Student Fellows Program Fall 2022 Research Projects
Below is a list of the proposed research projects for GHI Fall 2022 Student Fellows. Each project indicates whether it requires remote work, in-person work, or a hybrid of remote and in-person work. Any in-person work is subject to the university's operating guidelines. More information about the program and how to apply is available on the GHI Student Fellows Program page.
Opportunities for Undergraduate, Graduate, Law, and Medical Students
For this section, please take a closer look at who can apply for each project.
Correction of Misinformation
Faculty Mentor: Leticia Bode, Associate Professor, Communication, Culture, and Technology Program
Project Description: Prof. Bode's research shows that correcting people on social media reduces belief in misinformation. But not enough people engage in correction. She is working on a series of experiments to test interventions to boost comfort with and engagement in correction of misinformation. As part of that, the student will help with a new tool to make the experiment more realistic.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate and Graduate Students
Skills Preferred: This project requires some proficiency with the command-line and comfort installing and setting up technical tools.
Work Modality: Remote and in-person work
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COVID-19 & Non-profits
Faculty Mentor: Jun Han, Adjunct Professor, McCourt School of Public Policy
Project Description: The student will work on a research and consulting project "Impact of COVID-19 on Nonprofits, Social Enterprises, and Impact Investors, and their responses". The duties of the student will include literature review, data collection (qualitative and quantitative), policy analysis, and report/paper writing. The student will have a chance to become a co-author depending on contributions.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate and Graduate Students, Law Students, Medical Students
Skills Preferred: Literature search, data collection and analysis, etc.
Work Modality: Remote work
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Economic Cost Drivers for Health Security
Faculty Mentor: Ellie Graeden, Research Professor, Center for Global Health Science and Security
Project Description: To get a mortgage, a borrower has to know how much the house costs. Likewise in global health security, to get a loan or investment for global health, public health, or health security improvements countries need to know how much they need, whether from the WHO, World Bank, IMF, or other donors. One of the key challenges in global health and health security is defining those costs and tracking who is funding what and where. Over the last six years, the Center for Global Health Science and Security (CGHSS) has been working to address that challenge. (See ghscosting.org and tracking.ghscosting.org.) Analysis based on these data were recently used to develop the estimates for global health investment presented to the G20 and G7 by the US State Department and White House.
CGHSS is now launching a project to refine and update the costing tool at the foundation of that work and is looking for a student to support that effort. Specifically, the student will be responsible for online research and analysis of economic cost drivers for health security – everything from the cost of a cell phone in Nigeria to the cost of enterprise visualization platform for an emergency operations center in Thailand. This is a combination of practical problem solving and breaking down what needs to be done into its component parts, as well as quantitative analysis of the data identified in the research. The student will contribute to a widely-used, valuable set of resources that are having on-going global impact to global health security.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students
Skills Preferred: The student will preferably have prior experience in web-based research, including economics and financing. The student should have a working knowledge of the subject matter and be comfortable evaluating quantitative data and sources. This position requires attention to detail for data capture and the ability to creatively define requirements across complex topics. The student will need to proactively communicate with the PIs and research team.
Work Modality: Remote and/or in-person work
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Environmental Sustainability
Faculty Mentor: Rosemary Sokas, Professor of Human Science, School of Health
Project Description: Holy Family parish in Caldwell, Liberia, is a Jesuit parish with a health center that was established initially by Jesuit Refugee Services in the aftermath of a brutal civil war. The health center includes midwifery services and continued to operate during the 2014-2016 ebola outbreak. This project will seek to identify opportunities for providing the parish information about environmental sustainability.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Students
Skills Preferred: Excellent oral and written communications skills, experience with library and other information searches.
