What Is in the Tracking Education Kit?
National Environmental Public Health Tracking Program Tools From the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) FIGURE 1
PowerPoint Slides: The slides are separated into independent sets by topic to allow educators exibility in choosing which information to high- light. The slides give an overview of the National Environmental Public Health Tracking Program (Tracking Program) and introduce the Data Explorer, Envi- ronmental Justice Dashboard, Heat & Health Tracker, Melanoma Dashboard, and the application program interface (API). The slides also cover topics such as emergency preparedness and where to nd more information about tracking. Questions Bank: The questions bank includes questions with answers based on information in the presentation slides. The questions can be added to an exam, quiz, or knowledge check. Assignment Bank: The assignment bank provides more than 30 assign- ments that guide users through the practical application of Tracking Program tools and resources. Many assignments feature additional instruc- tions on conducting an in-person or virtual class activity and include prompts for discussion posts. The ac- tivities and prompts can be completed alongside the main assignment or as an independent class activity. Supporting Resources: • Assignment Bank Navigator: The assignment bank navigator helps educators explore assignments in the assignment bank. It organizes assignments by 14 Council on Edu- cation for Public Health competen- cies, 8 domains, and 10 learning ob- jectives across undergraduate- and graduate-level courses. It speci es whether an assignment includes an in-person or virtual activity; contains a discussion prompt; and is for a group, an individual, or both. • Instructor Guide: The instructor guide helps educators become familiar with Tracking Program resources and provides guidance on navigating and integrating content from the Tracking Education Kit into existing course content.
Essential Tracking Program tools (Figure 1) that can be used in the environmental health workforce include the following: • Data Explorer • Dashboards • Application program interface (API). The interactive Data Explorer (www.cdc. gov/ephtracking) has more than 700 environ- mental and health data measures from more than 90 sources. Students can explore choro- pleth maps (i.e., a type of statistical thematic map that uses color to show how data changes from place to place) to evaluate specific data side-by-side with other maps. They can ana- lyze trends and issues that involve a variety of health conditions, including asthma, heart disease, and diabetes. Students can also view these data in charts and tables that can be downloaded for further analysis. With some simple coding, users can export and embed any Data Explorer map, chart, or table into their own website. The Tracking Program also oers inter- active dashboards that can be tailored to a specific community. The dashboards provide additional context to the data, such as text or infographics, to help with data literacy and provide a better understanding of the data. All the data available on the Tracking Net- work can be accessed by an API, which sup- ports creation of apps or websites. In fact, the Tracking Network uses its own API to feed data from the Data Explorer into the
dashboards to ensure that the latest data are always available.
Learn About the Tracking Education Kit
The Tracking Program aims to connect envi- ronmental and health information in one place, making it accessible to anyone and easy to share. Tools are only eective, how- ever, when they are known and used. To that end, the developing workforce must recog- nize and learn how to benefit from Tracking Program tools, which begins with education. To support educator curriculum develop- ment, inform student educational needs, and demonstrate how Tracking Program tools are helpful, the Tracking Program created the Tracking Education Kit. The kit is a collec- tion of instructor lesson resources featuring PowerPoint slides, an assignment bank, a questions bank, an assignment bank naviga- tor, and an instructor guide. To create a robust kit that would serve col- lege-level educators, the Tracking Program formed an academic advisory group. Feed- back from the academic advisory group was instrumental in shaping the development of the kit. The academic advisory group is made up of five members from three universities: Emory University Rollins School of Public Health, Georgia State University School of Public Health, and Rutgers University School of Public Health. Based on input from the
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July/August 2023 • Journal of Environmental Health
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