Approaches to Research in Occupational Health and Safety
Fall Semester 2020
Alternate Tuesdays Starting September 15, 14:00-16:30
Classes to be held via Zoom
Dr. Stephen Bornstein (sbornste@mun.ca)

Overview

This course is a core requirement for all students registered in the Interdisciplinary Master’s program in Occupational Health and Safety. Registration is limited to students in this program. The seminar will meet every other week for two semesters and will provide you with the credit hours in total, awarded at the end of the second semester. It is divided into two semester-length units that form a sequence. Every student must take both terms and must take them in the correct order (the fall term before the winter term) but it isn’t necessary to take both terms in the same academic year. After a student has attended the fall term, he/she will receive a ‘no grade’ mark; a full 3-credit-hour grade will be awarded only after he/she has also attended the winter term.

The seminar has two objectives. First, it aims to introduce students to a variety of approaches to doing research in the field of OHS. This will be done through a series of sessions, each led by one of the professors associated with the program. Each of them will present the approach(es) and methods involved in his/her kind(s) of OHS research and will lead a discussion of several relevant required readings listed below. These sessions will take up the entirety of the fall semester and part of the winter semester. The rest of the winter semester will be devoted to the second objective—allowing the students to present their plans for a capstone research project and to discuss their ideas with their fellow students and faculty members.

Course Requirements and grading

• attendance and participation in both semesters with participation being scored for preparedness and the quality of contributions to in-class discussions (20%)
• short journal entries after each session to be submitted the following day, circulated and then discussed at the next session: (30% of final grade overall)
• one 10-page paper in mid-December (30%)
• to be submitted as an e-mail attachment
• late penalty of 4% for each day overdue
• two research proposals in the second semester to be presented in class, discussed, revised, submitted and graded (25% each)
• 8-10 pages each
• due dates and details TBA
• A grade for 3 credit-hours will be assigned after the winter term and will include marks for all oral and written work done in both terms.

Fall schedule

September 15, 2020
Leader: S. Bornstein
Introduction to the program and the seminar

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September 29, 2020
TDB