What:Â Go Viral Health Camp: Be a Disease Detective
When: Final Day – Friday, June 12; approximately 9 a.m.
Where:Â Southern Indiana Career & Technical Center
Health Sciences Classroom (first door on right as you turn into the parking lot)
1901 Lynch Road
What will take place:
During this week-long camp, middle school students have been learning about diseases of the world, including such topics as epidemiology, food poisoning, bacteriology, deadly diseases, and global health. On Friday, following a lecture on global health, students will participate in an activity that will make them think about the importance of water.
Erin Reynolds, assistant professor of health sciences at USI, (USI’s Southwest Indiana Area Health Education Center  is co-sponsor of the camp) says about the water activity: “Students will be carrying buckets of water from the Health sciences classroom, around the front of the building to the green house on the opposite side of the parking lot. They will have to fill a larger trash can (meaning several trips). They will then use the water to water the plants in the green house or the landscape beds, showing that it is important not to waste the water that you worked so hard to collect. The goal of this activity is to take what we have learned about waterborne and foodborne diseases and the importance of good hygiene and put it into a global perspective where water is a precious resource. We are lucky. We have running water to wash our hands after we use the toilet, before cooking food, before eating. In other parts of the world, water is less available, making it harder to be hygienic and control waterborne and foodborne diseases. Also, water scarcity is becoming more of an issue and we need to be aware of our usage…how better to do so then carry it and learn the weight (in terms of actual mass and importance) of a bucket of water!â€
