Health Educators

A Day in the Life

Your day as a public health teacher begins in the classroom. You arrive at the college where you work about 15 minutes before your first class is due to arrive. Depending on where you work, you may be called either a public health teacher or a health specialties teacher. Regardless of your title, you are responsible for educating students about health issues and keeping track of developments in your specialty area.

Your students arrive right as class is scheduled to begin. You are teaching an introductory seminar on public health issues, so you begin by discussing an influenza scare that has been in the news recently. Understanding the history of public health issues is important, and you make sure that you talk with your students about other flu scares. You field questions and moderate a discussion about the media's coverage of the new pandemic.

Before your students leave, you assign them a midterm essay. You hand out an instruction sheet and go over the prompts. Because most of the students haven't had your class before, you explain your expectations and give them tips about conducting research. As your students filter out, you set up an office appointment with a young man who is thinking of pursuing a degree in public health. If he chooses to pursue this path, you will act as his adviser.

After all of your students have left, you gather up your instructional materials and head to your on-campus office. You spend the rest of your morning grading papers and updating your student tracking system. You plan to have a quick lunch in your office before you get ready for drop-in office hours.

During drop-in office hours, you assist students who need help with assignments and course readings. One of your advisers come in to let you know that she's landed an interview at a public health agency. You talk to her about the interview and make a note in your calendar to follow up with her later in the week.

You also use this time to start working up a midterm exam for your public health policy class. It's your responsibility to design exams and to create grading rubrics for each of your courses. You work closely with your fellow faculty members to ensure that you are meeting department expectations.

After you finish another course, you can head home for the evening. Of course, you bring papers that still need to be graded with you. Once you're at home, you'll finish grading your papers and will go over your lesson plans for the next day before enjoying your free time.