On March 6, 2026, Russ Altenburg (Program Director at The Leon Levine Foundation) spoke to the WNC Health Policy Initiative about the foundation's new Good Jobs WNC initiative. This data-driven competitive grant initiative will begin with WNC's 11 community colleges before expanding to other education-to-employment organizations across the state to provide vulnerable and underrepresented learners with access to high-ROI, living-wage careers. Its focus on WNC is intended to support post-Helene economic recovery while building a statewide Good Jobs framework.

On October 31, the WNC HPI convened with our working group leads for a briefing to share progress and align next steps across the WNC HPI’s three core focus areas: Social Drivers of Health (SDOH), Access to Healthcare, and Healthcare Workforce Development. In this summary update, we share key takeaways, themes and action items drawn from the Oct 31 briefing to provide a roadmap of the working group’s activities over the next several months.