Undergraduates are allowed to enroll in this course.
Description: This course is designed to provide students with an understanding of intentional injury generally and adolescent violence-related injury in particular as a significant public health problem that is amenable to preventive measures in the same way as other public health problems. It will provide students with a comprehensive overview of the many issues associated with youth violence. The course will acquaint students with injury control theory more generally and cover the epidemiology of major violence-related injuries including disparities, social determinants as well as risk and resiliency factors associated with intentional injury. Topics to be covered include violence in schools, family (e.g., domestic violence) and peer (e.g., dating violence) influences, suicide, alcohol and drug use, firearms, and violence in the media. They will also learn about conceptual and theoretical models describing the etiology of adolescent violence-related injury and gain an understanding of how such frameworks influence the development of prevention programs. The course presents examples from local communities who are actively involved in youth violence prevention. The course will be linked to activities of the CDC funded Youth Violence Prevention Center and will include discussions with community partners. The course will be working with the Office of Community Based Public Health (OCPBH) to create student mini projects.
