Dr. Melody S. Goodman is the Director for the Center for Anti-racism, Social Justice and Public Health, Associate Dean for Research, Professor of Biostatistics at New York University School of Global Public Health. Dr. Janice Johnson Dias is an Associate Professor of Sociology at John Jay College and the President of the GrassROOTS Community Foundation, a training organization with an emphasis on public health and social justice. Drs. Goodman and Johnson Dias have over 10 years of collaborative partnership that is focused on increasing research literacy among non-academic audiences. Their shared aim is to empower community members to be informed and literate partners with social scientists and policymakers so they can advocate for the needs of vulnerable populations. Drs. Goodman and Johnson Dias have co-created and developed several initiatives; the latest collaboration is the Quantitative Public Health Data Literacy Training.
Their goal is to teach high school, college students, public health professionals, and community members particularly those from underserved communities, how to use data analysis software to explore real world issues using publicly available data.
The 4-week bootcamp is offered free to all participants and introduces students to R (available free) and Stata (free 1-month licenses provided to participants).
At the end of this course, participants will be literate in data analytics. They will also be able to manipulate data, make inferences based on data analysis and gain experience in statistical programming.
This course is perfect for residents in New York City and New Jersey and college undergraduate students. We highly encourage students attending community colleges, minority serving institutions or historically black colleges and universities to apply.
For more about Drs. Goodman and Johnson Dias’ collaborative work on increasing research and data literacy see:
- Goodman, Melody, Janice Johnson Dias, and Jewel Stafford. (2010). Increasing research literacy in minority communities: CARES fellows training program. Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics, 5 (4), 33-41.
- Goodman, M. S., Gbaje, E., Yassin, S. M., Johnson Dias, J., Gilbert, K., & Thompson, V. (2018). Adaptation, Implementation, and Evaluation of a Public Health Research Methods Training for Youth. Health equity, 2(1), 349–355.
- Bather, Jemar, Johnson Dias, J. & Goodman, M. 2022. The Demand for Literacy Training on Quantitative Public Health Data. AmStat News.
- Goodman, M., & Johnson Dias, J. (n.d.). Data Literacy as a Tool for Community Health and Social Justice. Https://Magazine.Amstat.org/. https://magazine.amstat.org/blog/2022/09/01/data-literacy/