STRENGTHENING GLOBAL COMPETENCE OF TUSKEGEE VETERINARY STUDENTS WITH FOCUS ON EMERGING ZOONOSES AND FOOD ANIMAL MEDICINE

<b>Project Methods</b><br> Develop syllabus & course outline for the new "Emerging Zoonoses" course with approvals from TU administration to offer from Fall 2022: It will be a 2.0 -credit hour elective course for veterinary students and graduate students. Pre-requisites for veterinary students will be the two courses of "Infection & Immunity" and any university-level course on Microbiology for graduate students.Provide externships for selected students at USDA Food Animal Research Centers & at foreign institutions in Egypt, Ethiopia, or India: Selected students will be sent for a 10-week summer internship programs at the two USDA institutions with stipends funded with this grant. Dr. Chitko-Mckown, Interim Research Leader at the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center has agreed to provide exposure to our students in the areas of food animal diseases and on-going research on those diseases and the current herd health management practices to enhance production. Dr. David Suarez, Research Leader at the National Poultry Research Center will expose our students to the on-going poultry diseases research at the center with special reference to avian influenza and how basic and applied research is supporting the poultry industry. Two selected students each year will be supported for externships at collaborating foreign institutions. Students will receive funds for meals, incidental expenses, and travel to the foreign country. The hosts will arrange to receive them and provide on-campus housing for 4-weeks.Facilitate attending of Scientific meetings & Training programs by faculty members: During each year of the project, two faculty members involved in this project will attend workshops/ training programs and two faculty members will attend scientific conferences related to emerging infectious and zoonotic diseases. We proposed International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases; Annual Meeting of the American Society of Microbiology (ASM); or International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases. One Faculty member (Dr. Asseged Dibaba, Associate Professor of Epidemiology & Public Health) will attend the training course "Infectious Disease Transmission Models for Public Health Decision making" at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University.