College of Public Health graduate student Steven Rippentrop has been selected for the 2015 Obermann Graduate Institute. As an Obermann Graduate Fellow, he will participate in a one-week intensive institute exploring how to combine public engagement with research and teaching. The program, now in its ninth year, is organized and presented by the University of Iowa Obermann Center for Advanced Studies.

During the week-long institute, participants discuss theories of engagement and meet with experts, including former Obermann Graduate Fellows, faculty members, administrators, and potential community partners. They participate in a site visit — this year’s will be to Iowa City’s water treatment facility. They also develop their own engaged project, which they present in draft form at the end of the Institute and then again in a public forum of their choice.

Rippentrop, a resident physician in the occupational medicine program and a student in the Executive Master of Health Administration program, anticipates that the institute will help him explore community based participatory research methodologies that build strong collaborations.

“Evidence based interventions in the community and in our health care delivery systems can decrease the cost of medicine while increasing its quality and value,” Rippentrop says. “Better quality and value in health care means healthier communities. This institute will help provide a framework through which we can get healthy and, then, pass it on.”