Discovering what powers community health organizations in Philadelphia

Less than a quarter mile from Penn’s campus is the new home of Bebashi, the nation’s first organization to address the AIDS epidemic in Black communities. Since 1985, it has evolved to holistically meet a variety of health needs facing low-income Philadelphians.

Their chief operating officer Nafisah Houston says that the move to a larger space in West Philadelphia last year will allow the nonprofit to serve more clients. But with that expansion, Bebashi leadership wanted to explore how they could best support staff. They turned to Andi Johnson, senior lecturer in the Department of History and Sociology of Science, and the 17 undergraduate students in her course Health in Philly: Past and Present.

The class focused on how different groups and institutions in Philly have addressed shared health problems and promoted well-being. Each semester it is offered, students visit multiple health organizations in the city and collaborate deeply with one.

“The organization poses a question, the students collaboratively work together to answer the question using methods from our discipline, and then we present the data back to the organization,” Johnson says. “It makes qualitative research more real for the students.”

Students visited Bebashi in October to see its health care clinic, prevention education services, housing and medical case management services, space for a forthcoming mental health clinic, food pantry, and free clothing boutique. They returned in December to present their findings, based on interviews with eight staff members.

Johnson taught students ethnographic interviewing techniques and how to analyze qualitative data, and the class split into groups focused on different topics, such as case management, prevention, and housing.

The students talked about the design of Bebashi’s new space, how leadership discusses internal policy changes, the distribution of work, and the challenges and opportunities of doing community health work. “I was grateful to hear how we’re already doing and how we can improve,” says Houston.

Bringing curriculum close to home

Johnson, who recently became director of the first-year experience in the College of Arts & Sciences, says that she began teaching the class in 2023 to connect curriculum for the health and societies (HSOC) major to the passion that its students have for health-related volunteering, internships, and research in Philadelphia.

“The core disciplines of the major are history, anthropology, and sociology, so we teach students how to think about the social contexts and consequences of science, technology, and medicine in different times and places,” Johnson says. She had previously observed students engaging with the history of health problems around the world but not specifically in Philadelphia. She also saw students wanting to learn not only about problems but also about solutions.

“I really wanted to give the students a radically different class, where they get the history, they learn from local experts, they don’t feel like they have to do it all themselves, and they also feel optimistic,” Johnson says.

Fourth-year HSOC major and pre-med student Aria Osborne says this course solidified how much she wants public health and community health to be at the center of her future medical career. She plans to take a gap year before medical school and says she can see herself either doing research or working at an organization like Bebashi.

“It was so great to learn about the inner workings and everything that goes into making community health possible,” says Osborne, who is from Fairfax, Virginia. “Community health centers like Bebashi are holding up the health of Philly, and that’s what this class is all about.”

Visiting health organizations across the city

In a previous section of Health in Philly: Past and Present, students partnered with Puentes de Salud, which provides health care services to the Latino immigrant community in South Philadelphia. They surveyed medical residents about what they learned from their rotation at the organization, information Johnson says can help Puentes de Salud in funding applications.

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Students worked with the Black Women’s Health Alliance in two other semesters to help the organization better understand the experiences of college students with problem gambling; the students joined the organization to present findings to the City of Philadelphia Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services.

This fall, as in years past, the class included multiple site visits to organizations throughout Philadelphia, such as Lutheran Settlement House in Fishtown, Nationalities Service Center in Center City, SEAMAAC in South Philly, Esperanza Health Center in Kensington, and more.

Denise Sanchez, a third-year HSOC major, says a visit with the Karen Community Association of Philadelphia was particularly impactful. The class went to their garden and picked produce, which community members used in dishes prepared for the group.

Sanchez, from South Philly, says that taking Johnson’s class was great because she got to learn more about the city she grew up in—and specifically through a health lens.

Noting support from the SNF Paideia Program, Johnson says, “We want students to be out in the world and be engaged and to do so in a way that is as historically informed and rewarding as possible.”