Meeting Minutes
"As a community, we should take more reasonable precautions to keep ourselves and one another healthy."
Meeting 7 - February 21, 2007
Discussion:
Attendance was light, with Michael, Steph, and Amber making appearances. We caught Amber up on last meeting's ideas and then discussed the emergence of clusters of pink-eye (Tennis team), and colds/influenza-like infections that we have observed over the last two weeks.
Finished:
Michael finished the required typographic changes on the final copy of the Satisfaction Protocol.
Todo:
Michael will talk to Maurice Eldridge about getting funding for the protocol just as soon as he asks for an estimate of the expected number of participants from Ginny. He will also fill out the IRB forms and will follow up with Myrt.
Someone, probably Michael, will ask Kathy Grace about the cost and time frame for bulk-ordering pens and candy if the expected number of participants is high.
Amber will be ready to buy samples, pens, and candy when we get funding for them.
Meeting 5 - February 7, 2007
Michael agreed to make the necessary typographic changes to the draft protocol, and to contact Myrt about copying expenses.
Jessica agreed to contact Stu Hain about getting hand-drying equipment in PPR. She also agreed to contact Environmental Services about securing permission to post flyers in academic bathrooms.
Meeting 4 - December 5, 2006
Michael described his meeting with Prof. Ginny O'Connell on the design of our protocol for finding which hand sanitizer formulation is most satisfying to the campus. She commented that it looked reasonable but strongly encouraged us to try to assess the effect of our program by doing another study to gather data on illness-related habits and on morbidity rates. Next, Ashley showed us the updated posters she made.
Meeting 3 - November 28, 2006
Steph and Michael discussed our tentative protocol for finding which hand sanitizer formulation is most satisfying to the campus. Rebekah summarized several articles that she read for us, Mara related the illness stories of five of her friends, and Ashley showed us the posters she made. Thanks so much to everyone who came!
Meeting 2 - November 14, 2006
Todo!
Meeting 1 - October 31, 2006
Ideas from the Brainstorming board and subsequent discussion
- Form connections with Worth Health Center to discuss public health situations (specifically mentioned were the lack of hand dryers and paper towels in some dorms)
- Develop RA education to help them act as public health resources and promote a healthy environment
- Encourage sick people to miss class
- Possibly invest in distance-learning technology
- Professors could establish in syllabi what steps sick students should take and/or how many "sick days" per semester were acceptable
- Create a space in the Phoenix or on Swat Dashboard for health issues and bulletins
- Track sickness and display results (possibly in space mentioned above)
- Specifically visual displays
- A version of the MMWR for Swarthmore
- Create a health-related advice column in the Phoenix around stressful times of the year
- Take samples of germs from surfaces in Sharples; culture them and share the results
- Investigate swinging or push doors rather than doors with handles
- Make hand sanitizers readily available
Outline of our (initial) longer-term projects:
- Encourage better hand-washing
- Put entertaining signs in the bathroom to encourage more thorough washing
- Make hand sanitizer available (possibly in Sharples and near the public computer banks)
- Already have a quote from one company
- May want to test types of sanitizers; this would involve
- Writing a protocol for the study
- Running the protocol past the Internal Review Board (since we would technically be doing research on human subjects)
- Running the tests
- Writing up results
- Making a recommendation to the administration
- Raise consciousness and knowledge level about public health issues
- Have education campaigns around finals week, when people may be most receptive (c.f. idea about advice column)
Short-term projects for 11/14/06:
- Make fun bathroom signs: Ashley and Keshia
- Write up a draft of the sanitizer study design: Steph
- Research the companies that produce hand sanitizer to see if they are engaging in socially irresponsible behavior or human rights violations: Amber
- Type up and minutes: Caitlin
- Read articles about hand hygiene: Rebekah, Ashley, Jessica, Yongjun, Brandon
- Design a logo for Swat Clean Hands: [no one yet]
- Work on a collection of people's stories about being sick: Mara