News from Stefanie Iverson Cabral, SNHS Faculty Member

This past year I have had the opportunity to serve as a CDC Science Ambassador Fellow.  This work started last July when I got to spend an incredible week at the CDC in Atlanta, where I connected with fellow educators to explore ways to integrate public health and epidemiology into STEM education.  Over our week together, we learned about teaching resources, brainstormed strategies for active learning, and collaborated with the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) officers to complete an “outbreak exercise”.  We were also able to tour the David J. Sencer Museum, the Emergency Operations Center, as well as the BL4 lab training facility.  Following the summer program, our work has continued virtually as our team has worked to develop a case study on traumatic brain injury (TBI).   This activity can be adapted for students ranging from 6th grade to higher ed and aims to teach students about what happens when someone experiences a TBI, as well as epidemiology-based skills such as data analysis and graphing.  We’ve also made sure to include discussions on how the social determinants of health connect to risk of TBI, as well as outcomes. This quarter I was able to pilot one section of our case study in BHS 210: Community Health Promotion & Communication where I was able to integrate some of the activities into our conversations on health literacy and effective public health messaging.