The Rutgers School of Nursing – Camden (RSNC) is leading this project, in which up to 2,000 vulnerable residents in the City of Camden and greater Camden County will take the COVID-19 vaccine at community-based vaccination events. Together with the Camden County Health Department, Cooper Health System and its faith-based, school, municipal and community partners, RSNC is coordinating up to three vaccination events each week. With two days dedicated to the City of Camden and one day focused on hard-to-reach communities in suburban areas, RSNC and its partners will deploy a mobile vaccination unit to community housing sites, senior communities, persons experiencing homelessness, local parks and homebound residents. In addition, RSNC is formally partnering with the Community Planning and Advocacy Council to provide mini-grants to community-based organizations also working to address vaccine hesitancy. Through the RSNC’s commitment to collaboration and partnership, this program could create a model for providing equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines.

RSNC and its community partners are among the nonprofits and service providers that have come together as the Moving New Jersey Forward Learning Collaborative to share accomplishments and lessons learned from this work with each other, with New Jersey Health Initiatives and the state, to benefit every community. Ensuring more equitable access to the COVID-19 vaccine originally connected these thought leaders as the New Jersey Vaccination Learning Network for over a year. In March 2022, the network renamed itself the Moving NJ Forward Learning Collaborative to better represent the partners’ systems-level thinking and commitment to applying the lessons from the past two years to unlock the doors to opportunity that marginalized communities face. Learn more about the collaborative’s expanded focus.