Dr. Catherine Yeckel

Students from the Yale School of Public Health merged their scientific skills with the creative talents of their peers at the Yale School of Art.

The result? The creation of a collection of original posters designed to provoke awareness, stimulate thought, and change behavior on pressing issues such as obesity, breast cancer screening, self-respect, the dangers of concussions, child abuse, early signs of autism, skin cancer and other issues. That work is now on view, through April 24, at the Oglethorpe University Museum of Art (OUMA).

This multi-year collaborative project combining public health and graphic design was organized by Catherine Weikart Yeckel, MS, PhD., Assoc. Res. Sci/ Lecturer of the Yale School of Medicine/ Yale School of Public Health, and Henk van Assen, senior critic, and Julian Bittiner, critic with the Yale University School of Art. On March 23, OUMA welcomes both Dr. Yeckel and Mr. van Assen for the lecture “The Art of Public Health,” a featured event of the Atlanta Science Festival. They will discuss their unusual partnership to produce the original posters with important scientific and public health messages.

Henk van Assen

The Yale University collaborators also will meet with two Oglethorpe biology classes planning their own public health messaging poster projects, with the help of Elizabeth Peterson, director of OUMA. Students in Genetically Modified Organisms, taught by Dr. Lea Alford, as well as Cancer Biology, a service-learning class with Dr. Karen Schmeichel, have been brainstorming their own public health messages specifically targeting the Oglethorpe community. These messages range from the health benefits of walking on campus and eating organically, to the dangers of secondary smoke and texting while driving. Their work will be on display during Oglethorpe’s 2016 Liberal Arts and Sciences Symposium and PRISM (Posters of Research in Science and Mathematics) later this spring.