Faculty Facilitators: Dr. Jo Ivey Boufford, Dr. Alexis Merdjanoff and Dr. Tom Kirchner
Lab Coordinator: Gina Gonzales, MPH
Urban health is an evolving area of research, education, practice, and policy making. Students are in a strong position to be part of these developing activities to advance the evidence base on research, implementation and evaluation in urban health. The Global Action for Urban Health Lab, co-developed by Dr. Jo Boufford and Dr. Alexis Merdjanoff, provides a space for students both within and outside of GPH to collaborate on various projects around urban health worldwide. The primary goals of this lab are for students: (1) to learn about the role of cities in global health and the role of urban governance in health, including policy approaches both across agencies and in public-private partnerships in the context of the SDGs and UN-Habitat’s New Urban Agenda (2) to develop a network of academic programs, faculty, and students across NYU focusing on urban health; (3) to engage with UN agencies and national/ municipal governments, international and domestic NGOs, urban health researchers, practitioners and policy makers worldwide (4) to develop skills for data collection, analysis and project implementation of priority urban health programs from collaborating organizations; and (5) to build on the platform of the International Society for Urban Health as a global network of researchers, educators, practitioners and policy makers committed to improving health and health equity in cities.
The Global Action for Urban Health Lab provides a platform for both individual and team activities with students from different disciplines and areas of interest from GPH and graduate students from across other NYU schools and programs (e.g., Wagner Urban Planning, Rudin Institute, Real Estate Institute, CUSP, Engineering, Marron Institute, Stern, Journalism, Institute for Public Knowledge, Furman Center, Geography, Department of Population Health at Langone, Tisch School of the Arts, etc.).
Projects for the lab will be proposed by faculty advisors and other faculty in partnership with participating local and global organizations, though individual and small groups of students may develop their own proposals. Each project will have a student lead to serve as the point of contact for the faculty advisor and “client” organization. Opportunities to potentially tie lab activities to student thesis projects or Applied Practice Experiences can be discussed with the faculty advisors.
The lab meets every two weeks and regularly brings in speakers and experts within and outside of NYU.. For more information or if you’re interested in joining the lab, please email urbanhealthlabnyu@gmail.com