On April 14, the College of Public Health’s first Public Health Scholar Bowl team competed at St. Louis University in St. Louis, Missouri, demonstrating their knowledge of public health issues and showcasing a fully planned intervention to address health issues in Haiti.
Beginning in February, team members Carolyn Bresnahan, Patrick Kelly, Kaitlyn Oberg, Alexandra Schmied and Martha Sherman met weekly to prepare for the two components of the competition: a series of quiz bowl matches against other universities and a case study that tasked the students with designing a service or immersion project in a low-income country, targeting either a specific issue or the country as a whole—all with a budget of $10,000.
The Temple team won three of their four quiz bowl matches, which consisted of 20 questions each, beating teams from University of Alabama, Lindenwood University, and George Washington University. Ultimately, the team fell to Ohio State University without scoring enough points to proceed to the semifinals. For the case study, the team considered issues around the world—infant mortality or the health of refugee populations, for instance—before settling on designing an intervention for HPV education and vaccine administration in Haiti. In the weeks leading up to the Scholar Bowl, they researched demographic information, potential community partners, epidemiology, policies in Haiti, and other factors that would influence their intervention.
They prepared a presentation that included an assessment of the problem, including background information on the country or population they were working with, and a detailed list of stakeholders they would theoretically engage on the ground. The group then created a budget, planned the marketing and educational components of the intervention, and described how they would evaluate outcomes.
“It’s been really awesome because it’s been a practical way to put everything we learn to use,” said Kaitlyn Oberg, a student on the team. “A lot of us have seen that doing the case study has closely followed the curriculum, and we’ve seen a lot of real-life experience to apply what we learn in the classroom.”
They were scored on the thoroughness, relevance, and overall quality of each of these areas, as well as on public speaking skills, the professionalism of their presentation, and their responses to questions following the presentation. Though they did not win the case competition, “they did an amazing job at their presentation,” said Michelle Scarpulla, instructor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences and faculty advisor for the team. “It was well researched, evidence-based, and well planned.”