Senior Shines at National Health Conference

01/27/2015 

SUNY Cortland senior Samantha Glassman never imagined in her earlier years of college that she would one day find herself representing her classmates and professors at the nation’s top health conference.

The senior community health major from Plainview, N.Y., said she was almost overwhelmed by the crowds at the American Public Health Association (APHA) annual conference in New Orleans, held Nov. 15 to 18. But an urgent health message motivated her presentation.

“You don’t have health, you don’t have anything,” said Glassman, explaining the reasons why she started her investigation into the genital human papillomavirus (also called HPV) vaccine as a research assistant in the College’s Health Department.

In fact, the quality of her diligent research ultimately led to the abstract that she presented on the HPV vaccine, the leading sexually transmitted disease in the country.

“I wanted students and everyone to be ‘educated and vaccinated’ about HPV,” Glassman said. Her presentation focused on how and why the HPV vaccination rate is so low among male college students.

Bonni Hodges, who chairs the College’s Health Department, was impressed at Glassman’s accomplishment.

“The APHA conference is the premier public health conference in the U.S. and includes presentations from all over the world,” Hodges said. “It is hard enough for we professors to get accepted to present at this conference, so the fact that Samantha’s work was selected is rather extraordinary.”

Glassman originally became involved with the HPV research while serving as an undergraduate research assistant to Associate Professor Jill Murphy and Hodges on a variety of projects. Glassman also worked with Associate Professor Sarah Beshers, who was working with Murphy to conduct a 2011 survey exploring the reason why the HPV vaccination rate is so low among young college males.

Glassman and her professors together submitted their research findings to the APHA late last spring. They learned the abstract was accepted last June and Glassman prepared for the presentation in the fall.

She developed an educational poster for the conference that combined Beshers’ survey with hew own related research. Glassman’s poster is displayed in Moffett Center’s main hallway near where the old and renovated corridors meet at a corner nearest Old Main.

Samantha Glassman stands beside the research poster that earned her lots of attention at the American Public Health Association in New Orleans, La.

Health Department staff members said they are proud of their young protégé.

“It’s a great opportunity to showcase our undergraduate community health program and all the experiences SUNY Cortland has to offer,” Hodges said.

Glassman’s future looks bright. She’s applying to nursing school to start her clinical background, and beyond that aspires to the top public health department posts in the state and country.

“I’m inspired to be a bigger and better official in the public health community,” she said.

Prepared by Public Relations Office intern Paul Barchitta