Work Modality: Remote work
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Equitable Partnerships in Global Health Education
Faculty Mentor: Myriam Vuckovic, Associate Professor, Department of Global Health
Project Description: Prof. Vuckovic recently published a mixed-methods study on the impact of experiential learning (a field-based research semester abroad) on the medium and long-term effect on students’ careers and life-choices, and on developing essential global health competencies. Through this study, the benefit of the experience for recent global health graduates has clearly been shown. However, the question whether the program - and similar field experiences at other universities - also aligns with the needs, preferences, and priorities of our department’s partner organizations in Africa, Asia, and Latin America deserves closer attention and will be the subject of this follow-up study, to assure that the partnerships we maintain are equitable and mutually beneficial. The GHI fellow will help design this planned study (research questions, questionnaires, interview-guides, FGD), conduct background research on how historical and politico-economic forces have shaped and continue to impact global health policy, research and practice, and help to conduct in-depth interviews and focus groups discussions with our partner organizations, in particular our former and current preceptors around the globe.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students, Law Students, Medical Students
Skills Preferred: Excellent literature-based research skills; very good writing skills; prior qualitative research skills; high intercultural competence. Prior experience abroad and interviewing skills would be a great plus.
Work Modality: Remote and in-person work
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Giardia & Epithelial Barrier Defects
Faculty Mentor: Steven Singer, Professor, Department of Biology
Project Description: Giardia is a major contributor to stunting in children around the world. A student is needed to assist with in vitro studies of the mechanisms by which this parasite produces epithelial barrier defects. Student will help culture cells and parasites, and will perform Western blotting and electrical resistance assays to monitor barrier function. Previous lab experience is required.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior Students
Skills Preferred: Lab experience is essential. Knowledge of cell culture methods and western blotting are important.
Work Modality: In-person work
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Global Health Security, Biosecurity, and Biosafety
Faculty Mentor: Ellie Graeden, Research Professor, Center for Global Health Science and Security
Project Description: One of the primary challenges for the global health security community during COVID-19, as well as for prior outbreaks, was a lack of a centralized repository of the existing tools available and used for biosecurity and biosafety efforts. To fill that gap, the Center for Global Health Science and Security (CGHSS) designed and launched Biosecurity Central (biosecuritycentral.org) with support from Global Affairs Canada.
CGHSS is now continuing and expanding the effort and is looking for a tech-savvy fellow interested in global health, biosecurity, and biosafety to help identify and evaluate new tools. In addition, the fellow will have the opportunity to work with other researchers on the project in coordinating the global committee of experts with whom CGHSS engages to expand visibility on the effort and perform analysis on areas of collaboration and coordination across the community and identify gaps in the tools and resources available. The fellow will contribute to a widely-used, valuable resource that is having on-going global impact to global health security.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students
Skills Preferred: The student will be interested in web-based research, including technical review of tools and resources for global health security, biosecurity, and biosafety. The student should have a working knowledge of the subject matter expert and be comfortable evaluating software, websites, and online materials. This position requires attention to detail for data capture, note taking, and the ability to synthesize across complex topics. The student will need to proactively communicate with the PIs and research team.
Work Modality: Remote and/or in-person work
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Health and Human Services Delivery Challenges
Faculty Mentor: Jessica Kritz, Assistant Professor, School of Health
Project Description: Support preparation of a symposium issue of the Journal of Health and Human Services Administration. The symposium topic is harmonizing the evidence from public health and public administration around complex health and human services delivery challenges. Issues will likely include, among others, urban health/planning, network analysis, climate, migration, urbanization. Participate in the design of a toolkit to train public servants in Ghana to build cross-sector collaboration. Conduct formative research on the homelessness crisis in Northern California. Other projects as needed.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Students
Skills Preferred: Excellent research, writing, and analysis skills
Work Modality: Combination of remote and in-person work
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Measures of Stigma Against Persons Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing
Faculty Mentor: John Kraemer, Associate Professor, Department of Health Management and Policy
Project Description: Prof. Kraemer is collaborating with stigma researchers at RTI International to develop and validate measures of stigma against persons who are deaf or hard of hearing. The project is part of the Lancet Commission on Hearing Loss. They have collected data from persons who are deaf or hard of hearing in Ghana and the USA, as well as parents, caregivers, and medical providers. The aim of the project is to validate a concise set of survey questions that works across settings and subpopulations for various manifestations of stigma (e.g. experienced, perceived, internalized, etc). They've concluded main analyses and the student fellow would help with literature searches and preparing papers for publication; depending on their experience, they may also be able to help with secondary analyses.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students, Medical Students
Skills Preferred: The student needs to have taken statistics and a social science research methods course, preferably one that includes psychometrics. Preference for students majoring or minoring in a public health-related field, psychology, or with a strong interest in behavioral health, as well as for students who are minoring in or have taken coursework in disability studies. Preference for students who have experience working with Stata.
