Osterberg takes public health issues on the road

David Osterberg, right, greets Rob Denson, president of Northeast Iowa Community College, before a public forum sponsored by the College of Public Health in Calmar. Denson said the University has been doing a great job of presenting topics of interest on his campus. Photo by Tom Jorgensen.

On a chilly November evening in the rural community of Calmar, more than 100 people trickled into the Dairy Center on the Northeast Iowa Community College campus.

They came from all walks of life—the Archdiocese of Dubuque, nearby Luther College, the Iowa Legislature, and the local farming community, to name a few—and they varied in years from college-aged to elderly. Some dressed in suits, while others opted for sweatpants and tie-dyes.

They congregated, in part, to engage in a discussion with a University of Iowa professor about the merits of renewable energy.

David Osterberg, associate clinical professor of occupational and environmental health, was part of a free educational program called “Farming for the Future: Sustainable Agriculture and Renewable Energy Production,” sponsored jointly by the College of Public Health and the Alumni Association. His presentation centered on a four-week solar bike tour that he took last summer in Europe, during which he and several companions visited a number of communities that are employing renewable sources of energy. He shared information on wind power, methane generation, and the burning of biomass. Mike Duffy, professor of agricultural economics at Iowa State University, was a co-presenter.

“Some of the benefits of using renewable energy [as opposed to reliance on coal-fired power plants] include less disease, such as asthma, less acid rain, less mercury in the Great Lakes, and fewer greenhouse gases warming the atmosphere,” he explains. “And using wind power, for example, is cheaper. New wind plants produce electricity more cheaply than new coal plants. Furthermore, you don’t know what the price of coal will be years from now, but the wind will continue to be free.”

Through his appointment in the College of Public Health, Osterberg travels to various Iowa communities about 30 times a year. His audiences vary from high school science teachers to Rotary Club members to church-based groups. In addition to renewable energy, he discusses issues related to global climate change and water quality.

Osterberg embraces the outreach aspect of his faculty position. Having spent 12 years serving in the Iowa General Assembly, he says his goal is to make the world a better place, and he’s content starting with the state of Iowa.

“We’re supposed to be the ones gathering the information and seeing the bigger picture,” Osterberg says of the University. “As researchers and teachers, we have skills that we ought to share with society.”

Not only do residents of smaller Iowa communities have an opportunity to visit with UI faculty and staff members and learn firsthand about the work they are doing, he says, such outreach events help “sell” the University.

“I think it makes people more willing to send their kids to Iowa and more comfortable spending their tax dollars on us,” he says. “And through outreach we can make a difference in their lives.”

On campus, Osterberg teaches courses on environmental policy and assessment as well as urban environmental planning and politics. He is the executive director of the Iowa Policy Project, a nonprofit organization that supports independent research by scholars at Iowa’s public and private colleges and universities.

Osterberg is one of many faculty members in the College of Public Health helping to spread the word on public-health issues. In fact, the college has teamed up with the Alumni Association—and often joins with area “partners,” such as hospitals or community-based advocacy groups—to present a series of free informational seminars across the state. Topics have included end-of-life care, the health effects of concentrated animal feeding operations, tobacco settlement monies, agricultural safety, and cancer.

Dan McMillan, the college’s director of communications, says outreach is an important avenue for carrying out the college’s mission to promote health and prevent injury and illness through commitment to education and training, excellence in research, innovation in policy development, and devotion to public health practice.

“Our farm-safety programs, a toll-free smoking cessation hotline, the activities of the cancer and birth defects registries, and training for local personnel in bioterrorism preparedness—these are all examples of programs that respond to important health issues in Iowa,” McMillan says.

“These programs tap the reservoir of skill and talent that exists among faculty and staff and makes it available to people living in, say, Woodbury County or Cerro Gordo County or Keokuk County. It’s a tangible product that also represents something larger: the critical connection between the people of Iowa and this great university.”

Article by Sara Epstein Moninger