Today@Sam Article

Education Professor Named To CDC Science Ambassador Fellowship

June 9, 2020
SHSU Media Contact: Wes Hamilton

After a nationwide search and application process, Lisa Brown, associate professor in the College of Education, was recently honored with the Science Ambassador Fellowship from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The CDC Science Ambassador Fellowship is presented annually to 30 educators across the country. The fellowship provides training in curriculum design and teaching strategies to help educators engage students in science, technology, engineering and math using real-life epidemiology and public health examples. The competitive fellowship includes a five-day interactive summer course, as well as a one-year distance-based professional development opportunity.

“I applied for this in October 2019 because I have always been fascinated by epidemiology and I am constantly wanting to learn more as a teacher,” Brown said. “When I introduce these lessons to the classroom, I think I will have a captive audience since the topic of public health and individual responsibility to decrease the spread of diseases is more relevant than ever.”

Due to concerns over COVID-19, the CDC has postponed the in-person portions of the fellowship until the summer of 2021. However, Brown will continue to collaborate with other ambassadors and CDC scientists to finalize teaching materials to be shared across the country over the next year.

“I know these people are the best of their field and will help me gain new perspectives by learning from other teachers. We all bring our own hidden talents and knowledge of teaching to this fellowship and that will help us become better educators for the next generation,” Brown said. “Kids in South Dakota are taught differently than kids in Texas. Fellowships like this make a more robust program for Sam Houston State University and make more robust teachers across the United States.”

Brown also mentioned that personal learning is important as a teacher of teachers. As one of the biggest programs in the state for teachers, the College of Education has a huge impact on future generations of education.

“Dr. Brown exhibits dedication to bringing public health sciences into her university classroom to better enable and equip future classroom teachers,” said Jannah Nerren, associate dean in the College of Education. “This is a great opportunity to engage in and I believe that it will be beneficial to Dr. Brown, to the teacher candidates at SHSU and to the PK-12 students that those Bearkats will teach in the near future.”

Something that is emphasized in the classroom by Brown is the importance of lifelong learning. Brown constantly puts this into practice in her own life and this fellowship is the most recent example.

“I will always be a lifelong learner. From a professional point of view, I want to better understand epidemiology, but from a personal approach, I also want to be able to bring this back to my class and share with my students,” Brown said. “In the real world we cannot operate in silos. Ag students, Family and Consumer Science students, Kinesiology students, I want them to go about learning in a cross curricular way. I want the knowledge we are teaching them to be beneficial for life and this fellowship will help me achieve that goal.”

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