognized leader in health communication — using media, marketing, and community engagement to improve outcomes in immunization and public health.

In June 2004, AED received a cooperative agreement from the CDC’s National Immunization Program to establish a technical assistance center for immunization coalitions. This became the Support to Immunization Coalitions Project, the foundation for the online Immunization Coalitions Technical Assistance Center (ICTAC). The project’s core mission was to connect, educate, and empower coalition members across the U.S. with research-based tools and peer networking opportunities.

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The Website: IZCoalitionsTA.org

The domain IZCoalitionsTA.org (where “IZ” stood for “Immunization”) served as the official online presence of the TA Network. The site was structured as a comprehensive knowledge base — offering downloadable reports, webinars, newsletters, event calendars, best-practice guides, and links to related CDC initiatives.

Its motto, “Helping coalitions accomplish their goals through shared knowledge,” reflected a broader vision: to transform fragmented local immunization efforts into a connected national movement. The website was especially valued by coalition coordinators, public health nurses, community clinic staff, and nonprofit organizations advocating for vaccine access and education.

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Goals and Objectives

The Immunization Coalitions TA Center pursued several interrelated objectives:

1. Provide Technical Assistance and Training
   It offered online resources, teleconferences, and on-site workshops to help coalitions develop communication strategies, organize outreach events, and improve program evaluation.

2. Promote Collaboration and Information Exchange
   By creating a national network, AED aimed to connect coalitions that were otherwise isolated by geography or resource constraints.

3. Support Evidence-Based Public Health Communication
   The site disseminated CDC-approved materials, literacy-tested brochures, and data-driven outreach models emphasizing clarity and cultural sensitivity.

4. Enhance Organizational Capacity
   Guidance on coalition governance, fundraising, and partnership development helped local groups sustain their work beyond grant cycles.

5. Address Health Disparities
   A significant emphasis was placed on reaching racial and ethnic minority populations disproportionately affected by low vaccination rates.

These objectives reflected a sophisticated understanding that improving immunization rates required not only vaccines and clinics, but also communication networks, community trust, and consistent education.

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Programs and Activities

Teleconference Series

One of the site’s most active components was its monthly TA Teleconference Call series, offering hour-long virtual sessions with recognized immunization experts. Each call addressed emerging issues or best practices and was open to coalition members nationwide.

Topics included:

• “Starting a Local Immunization Coalition”

• “Recruiting and Retaining Coalition Members”

• “Gearing Up for the Flu Season”

• “Working with Physicians to Improve Adult Vaccination Rates”

• “Partnering with Ethnic Physician Organizations”

• “Communication Challenges Facing the Upcoming Influenza Season”

Other sessions tackled urgent issues such as the 2006 mumps outbreak, HPV vaccination outreach, and Vote & Vax, an initiative that used polling locations as flu vaccination sites — a creative public-health intervention that blended civic engagement with preventive care.

Semi-Monthly Email Updates and Listservs

The TA e-updates and moderated listservs kept coalition members informed about conferences, funding opportunities, and CDC guideline changes. These early digital communications created what we now recognize as a precursor to online health communities — fostering peer learning long before social media became common in public health outreach.

Skill-Building Seminars and National Conferences

IZCoalitionsTA.org also linked to national meetings such as the National Conference on Immunization Coalitions (NCIC) and regional workshops organized by AED. These gatherings emphasized data-driven storytelling, communication planning, and cross-sector collaboration.

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The National Immunization TA Network

Beyond the website, the National Immunization Coalition TA Network functioned as an evolving community of professionals and volunteers. Membership was free and open to anyone involved or interested in immunization advocacy.

Members received access to online resources, invitations to TA calls, and inclusion in networking directories. To remain active, members were encouraged to complete periodic feedback surveys that shaped the direction of future TA activities. This participatory model kept the initiative responsive to local needs.

Importantly, the Network was not limited to state or local health departments — it actively welcomed community clinics, faith-based groups, pharmacy coalitions, and grassroots organizations, making it unusually inclusive for a CDC-supported program.

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The Transition to FHI 360

In 2011, AED merged with Family Health International to form FHI 360, a nonprofit human-development organization that now operates in more than 70 countries. The merger consolidated expertise in education, health, and technology, expanding the reach of AED’s earlier programs.

With that transition, IZCoalitionsTA.org was retired, and many of its resources were folded into broader FHI 360 initiatives. The original domain later lapsed — though, in a thoughtful act of preservation, an individual who valued its mission reacquired it to recreate archived pages and redirect visitors to FHI 360, ensuring the project’s legacy remained intact.

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FHI 360’s Continuing Role in Immunization and Public Health

Today, FHI 360 continues AED’s tradition of evidence-based public health programming, addressing immunization, maternal and child health, HIV/AIDS prevention, and health systems strengthening.

