Superfund Research Program

Training

Project Leader: Lloyd R. Sherman
Grant Number: P42ES007384
Funding Period: 2001 - 2006

Project-Specific Links

Final Progress Reports

Year:   2005 

The Mount Sinai School of Medicine SBRP Training Core seeks to promote environmental health literacy, environmental health career exploration, and post-secondary career preparation.

These goals are met in a year-round program of rigorous academic study, projects, seminars, internships, trips to Superfund sites, and research.  The SF-EH curriculum at The High School for Environmental Studies (HSES) focuses on arresting and offsetting habitat deterioration caused by persistent chemical contaminants; students learn the workings of exposure, bio-pathways and biomarkers of contaminants in animal, plant and human systems, and their social, economic and political effects on the community. Twenty-three students completed the Academic Year program in June 2005.  Twelve took part in a newly designed Environmental Health Toxicology course in the summer of 2005. They attended the six-week program daily at MSSM’s Center for Excellence in Youth Education. Instruction was provided by Mr. David Odebode, a science teacher at Life Sciences Secondary School (LSSS) with a degree in toxicology.

 

Thirty students enrolled in the Environmental Health Toxicology course at LSSS in fall 2005 - the second high school that has adopted MSSM’s Superfund Environmental Health Curriculum (The High School for Environmental Studies being the first). All participants in the summer received certificates of completion plus recommendation letters to their Principal for accreditation. Ten HSES students in Grades 10-11 joined the Fall 2005 Environmental Health Research program.  The program focused on developing environmental health laboratory research skills using the Zebra Fish model. The projects are coordinated by Marissa Maggio of HSES and supported by Mr. Kosj Yamoah, a graduate student in MSSM’s Graduate School of Biomedical Studies. The fall semester is spent setting up the Zebra Fish laboratory such that there will be continuous availability of healthy Zebra Fish for use in experiments during the Spring semester. This Fall course includes lectures and literature searches on key themes and research findings in the field of environmental health – including: geology, water characteristics and chemistry, organochlorines, bio-pathways, human exposure, cost benefit, clinical manifestations, socio-economic issues, ethics and environmental justice, epidemiology, and key definitions of urban ecology, environment, and health. Students attend the Environmental Toxicology Research Program two days a week after school. Their projects are intended for submission to the New York City Science Fair. The most successful students will continue into the summer; next fall, their projects will be submitted to Intel national science competition. The research program was guided by the SF Zebra Fish Research Advisory Committee (Avrom Caplan; Steve Zimmerman from NYU Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine; Richard Bopp; Philip Landrigan; Lloyd Sherman worked with the Instructors).

 

Two former SF-Environmental Health Students - Jennifer Vasquez and Pricilla Toral - served as TAs in the summer program; also, they each conducted their own environmental toxicology research using Zebra Fish and presented their findings to their peers in MSSM’s Summer Research Fellowship Program. Two hundred and thirty nine high school students have taken part in the Environmental Health Program since its inception.