Every year, the membership committee conducts a membership engagement survey to help us better understand how we can engage our members and track how we are improving this effort. On February 12th, we sent out a survey to all members over the APHA Connect list-serv. The response rate was 10.44% (n=237) which is a decrease from last year’s 12% response rate.
Of the members who responded, 38% were regular members (full, discounted, or affiliate), 26.6% were students, 22.8% were Early Career Professionals (ECPs), and 12.7% were retired. Almost half of the respondents 46.4%, have been an IH member for less than a year, 29% have been a member for 1 to 3 years, 7.6% of them for over 20 years. The majority (85.2%) indicated that they intend to renew their APHA membership and 89% of them intend to remain with the IH section.
The most common reason listed as the primary reason for joining APHA was: connecting/networking with other professionals (40.5%), followed by professional collaboration with other researchers/professionals (20.7%). About one-third of respondents indicated that they joined to either attend (11.8%) or present (11.4%) or advocate/lobby (11.4%) at the Annual Meeting.
Respondents were asked how easy it is to get involved with Section activities. On a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being the most difficult and 5 being the easiest, the percentage of respondents were; 1=6.6% (most difficult), 2=19.7%, 3=42.8%, 4=21%, and 5=10% (easiest). Most (79.5%) of the respondents have never been involved with the section committees or working groups.
A clear majority of survey respondents indicated that they were unaware of the Section’s communications platforms: the section website (65.5%), quarterly newsletter (62%), social media (67%) and APHA Connect (59.4%). A quarter of the respondents are aware of the section website, social media and APHA Connect but do not read. And a quarter of the respondents read the quarterly newsletter regularly. Many of the respondents (71.2%) are interested in using communications platforms to network with other section members and discuss global health research and advocacy programs outside of the Annual Meeting. Most of the respondents (81.7%) are also interested in attending regional meet-up event outside of the Annual Meeting.
Members were asked to indicate if they were interested in learning more about the Section’s committees and working groups and to provide their e-mail address so they can be contacted by our committees with information on how to get involved. Committees that generated the most interest among respondents were Policy/Advocacy (71.2%), Program (31.9%), Student (24.5%) and Mentorship (31.3%). Working groups with the largest number of interested respondents included Global Health Connections (70%), Maternal and Child Health (39.5%), Community-Based Primary Health Care (39.5%), and Climate Change and Health (37.9%).
If you have any questions about the survey or have an interest in additional analysis, please feel free to reach out to Jay Nepal or Rose Schenider of the Membership Committee.
IH CONNECT 