Pictured: CCL students and advisors in the field.
For a second successful year, the Office of Undergraduate Programs welcomed new — and returning! — high school students to its College and Career Lab (CCL) to study public health with the amazing NYU GPH community. This year’s program was designed to provide students with an overview of how social and environmental forces can impact the health of large populations.
The first week introduced rising ninth-grade students to public health as a potential career field, with a particular focus on health communication. After learning about the history of public health and current issues in the field, students explored the relationship between nutrition, branding and social media. They also heard from a panel of GPH students and staff, each of whom represented different stages of what a career in public health might look like. As the week’s culminating project, students produced their own public health campaigns, which were designed to address topics relevant to high school-aged populations.
Pictured: CCL students from week one at the end of their final health communication presentations.
Pictured: CCL students listening to peer presentations.
Over the next two weeks tenth- and eleventh-grade students immersed themselves in a curriculum that covered nutrition, sustainable food systems and environmental health. They embarked on a number of excursions in which they collected noise and air quality data from the neighborhoods surrounding Washington Square Park. After receiving training in the use of laboratory equipment, students learned how to use such devices to test for lead contamination in everyday items and environments.
Outside of the classroom, students visited NYU’s Urban Farm Lab as well as the Gowanus Canal Superfund site in Brooklyn, a heavily polluted location that has received federal funding for its environmental restoration. Finally, the students created profiles for neighborhoods in Manhattan, relying on findings in the field as well as their own research.
The Office of GPH Undergraduate Programs would like to thank all the students, faculty and staff without whose help the 2023 College & Career Lab (CCL) would not have been possible. We especially thank Dr. Kayleigh Blaney, Dr. Marie Bragg, Dr. Jennifer Cantrell, Dr. Jack Caravanos, Hsin-Yi Chang, Dr. Janice Chisholm, Claire Deshaies, Brittany Edghill, Rebeca Espinosa, Dr. Ollie Ganz, Mentalla Ismail, Amber McLeod, Brian McNiff, Melissa Metrick, Dr. Joyce Moon-Howard, and John Patena.
Pictured: Students gathering data at a local market.
Pictured: Students collect readings of environmental contaminant levels in neighborhoods with Dr. Jack Caravanos.