Its immunization-related work now spans multiple continents and integrates research, behavior-change communication, and digital tools — representing an evolution of the same multidisciplinary approach that IZCoalitionsTA.org pioneered in its digital infancy.

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Support from the CDC and Federal Recognition

The IZCoalitionsTA initiative operated under Cooperative Agreement U66/CCU324035 with the CDC. While its content did not represent official CDC views, the partnership underscored federal recognition of the crucial role that community coalitions play in advancing national immunization goals.

Through the program, AED also supported READII (Racial and Ethnic Adult Disparities in Immunization Initiative) grantees, focusing on outreach to African American and Hispanic seniors. These partnerships demonstrated how public-private collaborations could address health inequities through targeted, culturally competent strategies.

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Audience and Impact

The primary audience for IZCoalitionsTA.org consisted of:

• Local and state immunization coalitions

• Public health departments and community health centers

• Nonprofit organizations advocating for vaccination access

• Healthcare professionals and students seeking training resources

• Volunteers and advocates interested in vaccine education

For many of these groups, the site was an indispensable gateway to up-to-date guidance, peer connections, and tools to increase immunization coverage.

By fostering knowledge exchange and standardizing technical assistance, the initiative amplified the capacity of small, under-resourced coalitions — many of which operated on shoestring budgets but made measurable impacts on vaccination rates in their communities.

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Reviews and Reputation in the Public Health Community

Although the website itself predated modern review systems, IZCoalitionsTA.org earned a strong reputation among coalition leaders and health communicators. It was widely praised for:

• Ease of access to reliable information

• Relevance of training materials for real-world use

• Collaborative spirit that encouraged coalition networking

• Strong leadership from AED’s Center for Health Communication

Participants frequently cited the monthly calls and e-updates as “lifelines” that kept them connected to national developments, particularly during the shifting vaccine guidelines of the mid-2000s.

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Press, Media Coverage, and Academic Mentions

While not a public-facing consumer brand, the TA Network occasionally appeared in CDC communications, conference proceedings, and academic references related to immunization coalition development.

Notably, AED presented findings from its rapid needs assessment of coalition capacity at the Sixth National Conference on Immunization Coalitions, highlighting gaps in outreach resources, training, and evaluation tools. These presentations helped shape later CDC approaches to coalition technical assistance.

Even after the site’s closure, its framework continued to influence subsequent resources such as the Community Guide for Preventive Services and CDC’s Partnership for Immunization initiatives.

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Cultural and Social Significance

The story of IZCoalitionsTA.org extends beyond public health administration — it represents an early moment in the digital democratization of expertise.

In the pre-social-media era, when most federal resources were static PDFs or newsletters, the site’s interactive features — online registration, listservs, and live teleconferences — gave small community organizations a voice and a network.

This culture of peer learning and open access paralleled the growing ethos of Web 2.0, where users were not just recipients of information but participants in creating and refining it.

The project’s approach to health communication also reflected an emerging awareness that trust and cultural relevance were as critical as scientific accuracy — an insight that would become even more evident during later vaccine controversies and the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Legacy and Preservation

When the domain expired, much of IZCoalitionsTA.org was archived through the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine, ensuring that researchers and former coalition members could still access historical snapshots of the program.

The subsequent acquisition of the domain by a preservation-minded individual ensured that future visitors seeking information would be redirected to FHI 360’s current site — a gesture of respect for the project’s historical and social value.

In many ways, this act mirrors the coalition ethos itself: stewardship, continuity, and the prevention of misinformation through responsible curation.

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Broader Lessons and Continuing Relevance

Even decades later, the underlying challenges IZCoalitionsTA.org addressed remain strikingly familiar: vaccine hesitancy, misinformation, inequity, and resource gaps in community outreach.

Its solutions — networked communication, evidence-based messaging, and partnership-driven capacity-building — are still considered best practices today. Modern equivalents, such as the Immunization Action Coalition (IAC) and the National Network of Immunization Coalitions, trace some of their design philosophy to the groundwork laid by AED’s TA Network.

For historians of digital health, the site represents an important milestone: one of the first structured, web-based capacity-building platforms devoted to immunization advocacy in the United States.

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The story of IZCoalitionsTA.org is ultimately about connection — between science and society, between national agencies and local communities, and between individuals committed to the collective good.

Through the partnership of AED, CDC, and later FHI 360, the National Immunization Coalition Technical Assistance Network created a model of collaboration that blended rigorous public health practice with the emerging possibilities of online communication.

Though the original site no longer operates, its influence endures in the many coalitions it strengthened, the resources it inspired, and the enduring ideal it represented: that the fight for public health is most effective when grounded in shared knowledge, trust, and cooperation.

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