Research in Action: Our Success Stories
Read about recent and ongoing projects through which Carolina centers and institutes make North Carolina a safer, healthier, better place to be.
- Storm forecast: No other state can forecast potential storm impacts the way North Carolina can, thanks to the models created by supercomputers that can make trillions of calculations per second. (+) More
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Storm-surge modeling at RENCI:
The impacts from hurricane storm surge can devastate North Carolina coastal areas. Without effective preparation and evacuation plans, surges can level homes and businesses, cost billions of dollars, and kill thousands of people. Computer modeling can highlight areas that are vulnerable and need protection or insurance coverage. Storm-surge modeling can also help communities plan for evacuations of vulnerable areas and at-risk populations.
The Renaissance Computing Insitute brought together a team of oceanographers, statisticians, meteorologists, and computer programmers to assemble a storm-surge modeling system capable of simulating hundreds of potential storms that could hit the coast, exploring all combinations of storm size, tracks, and frequency that could occur over hundreds of years. The resulting floodplain maps pinpoint properties located in areas vulnerable to surging water. Simulating these storms requires millions of computer hours on a RENCI supercomputer; similar work in other states has required much more time and money because there was no state-supported resource like RENCI available.
The same storm surge modeling system can be used to forecast storm-surge water heights when real tropical storms and hurricanes hit North Carolina's coast. The simulation results will then be passed along to the National Weather Service for inclusion in their analyses. RENCI also produces complex hurricane models and inland-weather models, which complement the storm-surge models and help weather forecasters and emergency managers predict severe weather and dangerous conditions. The RENCI supercomputers used to create these models, machines capable of many trillions of calculations per second, give North Carolina a unique local capability to forecast potential storm impacts well before they occur.
- Highway safety: The leading cause of death among teenagers in the U.S. is motor-vehicle crashes. But in North Carolina, crashes involving 16-year-old drivers are down by 38%. (+) More
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Highway safety in North Carolina:
In the mid 1970s, less than 10 percent of drivers wore their seat belts and even fewer children—about 5 percent—were buckled up in any way during crashes. The Highway Safety Research Center recognized the need for action and conducted some of the first research studies on occupant protection and child passenger safety. Through research and data analysis, HSRC was instrumental in getting both the adult seat-belt law and the child-passenger safety law passed in North Carolina.
HSRC then worked with several partnering agencies to develop and implement North Carolina's "Click It or Ticket" program. This ongoing, statewide, high-visibility enforcement program has increased seat-belt use in North Carolina to nearly 90 percent—one of the highest usage rates in the nation. The program now serves as a national model for other states.
HSRC also operates the North Carolina Child Passenger Safety Resource Center. Through an information website and an in-state, toll-free phone line, the center fields and answers child-restraint and safety-belt questions for North Carolina citizens, parents, and child-passenger safety advocates.
- Child abuse: How do you ask questions of a child who's been sexually abused? Mark Everson's research has helped train over 400 workers in Child Protective Services to do just that. (+) More
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Helping children who have been abused:
With the support of the Injury Prevention Research Center, Carolina professor of psychiatry Mark Everson has spent years working to improve decision-making in cases of alleged child sexual abuse. The results of his research are now part of the curriculum used to train child protective services workers throughout the state on interviewing children about sexual abuse allegations. During the last 3 years, over 400 child protective services workers have undergone this interview training.
- Creating jobs: In rural Sampson and Duplin counties, almost 20 percent of households live at poverty level and unemployment is rampant. Micro-enterprise grants, though, are creating jobs. (+) More
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Creating jobs and better health behaviors:
Threads of HOPE NC Inc. is a sewing enterprise that was started by low-income women who participate in HOPE Works, an obesity prevention and empowerment program funded by the CDC and conducted by the Center for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. The participants began with no startup money and worked in the back of a drapery and upholstery shop in Wallace, Duplin County, but now Threads of HOPE NC has successfully completed orders for several large conferences and many individuals. The women—who are African American, American Indian (Coharie Tribe), Latina, and white—live in Sampson and Duplin Counties in eastern North Carolina, where unemployment has been high since the mid-1990s when tobacco and textile production left the area. The poverty rate in those counties is close to 20 percent of households.
The project's organizers recruited Mae Tuggle, a seamstress and business owner in Wallace, North Carolina, to train women and coordinate the initial sewing orders. To find women to join the team, the organizers seek out women who were laid off from jobs in textile factories.
This academic year, team members from Threads of HOPE NC were assisted by students and faculty from the UNC Community Development Law Clinic in preparing to submit an application to the IRS for non-profit status. With non-profit status approval, the participants will be able to seek government and private funds to secure their own space for training and production, to expand their product line, and to provide training for women in the community to begin a variety of small businesses that will bring jobs to the region.
