College of Public Health alumna Rebecca Arnold (MPH ’10) has been selected to receive the 2015 International Impact Award for outstanding work in the field of public health.

Arnold will receive the award on Nov. 10 at the start of International Programs’ WorldCanvass television show and will participate in a wide-ranging discussion of global public health issues. Earlier that day, she will present a seminar open to students, faculty, and staff.

Nov. 10
Guest Seminar – Improving Community Health: From Africa to Asia, from Grassroots to Policy
Noon to 1 p.m.
C217 CPHB

Arnold will speak about her career improving community health around the world. All are invited; lunch will be provided.

Nov. 10
WorldCanvass: Communicating for Social and Behavioral Change
5 p.m.
FilmScene, 118 E College St., Iowa City

About the award

The International Impact Award recognizes distinguished alumni and other individuals with significant ties to the University of Iowa who have made important contributions internationally or, in the case of international alumni, abroad in their home countries.

The International Impact Award was established by UI International Programs in 2010 in order to honor exceptional individuals in any field who have made sustained and deep contributions internationally or in the U.S. to promote global understanding. The award is presented by the UI president during International Education Week in a public ceremony.

Currently the senior program officer at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Center for Communication Programs, Arnold  has effectively blended her deep knowledge of communication strategies with an understanding of critical public health issues facing populations in many parts of the world.  A self-described “social and behavioral change communications specialist,” her work has directly affected the delivery of knowledge and skills around family planning as well as maternal, newborn, and child health and nutrition, and has led to improved health behaviors in communities from Madagascar to Bangladesh.

A global focus

Arnold’s focus has always been global. She’s worked as a community health educator, has fought global poverty with the NGO CARE (Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere), and has developed grassroots advocacy guides used in Burundi, Uganda, and Rwanda to assist local activists in the prevention of gender-based violence in their communities.

In recent years, Arnold, a native of Rock Island, Ill.,  has directed the Bangladesh Knowledge Management Initiative (BKMI) in Dhaka, Bangladesh.  BKMI is a USAID-funded project to strengthen the capacity of the Bangladesh Ministry of Health and Family Welfare as it attempts to develop a national communication framework for health, population, and nutrition, which is currently absent in Bangladesh.  As part of this effort, she is developing digital resources (eHealth) for community-based, non-clinical field health workers to use in counseling at the household level.

These are only a few highlights of Arnold’s impressive accomplishments at a global level. Since her earliest days as a Peace Corps volunteer, Arnold has been acutely aware of the relationship between health and economic security. By creating appropriately targeted behavior change communication campaigns around health, Arnold and her public health colleagues are positively affecting not only those in the immediate vicinity but serving as a model for use by public health workers in other developing countries.

Article courtesy of UI International Programs