Drew Hill '09

Environmental Health  Strategy Center of Maine, Alliance  for a Clean and Healthy Maine
  Waterville, Maine

January 2009  

My internship is with the Environmental Health Strategy Center (EHSC). EHSC
    (http://www.preventharm.org) is a non-profit organization in Maine with the goal of
    protecting human health by “reducing exposure to toxic chemicals, expanding the use of
    safer alternatives, and building partnerships that focus on the environment as a public
    health priority.” They work to accomplish this goal through grassroots movements and
    state campaigns as well as the dissemination of their public health models and legislation
    to national and global public health networks.

    As a research intern for the Environmental Health Strategy Center (EHSC), I spent the
    majority of my time researching current literature on Bisphenol-A. Specifically, I
    researched exposure types, health and behavioral effects, and legislation concerning
    Bisphenol-A. I also devoted some of my time to researching “obesogens,”
    environmentally present chemicals that have been shown to facilitate obesity. The final
    fruit of my labors was an annotated bibliography and executive summary of exposure
    types, health and behavioral effects, and legislation concerning Bisphenol-A. This dossier
    will be used to quickly and efficiently educate legislators as well as uninformed workers
    at EHSC.

My internship was carried out from an on-campus. The literature research I performed
    was entirely web-based, and, with the seemingly infinite access to web-databases and
    electronic journals, I was able to work out of the Diamond GIS lab or my dorm-room.

    While working on-campus was not conducive to learning a lot about the organization
    (EHSC), I learned a considerable amount about literature-research methods and the field
    of environmental health as a whole. Moreover, I became a veritable expert on the current
    situation of and scientific knowledgebase of Bisphenol-A.