Aarin Palomares, Claire Finney, Sean McMahon, Katherine Hymel and Beenish KamranFive students from the UAB School of Public Health competed against 13 teams from across the United States in the St. Louis University Public Health Scholar Bowl, winning first place in the bowl and tying for second place in the case competition.
Beenish Kamran, Katherine Hymel, Sean McMahon, Claire Finney and Aarin Palomares won the quiz-bowl-style tournament focused on current public health topics ranging from disease outbreaks to global and community health. The group of undergraduate students competed against teams including Johns Hopkins, George Washington University and Washington University.
“Beyond academic success in the classroom — which this group has in spades — these students have always pushed the envelope to identify opportunities to practice and display their public health skills in the community,” said Suzanne Judd, Ph.D., assistant dean for undergraduate education in the School of Public Health. “The public health scholars bowl was a natural extension of their commitment to seek out these new opportunities. Competing against students from other universities only enhanced their drive to succeed. I am so proud of the passion and drive within each of these talented undergraduates that led to the success they achieved at the scholars bowl.”
During the case competition, UAB’s team worked collaboratively to tackle a current issue causing health problems in a community, sleep deprivation on campus. The team developed a promotional campaign and identified policies that may impact sleep, which landed them in second place.
“These students have participated in our Wicked Problem Case Competition and the Global Case Competition, and this year a couple of them assisted in writing the case for our wicked competition,” said Max Michael, M.D., dean of the UAB School of Public Health. “Because the cases we use are so complex, our students are well-prepared in thinking through the process of dealing with complicated issues. I’m not at all surprised at their success and how well they represented our school at a national competition.”