Work Modality: Remote work
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The Metaverse, Human Rights, and Health
Faculty Mentor: Andrés Constantin, Assistant Director of Health Law Programs, O'Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law
Project Description: The metaverse will change the world in many ways. Essentially creating virtual spaces owned by private companies where individuals, corporations, and even governments can interact with minimal oversight. Although the Web 2.0 had already offered a brand-new way of interacting with others, the interactions that the metaverse’s immersive technologies enable will bring about a new worldview and multiple challenges.
The metaverse will definitely offer numerous benefits for users–such as organizing virtual field trips for students or getting a telemedicine consultation with a doctor in any part of the world. However, the use of these technologies could also entail potential serious risks for human rights. This student will examine the legal and policy implications of the metaverse to human rights and what it means for people’s health. In particular, the student will aim to answer questions, such as: what is or should be the role of public health authorities in the metaverse? Are current health-related legal standards applicable in the metaverse? Do we need specific norms to protect the right to health? What are the anticipated health and human rights risks that a poorly regulated metaverse–or poorly enforced laws and regulations in this space– can facilitate?
Looking ahead, an exhaustive analysis of the legal and policy challenges of immersive technologies for the right to health is required in order to anticipate and prevent potential harms to people’s wellbeing. This project aims to take the first steps towards such endeavor.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students, Law Students
Skills Preferred: Strong research and writing skills; Interest in health and human rights
Work Modality: Remote work
Additional Information: The student fellow will also work and interact with external partners from the Center for Technology and Society in Argentina.
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Multinational Enterprise in Brain Science
Faculty Mentor: James Giordano, Professor, Department of Neurology; Chief, Neuroethics Program; Co-Director Program in Brain Science and Global Health Law and Policy
Project Description: The student will contribute to a project that explores issues and implications of multinational enterprise in brain science upon global health and health promotions. Mentees will be author’s intent any/all of their work that is accepted for publication.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students, Law Students, Medical Students
Skills Preferred: Research and writing
Work Modality: Remote work
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Newborn Care in Jordan
Faculty Mentor: Indira Narayanan, Adjunct Professor, Department of Pediatrics/Neonatology
Project Description: The project relates to providing support for newborn care in Jordan: This is part of a 5- year USAID/University Research Corporation supported project for which Georgetown University has been invited to be a partner. In the first year the focus will be on (a) learning the background and the existing status of newborn care in the country that will focus on a desk review of key available information and (b) developing plans for the necessary activities. It will give a chance for the students to gain real life experience in how international programs are developed to support care in a low and middle in a country, in particular, keeping in mind promotion of quality of care, expansion to scale and sustainability.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate and Graduate Students, Medical Students
Skills Preferred: The ability to carry out a search for appropriate information including documents and publications and prepare suitable summaries. These can also be taught to the students and, hence, only a willingness to learn and interest in the project are required. Skills in doing power point slides and in excel would be benefits but not essential.
Work Modality: Remote work
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Public Health Interventions & Infectious Diseases
Faculty Mentor: Margaret Baker, Associate Professor, Department of Global Health
Project Description: This project relates to a scoping literature review on access to public health interventions targeting infectious diseases, for ethnic and religious minorities. This requires understanding the challenges, barriers, and solutions as applied to different cultures around the world. Literature across public health interventions will be reviewed including (but not limited to): immunizations, mass drug administration campaigns, bednet distribution, TB and HIV programs. The scope may be refined further depending on initial findings.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students
Skills Preferred: A combination of patience and speed are required to filter through 100s of publication titles and abstracts. The ability to carefully read and distill key information from selected articles is also important. Clear written and oral communications are a must. A lot of this work will be conducted alone with weekly check ins with the professor.
Work Modality: Remote and in-person work
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Public Health Measures & COVID-19
Faculty Mentor: John Monahan, Professor, Department of Medicine; Senior Advisor to Georgetown University's President
Project Description: Professor Monahan is conducting preliminary research on the political framing and language used by national elected officials to argue for adopting public health measures during the course of COVID. The Fellow would help conduct online and library research to advance this project.
