Exploring Worksite Hazards through Student-Worker Partnerships

Students from the Occupational Health Internship Program (OHIP) will report on their projects with unions and worker centers from 2008, the fifth year of the program. Pairs of undergraduate and graduate students collaborated for eight weeks over the summer with a group of workers to identify and investigate a worksite problem and develop recommendations. Each team will report on how they involved workers in formulating the scope of the project, what they learned from worker interviews and worksite visits, and describe the final health education product they developed to assist workers in future efforts to protect their health on the job.

Some of the proposed projects likely to be reporting are projects with immigrant (largely Latino) worker populations. This may include hotel room cleaners concerned about ergonomic hazards and exposure to toxic cleaning products, worker and community exposure to diesel fumes related to port activities, multiple hazards faced by day laborers in southern California, and workplace violence issues among health care workers.