This application is to continue the successful NIOSH TPG at Virginia Tech.
Our aims are to provide a high quality education to trainees, to have them conduct high quality basic and/or applied research, and to provide service to our profession, to industry, and to society. A key goal of our program is support the NIOSH goal of supplying qualified professionals who move on to careers that focus on occupational safety health, through both research and practice. Our program emphasizes three aspects of occupational safety and health (OSH) at the MS (thesis) and PhD levels: safety engineering, occupational ergonomics, and construction OSH. The latter aspect benefits from the collaboration between several academic and research units at Virginia Tech: Department of Industrial & Systems Engineering (ISE), the Myers-Lawson School of Construction, and the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering. This renewal application seeks program support for five years, and is budgeted to support two full-time, pre-doctoral trainees. We target a mix of trainees at the MS and PhD levels. The need for training in these areas is justified in several ways, primarily by the continuing levels of occupational accidents, injuries, and illnesses; substantial pre-doctoral interest; educational needs in contemporary OSH positions; and the national need for trained researchers and practitioners in these areas. Our program is characterized by a dual emphasis on breadth of trainee experience and the requirement for specialization. TPG funds allow us to maintain this emphasis, as well as attract and retain outstanding trainees. A broad, yet cohesive group of faculty and staff support the program. Training is achieved through a combination of formal coursework, faculty advising, research, and more general exposure through seminars and interdisciplinary interactions. Core sets of courses exist at both the MS and PhD levels, and each trainee conducts a formal research project. Several mechanisms will be to evaluate and improve the program, including an external advisory committee and trainee feedback, and a plan for diversity enhancement, enrollment, and retention that is aligned with the University's Diversity Strategic Plan. Candidates for our program are MS or PhD students accepted within the Human Factors Engineering and Ergonomics graduate concentration area within the Industrial and Systems Engineering Department. Prospective trainees are also actively recruited through several means. Our program overall has been quite successful during the prior period, based on the number of graduates, the high proportion of graduates continuing in the OSH field, faculty and student scholarly output and awards, and the continuing high number of applications received.
This application proposes a continuation of our Training Project Grant at Virginia Tech, begun in 1992. Our proposed training focuses on safety engineering, occupational ergonomics, and construction OSH, and supports both regional and national needs for practitioners and researchers in these domains.
