Scholar Program

The Scholar program at UE's Institute for Public Health provides a supportive infrastructure for meaningful physical and virtual collaborative exchanges. A critical part of the program's success is not relying on a one-size-fits-all approach. We are committed to a portfolio of strategies to suit scholars from across the university and community in various disciplines, at different stages in their careers, and with distinctive pathways toward success. We want to work with scholars to spark productive collaborations, remove barriers to collaboration, and make it easier for scholars to broaden their networks for their public health research, practice, advocacy, and teaching activities. Scholars should be interested in collaborating with other disciplines to help expand their own areas, refine research questions, enhance development of public health interventions, improve practice delivery, enrich teaching, etc. Scholars will be awarded $750 to support their proposed project and will be required to present their work at the Fall 2020 Institute for Public Health Board Meeting.

There are three categories where individuals may apply to become a scholar.

  1. Faculty scholar is for University of Evansville faculty.
  2. Student scholar is for University of Evansville students (undergraduate or graduate).
  3. Community scholar is for Evansville community members. If you are interested in becoming a scholar, please contact Dr. Payal Patel-Dovlatabadi at pp42@evansville.edu. Deadline to apply is 11/15.

Benefits of Being a Scholar

  • Help connecting to one another, or to useful resources and networks, to solve public health challenges
  • Assistance planning and implementing unique scholar-driven activities related to public health practice, research, education, and advocacy
  • Support from the Institute's communication infrastructure to disseminate news about scholars' public health work through multiple channels including website, email newsletter, social media, or other tailored approaches
  • Comprehensive communications about public health events and opportunities

Scholar Expectations

To be best equipped to add value to scholars' careers related to public health interests and activities, the Institute will ask scholars for:

  • Open communication about their needs, interests, and challenges
  • Keywords describing their public health work or interest
  • Willingness to respond to fellow scholar inquiries about their work
  • Sharing of key individual or organizational public health opportunities with the Institute
  • Openness to being featured in publications that showcase public health at the university
  • Participation in the Institute's annual board meeting

2019 Scholars Announced

The Institute for Public Health Scholar Program aims to provide support to promote collaborative work in the field of public health. This year's scholars have been chosen and they are:

  1. Kelsey Preocanin (Student Scholar) - Kelsey, a Public Health major, will develop and implement effective strategies to reduce the prevalence of viral infections while at Harlaxton.

  2. Abraham Dalen Traore (Community Scholar) - Dalen, a current MPH student and Deaconess employee, will strive to implement a lactation program at UE to show support to the health of its employees and students who are nursing mothers.

  3. Diana Rodriguez Quevdeo (Faculty Scholar) - Diana, Associate Professor of Spanish, will examine medical/therapy services and barriers to accessing these services for Hispanic Latinx families of children with special needs especially relating to autism spectrum disorder.

Congratulations to this year's Institute for Public Health Scholars!