Research plan project

1)  PICK AN ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARD OF PARTICULAR CONCERN TO YOU.  IT SHOULD BE RATHER SPECIFIC SINCE DATA INVOLVING THIS HEALTH HAZARD ARE REQUIRED.  

2)  Plan a data collection study to identify potential human health hazards.

3)  Demonstrate knowledge of safety, health, and environmental laws, regulations, and policies to assure protection of humans.

4)  Analyze and interpret data using quantitative reasoning to draw conclusions about the impact on human health.

5)  Effectively communicate knowledge of environmental health principles and relevant data, analysis, conclusions, and recommendations.

An important part of environmental health professional practice is assessing environments for potential hazards or exposure to hazards within a given environment. To conduct an assessment, a practitioner must use effective data research methods.  Learning to conduct data research and to communicate your findings are essential skills for an environmental health professional. With this assignment, you will be expected to demonstrate many skills directly relevant to the field of environmental health. As part of this assignment, you will:

Collect and analyze data on a potential environmental issue in the environment and develop a Data Research Plan to study this issue OR use official data (government or privately verified)

• Plan and conduct (or use) a survey/data collection of an environmental issue
• Identify relevant laws and policies
• Use a specific research report style to report your findings (See your instructor for additional details)
• State a hypothesis and design an experiment
• Collect, analyze, and interpret data
• Use descriptive statistics including resenting data graphically
• Perform some statistical analyses on the data collected
• Be expected to demonstrate effective writing and communication skills
• Communicate and present your results visually (MS PowerPoint or equivalent) in a management briefing

 The research project will be conducted in three parts. 

• 1stphase – DUE END OF WEEK 2:  RESEARCH PLAN for Data Collection/Survey  (3% of Data Research Project Grade)

1. selection of environmental issue, background investigation (including initial literature review), and development of Research Plan. MAKE SURE YOUR ISSUE HAS DATA TO ANALYSE OR STATISTICS ON THE DATA THEY COLLECTED.  CITE THOSE SOURCES FOR THE INSTRUCTOR TO REVIEW.  Think about how you might display those data and/or statistics DESCRIPTIVELY.  This Research Plan will be reviewed and graded by the Instructor. The Research Plan will be submitted as an assignment no later than the end of Week 2. The RESEARCH PLAN is simply a statement of the environmental health issue you plan to research, any refinement of that issue based on the source(s) of the raw data you can find to examine, and the conclusion(s) you intend or hope to be able to make based on the analysis of those data.  Cite the initial references you have found and what they deal with. Lastly, provide a rough outline of the content of your final report.  The Instructor will provide comments and recommendations.

• 2ndphase – REPORT DUE END OF WEEK 6:  CONDUCT Data Collection/Survey {OR use official data source} AND PREPARE PROJECT PAPER (8% of Research Project Grade) [See Grading Rubric below for details of the expected content for the Research Project Report]

1. conduct of the study, including data generation, data analysis, and final literature review.  Input Data into a spreadsheet or other tool and conduct analysis
2. preparation of Research Report, to include results and data presentation (figures, tables, etc.), and conclusions. The Data Research Report will be submitted usually no later than the end of Week 6 (check the specific class schedule).

• 3rdphase – POWERPOINT-TYPE PRESENTATION DUE END OF WEEK 7:  (5% of Research Project Grade)

        submit MS PowerPoint or equivalent presentation of the Data Research Report 

Required features of the Research Report are:

1. COVER/TITLE PAGE: Title of report, student name, course number, instructor name, and due date of paper
2. TABLE OF CONTENTS: list each section heading and the major subsections with the beginning page number for each section/subsection (see #3 below for section headings).
3. BODY OF REPORT: Organized by sections, e.g., I. Introduction (includes discussion of relevant laws, regulations and policies); II. Project Objectives/Hypothesis, III. Methodology, IV. Results (includes figures, tables, graphs, or charts), V. Discussion (includes discussion of remediation and/or compliance with relevant laws, regulations and policies), VI. Summary and Conclusions, and VII. Cited References.
4. FORMAT: 10-15 typed, double-spaced pages; submitted as MS Word document or comparable
5. CITED REFERENCES: Use APA (American Psychological Association) style (consult the UMUC Guide to Writing and Researchfor specific formatting requirements)
6. PRESENTATION: Prepare an MS Power Point presentation (or comparable software presentation) based on the project and submit it for discussion (post as a DISCUSSION topic)