National Webinar Calendar - Upcoming Webinars

GIS for Everyone: Turning Environmental Health Data into Action

Sep 30, 12:00 - 1:00 pm MT | Register

This webinar explores how Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are powerful tools for understanding, visualizing, and communicating environmental public health data—and they are accessible to organizations at every stage of GIS adoption. This webinar will bring together environmental health professionals to share practical examples of how maps, dashboards, and spatial data are being used to improve program management, support decision-making, strengthen partnerships, and communicate public health impacts.

Through real-world case studies and peer-to-peer learning, participants will discover scalable approaches to GIS implementation, explore innovative applications across environmental health programs, and gain ideas they can apply within their own organizations, regardless of their current level of GIS experience.

Protecting Children’s Health in a Changing Environment

This three-part webinar series equips environmental health professionals with the knowledge, tools, and practical strategies to better protect children from environmental and climate-related health risks. Participants will explore children’s environmental health competencies, prepare for climate-related hazards, and learn effective ways to communicate with diverse audiences about climate and children’s health. Together, the sessions provide actionable approaches for strengthening practice, building community partnerships, and advancing healthier environments for children.

Webinar #1 Integrating Children's Environmental Health Competencies into Public Health Education and Practice

October 13 at 11 am MT | Register

Description: Children face unique environmental health risks because of their developing bodies, behaviors, and environments, making children’s environmental health an essential component of public health practice. This webinar will introduce the Children’s Environmental Health Competencies and Performance Indicators, a framework designed to strengthen the knowledge and skills needed to identify and address environmental threats to children. Presenters will demonstrate how the competencies can be integrated into public health curricula, workforce training, environmental health practice, and community initiatives. Using case studies, participants will explore practical strategies for applying the competencies to real-world environmental health challenges. Attendees will leave with tools, teaching materials, and resources they can use to assess existing programs, strengthen workforce competencies, and support children’s environmental health initiatives in their communities. The session will also highlight opportunities for collaboration among environmental health professionals, educators, public health practitioners, and community partners.

Webinar #2: Protecting Children's Health in a Changing Climate: What Environmental Health Professionals Need to Know

November 10 at 11 am MT | Register

Description: Children are uniquely vulnerable to climate-related health risks because of their developing bodies, behaviors, and dependence on caregivers and community systems. As climate conditions change, environmental health professionals play a critical role in protecting children from hazards including extreme heat, air pollution, wildfire smoke, flooding, poor water quality, vector-borne diseases, and extreme weather events. This webinar will explore how these hazards affect children and how risks may differ across rural and urban communities and populations experiencing environmental health inequities. Using local and state examples, presenters will demonstrate how to apply a children’s environmental health lens to climate adaptation, preparedness, and response. Attendees will gain practical strategies for identifying children and communities at increased risk, incorporating children’s unique vulnerabilities into environmental health assessments and preparedness planning, and identifying opportunities for action within their own programs. Participants will leave better equipped to integrate children’s health considerations into climate-related environmental health practice.

Webinar #3: Talking About Climate and Children's Health: Communication Strategies That Work

December 8 at 11 am MT | Register

Description: Communicating about climate change and children’s health can be challenging, particularly when audiences have different levels of health literacy, concerns, values, or beliefs. Facts alone are often not enough to build understanding or motivate action. This webinar will introduce environmental health professionals to practical communication strategies for discussing climate-related health risks in ways that are clear, locally relevant, and responsive to their audiences. Participants will explore message framing, trusted messengers, climate and health literacy, and approaches for constructively addressing misinformation and polarization. Examples will demonstrate how communication can be tailored for parents, communities, schools, policymakers, and other partners. Through an interactive message-development exercise, attendees will practice translating environmental health information into accessible, audience-specific messages. Participants will leave with communication strategies and tools they can use to explain climate and children’s health risks, respond to common misconceptions, build trust, and support informed action in the communities they serve.

Speakers

Michelle Del Rio, MPH, PhD

Dr. Michelle Del Rio is an Assistant Professor of Environmental and Occupational Health and Associate Director of the Maternal and Child Health Research Institute at Indiana University Bloomington. An interdisciplinary environmental health scientist, she conducts community-engaged research examining how environmental contaminants and social determinants of health interact to inform equitable, multilevel interventions. Her research focuses on reducing environmental health disparities, particularly lead and arsenic exposure, water insecurity, and transportation barriers among underserved populations. Using mixed-methods approaches, biomarkers, environmental data, exposure and risk assessments, and participatory science, she investigates cumulative environmental exposures and develops accessible approaches to exposure assessment. Dr. Del Rio earned her Ph.D., MPH, and bachelor’s degree from the University of Texas at El Paso and is a first-generation college graduate. Her long-term goal is to develop holistic interventions that reduce children’s exposure to lead and other environmental contaminants while advancing training and capacity in children’s environmental health.

Leyla McCurdy, MPhil

Leyla McCurdy is the founder and chair of American Public Health Association’s (APHA) Children’s Environmental Health Committee. She has over twenty years of experience in public health and the environment. She has been instrumental in creating thousands of environmental health champions among health professionals, and developing model environmental health interventions implemented in communities nationwide. She has organized conferences, led public education campaigns, developed publications, and published articles in peer-reviewed journals.

Currently she is an environmental health consultant, chairs the Climate for Health Executive Committee at ecoAmerica, and serves on the boards of Children’s Environmental Health Network and the Neuro Climate Working Group . She also serves on expert committees, including APHA’s Center for Climate, Health and Equity Advisory Board and the National Council for Environmental Health & Equity. She holds a Master of Philosophy in Chemistry from George Washington University. Her work experience includes ecoAmerica, National Environmental Education Foundation, American Lung Association, and Johnson & Johnson.

Lindsay Tallon, PhD, MSPH, CPH

Dr. Lindsay Tallon is an Associate Professor of Public Health at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. Her work focuses on children’s environmental health, climate change, and environmental justice, with expertise in chemical policy, community engagement, and air quality. She is a researcher with the PFAS Project Lab and has led international projects on air quality in schools and citizen science. Previously, Dr. Tallon held leadership positions at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health and continues to support public health professionals through projects focused on lead poisoning prevention, environmental justice and equity, and environmental health workforce training. Her award winning textbook, Environmental Health: Foundations for Public Health, brings together the expertise of environmental health practitioners and educators to provide an applied foundation in the field. Dr.Tallon also serves as Associate Editor of the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice and earned her Ph.D. in Population Health from Northeastern University.

Previous National Webinars

Our older webinars, full of relevant and engaging information, are all available for free on youtube. Check us out here.