The Health Educator in a Rural Community *

The rural California county of San Luis Obispo, serving 45,000 population, lacked money, as do most rural counties, for the employment of a health educator. However, early in 1945 the need was considered so urgent that the local Tuberculosis Association decided to include health education experience as a job requisite for its first fulltime executive secretary. Since November, 1945, a trained health educator, employed by the Tuberculosis Association, has been in the community. The Executive Board of the Tuberculosis Association instructed its new secretary to work closely with the health department in carrying out the Tuberculosis Association program and to assist the health department in general health education work. From an administrative standpoint, entrusting the responsibility of the community health education program to an individual not directly employed by the health department may be considered unwise, but this arrangement has worked out very well. No attempt has been made to advance the program of either agency at the expense of the other, and both have profited by this worker utilized mutually. The sole apparent disadvantage of this type of set-up is the amount of time expended by the trained health educator in the Christmas Seal sale, which might well be spent to better advantage in actual health education. Evaluation of the services performed by a health educator after only one year is of limited value, but it permits a listing of short-term gains, as follows: 1. Additional news stories pertaining to health in the local paper. The daily and weekly newspapers have allotted more and better space for better stories. 2. The radio station has offered the health department regular weekly and monthly time for health department programs, which have