by Frank Strona & Daniel Murphy
Health Science faculty members (and edu-tech innovators) Frank Strona and Rebecca Krueger, with their students in SJSU’s Health Communication and Technology (aka HS158), held the Health Communication Sampler Celebration & Presentation Workshop this past Tuesday December 4th, 2012 at MLK Library. Click here for a video overview: Group 11 Sampler.
The event featured 12 students teams who presented original material they developed using 21st century tools – including iPads, Tablets, social media technologies, digital
Project posters at 2012 event showcase edu-tech innovations
and audio software – resulting in short digital media content. They also introduced for the first time an entire cloud based series of presentations based on the Prezi.com platform. Student groups dedicated an entire semester to creating a digital, interactive technology-based project or educational intervention. The results were fantastic.
HS158 attempts to engage its students in an active experience that explores the evolving roles of the Health Science graduate in the workplace today. The core elements of the course allow students to build on group skills, new digital technologies, and the Internet as tools for health promotion, disease prevention, and health care.
Strona noted, “What is especially exciting is that the students enrolled in HS158 are not students who would‘ve generally looked at technology and digital media as a routine response towards improving the health of communities. As Health Science undergraduates, participation in this course required the students to actively engage accessible and self-paced content, low-cost tools, and self-initiated learning above and beyond standard curriculums in an attempt to replicate the real-time work environment these young professionals will eventually find themselves in.”
HS158 leads the way in edu-tech tools in the classroom
The innovative projects shared during the Sampler were developed in collaboration with the community-based partners and organizations that applied for free partnership support over the summer as a way to promote and widen the health opportunities of the communities they serve locally in San Jose, in the larger Bay Area, as well as nationally. Each student group addressed various health-related issues; assessed the impact the tools could achieve; and designed, filmed, and edited a custom digital project suitable for use by their host.
Student Jessica Huckabay noted, “Our group poster was on sexual education marketing to gay men in SF for the S.F. Dept. of Public Health. We also did a series of interviews with gay men to find out what they thought/knew about the FC2. It sparked my interest in working with LGBTQ people. I plan on working with a health educator at the Billy De Frank Center on the Alameda, to understand the population and do health education work.”
The event highlighted the transformative edu-tech work being done by faculty and students in the Health Science, notably driven by Frank Strona, whose commitment to cutting-edge techniques benefits SJSU students and community partners.
For more information about this event and about technology innovation in the classroom, contact Frank Strona at Frank.Strona@sjsu.edu; follow the class twitter feed at @HealthCommTech or follow hashtag #HS158.