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate and Graduate Students, Law Students, Medical Students
Work Modality: Remote work
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Women Living with HIV in Eswatini
Faculty Mentor: Samson Haumba, Assistant Professor, Center for Global Health Practice and Impact
Project Description: Eswatini is one of the Countries with high HIV prevalence and one the highest cervical cancer rates globally. In Eswatini, high proportion of HIV positive women present to the oncology hospital with advanced cervical cancer despite a cervical cancer screening program. This project shall use a cascade approach to evaluate the full continuum of secondary prevention from screening to treatment of pre-cancer and follow-up for women living with HIV (WLHIV). Cervical cancer screening is integrated HIV clinics in Eswatini. Findings and recommendations will be used to address the gaps in the screening cascade and to scale-up efforts of cervical cancer screening in support the World Health Organization(WHO)’s goal to eliminate cervical cancer. The student will work with Prof. Haumba to analyze the data and prepare reports, manuscripts, and other program documents as a result of this work.
Skills Preferred: Statistical analysis, interest in global health or non communicable diseases and HIV
Who Can Apply: Undergraduate Junior/Senior and Graduate Students, Medical Students
Work Modality: Remote work
Opportunities for Only Graduate and/or Medical and/or Law Students
Electronic Medical Record Systems in Nigeria
Faculty Mentor: Ibrahim Bola Gobir, Assistant Professor of Medicine; Resident Field Director for West and Central Africa for the Center for Global Health Practice and Impact
Project Description: The project relates to developing an internationally recognized, sustainable academy for two donor-deployed electronic medical record systems in Nigeria. The first is used for managing all diseases, while the second is used for managing Orphan and Vulnerable Children programs. The proposed academy should have a potential academic affiliation that will create local, national, and international Health Information System workforce capacity to enhance their usage, knowledge, and skills. An instructional System Design Model will be adopted to guide the process of activating and institutionalizing the academy that will be tiered for users, developers, managers, implementers etc. The platforms are expected to create alternatives to available Open source platforms for management of health programs.
Who Can Apply: Graduate Students
Skills Preferred: Product management skills or software development.
Work Modality: Remote work
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Research for Global Health Law (2nd ed.)
Faculty Mentor: Lawrence Gostin, Professor, Law Center and Faculty Director, O'Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law
Project Description: The student will have 1) one main ongoing project while 2) contributing to a second project as the need may arise.
1) Professor Gostin is developing a second edition of Global Health Law, a book first published in 2014 that defined the field of global health law and has served as the leading reference on the subject. The second edition will be a major revision, now underway, with numerous new chapters and updates to chapters in the first edition to bring the book up to date. Prof. Gostin is collaborating with two other authors on this edition. This will be the main project for the fellow, who will provide research support for this second edition and may have an opportunity to directly contribute to drafting material for the book.
2) Prof. Gostin is collaborating with Ben Meier, a health and human rights expert and professor at the University of North Carolina, on a new textbook, Global Health Law & Policy: Realizing Justice for a Healthier World, which like Global Health Law, is meant to grow the field of global health law. Drafts of the chapters should be complete by fall 2022, but we expect that substantive work on revising draft chapters will be underway, in which case the student would have an opportunity to contribute to this important project.
Who Can Apply: Law Students
Skills Preferred: Strong research and writing skills will be important, along with an interest in global health issues and the potential of law to address them, with law's potential to advance global health equity and justice.
Work Modality: Remote work
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Respiratory Protection Program
Faculty Mentor: Rosemary Sokas, Professor of Human Science, School of Health
Project Description: This projects relates to finalizing an intervention to provide reusable respiratory protection for infection control in a central referral hospital in Monrovia, Liberia, in collaboration with the National Public Health Institute of Liberia. The project will attempt to evaluate user experiences establishing and using a respiratory protection program.
Who Can Apply: Graduate Students, Medical Students
Skills Preferred: Strong interviewing and analytic skills will be needed. Experience having been fit tested for respirator use is a plus.
Work Modality: Remote work