The mission of Threads of HOPE NC, Inc. is to be a laboratory business for training and educating rural women on all aspects of entrepreneurship and business development. Our laboratory business pays a living wage, provides good benefits in a healthy, positive work environment, produces sustainable products, and supports other local businesses. Our focus is on health promotion, social improvement, and sustainable economic development.
- Healthy aging: Translating research into practice helps North Carolina's older citizens take control of their health. (+) More
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Aging in North Carolina:
Over the past eight years, the Institute on Aging has managed the NC-Healthy Aging Network. The network has gained considerable momentum as members of IOA work closely with state, regional, and local partners in public health and aging to translate healthy aging research into practice, build partnerships, and provide technical assistance and training for service providers in public health and aging.
Through the institute, the NC Healthy Aging Network coordinates statewide training, conducts falls-prevention training programs, and works to improve state policies that affect the health and health care of older adults in North Carolina.
- Allied health: The loss of textile, furniture, and manufacturing jobs in North Carolina has left many people unemployed. The field of allied health, though, could be the open door hundreds of workers need. (+) More
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New jobs for North Carolina's unemployed:
While many policy-makers are aware of the shortages of physicians, nurses, dentists, and pharmacists, shortages of allied-health professionals are often overlooked. But with the support of UNC's Sheps Center for Health Services Research, research fellow Erin Fraher identified allied-health professions facing shortages in various regions of North Carolina, and her research caught the attention of state policy-makers who were looking for ways to address manufacturing, textile, and furniture job losses.
Fraher is now collaborating with the Governor's office, the legislature, the N.C. Departments of Health and Human Services and Commerce, the community college system, the university system, and the N.C. Area Health Education Centers to develop innovative ways to transition unemployed workers into allied health jobs. Her work could reduce allied-health workforce shortages, increase access to health-care services, and improve the economic outlook in our state's neediest counties.
- Our coasts: Public beaches in North Carolina face rapid development, increasing coastal storms, and a rising sea level. UNC's Hazards Center is working on a solution. (+) More
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Planning coastal safety:
The North Carolina Coastal Federation and UNC's Center for the Study of Natural Hazards and Disasters convened a Beach Management Summit in Beaufort, North Carolina, in March 2009 to discuss emerging threats to the public beach and to evaluate existing oceanfront land-use policies, programs, and regulations. Center researchers worked with participants to find ways to ensure that North Carolina is prepared to address rapid coastal development, increasing coastal storms, and sea-level rise along our oceanfront. The summit produced a coherent set of policy recommendations that are supported by science and will further the policies adopted by the state to protect its beaches. The center will present their study's findings at an upcoming meeting in April, 2009.
- Lifelong learning: The Institute on Aging is helping public libraries to redefine their services to older adults and promote civic engagement in their communities. (+) More
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Lifelong learning and civic engagement:
North Carolina is about to experience a major demographic shift. Our state has the fourth-largest in-migration rate of retirees from other parts of the country, and our own population is aging. This growing group, sometimes referred to as "the experience generation," represents a tremendous resource for the state if its members can continue to be active and engaged in the community. The Institute on Aging's NCCoLLE project is aimed at stimulating lifelong learning and civic engagement through public libraries across the state. The Institute on Aging is partnering with the UNC School of Information and Library Science, the State Library, and the N.C. Division of Aging and Adult Services to design a program that will help public libraries to redefine their services to older adults and promote civic engagement in their communities. NCCoLLE has been identified as a Lifelong Access Libraries Center of Excellence by Libraries
for the Future, a national non-profit organization.
- Pedestrian safety: Each year in North Carolina, 2,200 pedestrians are involved in police-reported crashes with motor vehicles. Between 150 and 200 are killed and 500 more are seriously injured. (+) More
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Keeping North Carolina's pedestrians and bicyclists safe:
The Highway Safety Research Center conducts pedestrian safety training courses across the United States through the Pedestrian and Bicycle Information Center, a national clearinghouse housed within HSRC. Through training sessions and workshops, HSRC has presented several policy recommendations to the North Carolina Executive Committee for Highway Safety, including the development of a two-hour curriculum for law enforcement officers on bike/pedestrian/motorist laws and how to enforce them. Now the North Carolina Justice Academy's Annual In-Service Training includes this curriculum for all police, sheriffs, and other law enforcement personnel.
HSRC has also implemented a pedestrian safety awareness campaign on Carolina's campus, where a high concentration of drivers, pedestrians, and bicyclists creates special risks for all.
