Research is an essential element of public health. Many CU Boulder faculty members are engaged in innovative research projects that involve the study of overall health and wellbeing.
Listed below are relevant faculty who lead research projects with potential opportunities for undergraduates. Depending upon the project and research advisor, students may be encouraged to fund their research through the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP).
CONVERGE
CONVERGE is a National Science Foundation-funded initiative headquartered at the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado Boulder. As part of the Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI) for the nation, one of the major tasks of the CONVERGE project is to accelerate the education and training of a diverse next generation of hazards and disaster researchers and practitioners. To that end, our research team at CONVERGE has developed a series of free, online training modules that are specifically designed for students, emerging researchers and practitioners, and others new to the field who hope to quickly background themselves on key information. Thus far, we have released eleven modules, which are all available on the CONVERGE website: https://converge.colorado.edu/resources/training-modules/
The modules cover a wide range of topics and are designed to help prepare researchers to carry out extreme events research that is ethically grounded, methodologically sound, and scientifically rigorous. Three of these modules (the CONVERGE Public Health Implications of Hazards and Disaster Research; Disaster Mental Health; and Social Vulnerability and Disaster Training Modules) are especially relevant for those working or studying in the intersection of public health and extreme events research.
Each module features learning objectives, lesson plans, written content, and case study vignettes. The modules also offer supplemental resources including a list of publications for further reading, annotated bibliographies, and links to standardized scales and measures, data sets, and other online information. Each module is followed by a short multiple choice and true/false quiz. Those who receive a score of 80% or higher receive a CONVERGE Training Module Certificate of Completion, which is worth one contact hour of general management training through the International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM) certification program.
In addition to the modules, we also have several other resources available via our CONVERGE and Natual Hazards Center websites:
- For publications, webinars, presentations, and other communications regarding our work at CONVERGE: https://converge.colorado.edu/communications/
- For publications, webinars, presentations, and other communications from the Natural Hazards Center, accessible via the tabs at the top of the page: https://hazards.colorado.edu/.
- For public health reports written by awardees of our Public Health Disaster Research Program: https://hazards.colorado.edu/research/public-health-disaster-research/reports.
Be sure to also subscribe to our email listservs to stay up to date on events, publications, news, and other opportunities through both CONVERGE (https://converge.colorado.edu/signup/) and the Natural Hazards Center (https://hazards.colorado.edu/signup).