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| IEHMS K-12
Curriculum Development at UNM |
OUR GOAL: to create and enhance a more comprehensive response to community
concerns and to provide policy makers with necessary information to make
informed decisions.
OUR WORK:
- develop
programs to respond to the concerns of the communities with which we work,
as well as to facilitate responses to environmental issues through
collaborative efforts with NM NIEHS research and facility cores and state
and local agencies.
- provide
a series of basic trainings in environmental health geared towards
increasing community capacity to address their concerns
- work with other Center
members and state agencies to develop integrated health and environmental
data systems, to identify gaps in current data, and develop strategies to
address those gaps.
- offer
K-12 educational outreach to students and teachers throughout NM to
promote environmental health awareness at school-age levels as well as
education on environmental sciences;
K-12 (IEHMS)
Curriculum Development at the University of New Mexico
OUR
STAFF:
COEP staff are a multi-disciplinary
team with strong, active working relationships with various federal, state
and local agencies, Pueblos and tribal community members throughout New
Mexico
- COEP Director: Johnnye Lewis, Ph.D.,
D.A.B.T.
Dr. Lewis is a Professor in Internal Medicine, Division of Epidemiology,
and the developer and Director of the Community Environmental Health
Program (CEHP) at the Health Sciences Center.
She brings to the COEP a unique background encompassing both a
long and successful history in basic laboratory toxicological research
in inhalation and neuro toxicology, as well as community participatory
research and education with Native American communities in the
Southwest.
She was the coordinator of the New Mexico Turning Point
Environmental Health Task Force, a project that brought together
environmental health professionals, NGOs, and concerned community
members to define and prioritize the needs of the state with respect to
environmental health issues.
She has worked closely with 5 of the 6 target populations for the
COEP over the past 5 to 10 years and continues to have active projects
in most of these communities.
She works closely with the New Mexico Environment Department to
ensure regulatory standards for groundwater are protective of the
state’s varied populations and serves as a liaison between the
communities and department to ensure environmental justice concerns are
met in remedial actions.
Through her program she has worked to develop coordinated efforts
between health care providers and lay health workers who are often the
trusted sources of health information in the state’s rural
communities.
Her continued involvement in basic science research combined with
her community involvement allows her to effectively communicate key
concepts in environmental health and be an effective liaison between
communities and professionals.
-
Mallery Downs,
RN
Ms.
Downs brings a background of clinical skills combined with six years of
health promotion activities with the Department of Health.
She has worked for IHS at Acoma Pueblo and in Navajo communities,
as well as in other rural communities in the Southwest.
She led efforts in developing and implementing educational
materials on Hanta Virus for the Department of Health and the CDC. She
currently
manages the CEHP and is active in developing and presenting training
materials on environmental health for Promotoras and CHRs, as well as
for health care professionals including nurses and physicians throughout
the state.
Her expertise in clinical settings has been instrumental in
training of lay health workers.
She has played a key role in development of training modules for
the Agency for Toxic Substances Disease Registry (ATSDR) and the
Association of Occupational and Environmental Clinics (AOEC).
-
Gene
Gallegos, MA
Mr.
Gallegos brings a social science perspective to the CEHP as well as a
strong understanding of issues of concern to communities in the Border
region.
He is fluent in Spanish and develops and presents education and
outreach materials in Spanish.
He is active in lay health worker consortiums and serves as a
liaison between that community and the UNM-HSC in working to establish
professional qualifications and training needs for that profession. He
is an active participant in both development and delivery of materials
and brings a strong ability to define and translate technical concepts
into terminology and examples that can be understood by the lay
communities.
He has served as a reviewer for the Hesperian Foundation in the
development of environmental health texts for communities in developing
countries.
Mr. Gallegos has also been instrumental in CEHP’s development
of the AOEC/ATSDR training modules on environmental health.
Mr. Gallegos has also developed and taught a course at Northern
New Mexico Community College in grant writing and establishing effective
community-agency interactions in rural communities.
This effort was part of an ongoing effort to build the
community’s capacity in environmental health.
-
Stefani Hines, MA, MS
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