K-12 Science Education and Student Mentoring

The NYU-NIEHS COEP conducts K-12 educational programs focused primarily on environmental health issues and more recently about careers in this growing field. Our most recent K-12 COEP Program, Youth Participation and Leadership Program, incorporates educating high school students on environmental health issues and to expand their awareness about careers in the environmental health sciences. Our faculty also conduct student mentoring with local high schools.

High School Student Environmental Education Outreach: One high school education outreach initiative conducted in 1999-2001 was our work with a local high school in the Newburgh School District. The City of Newburgh is a predominantly minority community that has had an unemployment rate of 29% and an especially high school drop-out rate, indicating the need for our Center's assistance in encouraging student interest in science education, and, thereby, in completing school. We provided classroom air pollution monitoring equipment, technical expertise for setup and maintenance, and related classroom lectures regarding air pollution and human health at the Newburgh Free Academy (NFA) high school. During the summer of 2000, one of the students from the Newburgh class that participated in our 1999-2000 high school air pollution monitoring project at that school was selected as a summer intern on an air pollution research project being conducted by Center researchers.

We have also had students visit our Center facilities for educational programs. In the fall of 1999, we hosted several groups of students from various New York City High Schools, who visited our Center for a day of education in the environmental sciences in collaboration with the Sterling Forest Partnership. During their visits to the Institute in Sterling Forest, they were introduced to air pollution monitoring and other environmental analysis equipment used at the laboratory. Furthermore, they took turns using the Center's computers to visit our World Wide Web Outreach site, and learned, with Dr. Thurston's assistance, how our "Environmental Problems" web site could be useful to them in helping them to research their school projects.

The Youth Participation and Leadership Program's objective is to involve high-school students from the study area to learn from the project by training them in environmental science, policy and health, and by offering them a chance to work directly with scientists and policy experts in these areas. Having gained skills in these areas, it is hoped that the students will help to disseminate the findings of the project to other community leaders and residents. In addition, the youth participants will gain an opportunity to explore career opportunities within the fields of public health and environmental sciences and research.

Elementary Student Environmental Education Outreach:
As a part of an HEI-funded pilot study of traffic-related PM exposures and health effects among children with asthma at PS154 in the South Bronx, our COEP added on student educational components. To enhance the experience for both the participating students (who each carried personal air samplers during the study) and their fellow classmates, "Research Teams" were developed. Each student with a sampler was assigned a "team" of researchers. Each team-member had a title and a job description with a time line of responsibilities and deadlines of assignments.