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Context:Many people living in the 5 inhabited US territories experience high rates of natural hazard exposure and social vulnerability to disaster impacts. Public health workforce development and evidence-based, culturally competent approaches to disaster preparedness, response, and recovery are needed in these regions. Program:In 2020, the Natural Hazards Center established thePublic Health Disaster Research Award Programwith funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The program’s goal is to advance public health disaster research and practice by funding, training, mentoring, and connecting researchers, students, and practitioners in historically underserved areas with high natural hazard risk. Between 2020 and 2022, 26 research teams received up to $50 000 each to investigate public health disasters in 1 or more US territories. The program also supported awardees by providing individual consultations, online trainings, feedback on report drafts, and a virtual group workshop on the public health implications of research. Awardees authored final reports and presented at a public webinar. Evaluation:In 2023, the Natural Hazards Center developed and distributed an online survey to all principal investigators. The survey evaluated how awardees advanced knowledge about public health disasters in the US territories; what skills, resources, and connections they acquired; and how they translated their research into public health applications and otherwise disseminated their findings. Discussion:Our evaluation showed that the program is advancing knowledge of understudied hazard contexts and socially vulnerable populations in the US territories and supports awardees in sharing their findings with academics, policymakers, and practitioners. Moreover, it expanded the public health disaster workforce by bringing professionals from a diverse range of disciplines and institutions into the field, and by investing in students, early career scholars, and investigators based in US territories. Researchers are working with local partners to apply their findings to practice. 

The U.S. Geological Survey-managed ShakeAlert® earthquake early warning system is the first public alerting system in the United States to provide rapid mass notification when an earthquake is detected. Although public alert delivery via mobile phones began in California in 2019 followed by Oregon and Washington in 2021, little is known about what might drive widespread implementation in at-risk institutional settings such as schools. For example, there has been limited research on how to best integrate earthquake early warning into existing emergency plans, alert systems, and drills to keep school children and personnel safe in an earthquake. To address this gap, in the spring of 2022, every school district superintendent in Alaska, California, Oregon, and Washington was sent a 15-min online survey. The survey assessed superintendent knowledge of ShakeAlert, preferences for alert messaging, and perceived opportunities and barriers to incorporating the system in schools. The results showed that superintendents had low awareness of ShakeAlert but held positive perceptions of the system's potential to enable life-saving protective actions. A major barrier to adoption included the perceived financial cost of implementing and maintaining the system. There were some statistically significant differences in state responses, and future research could investigate the specific needs of each state based on school district size and composition, hazard exposure, and earthquake experience. Together these findings can help inform targeted strategies to increase ShakeAlert adoption in schools and ultimately improve the safety of school children and staff during earthquakes. 

The National Science Foundation-supported CONVERGE facility was established in 2018 as the first social science-led component of the Natural Hazards Engineering Research Infrastructure (NHERI). Headquartered at the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado Boulder, CONVERGE identifies, trains, connects, and funds researchers across disciplines in the hazards and disaster field. This article provides an overview of one of our most widely used tools, the CONVERGE Training Modules. These free, interactive, online trainings are designed for students, early career professionals, and others who are new to hazards and disaster research and practice. Since July 2019, our team has released 10 modules that cover a range of foundational topics in hazards and disaster research, including Institutional Review Board procedures, conducting emotionally challenging research, cultural competence, collecting and sharing perishable data, social vulnerability, and disaster mental health. In addition, CONVERGE offers advanced trainings in specialized topics such as broader ethical considerations for hazards and disaster researchers, reciprocity, gender-based violence in fieldwork, and public health implications of hazards and disaster research. Between July 2019 and November 2022, 6,311 unique users registered for the modules, and these users logged 7,222 module completions. Of the module completions to date, the largest percentage of users completed only one (46.0%) of the available trainings, although a small group of “superusers”—whom we surveyed for this article—have completed all or almost all of the available modules. When asked why they planned to complete the modules at the time of registration, most users indicated that it was to fulfill a classroom or other educational requirement (51.2%), for personal interest/to learn more (9.0%), or to prepare for or to support research (7.1%) or practice-oriented activities (5.8%). In addition to providing more information regarding module users, this article details the development of the technology and discusses the impact and success of this tool for transferring knowledge and skills to the hazards and disaster research and practice community. We conclude with a discussion of future directions for this research-based educational intervention. 

Researchers across disciplines have long sought to collect ‘perishable data’ in the context of disasters. Yet, this data type is neither consistently defined nor discussed in specific detail in the literature. To address this gap, this paper defines perishable data and provides guidance on ways to improve both how it is collected and shared. Here, perishable data is conceptualised as highly transient data that may degrade in quality, be irrevocably altered, or be permanently lost if not gathered soon after it is generated. Perishable data may include ephemeral information that must be collected to characterise pre‐existing hazardous conditions, near‐miss events, actual disasters, and longer‐term recovery processes. This data may need to be gathered at multiple points in time across varying geographic scales to accurately characterise exposure, susceptibility to harm, or coping capacity. The paper considers ethical and logistical challenges and discusses opportunities to advance equitable perishable data collection and dissemination. 

In addition to academic curricula, schools offer regular drills to train young people and adult staff on what to do in an emergency or disaster. Earthquake drills in the United States currently recommend the protective action “drop, cover, and hold on” in the event of shaking. Yet, little is known about whether this guidance is followed in schools and homes by children and adults. To fill this gap, this research examined protective actions taken by children and adults during the 2018 Anchorage, Alaska earthquake and the 2019 Ridgecrest, California earthquake sequence. Our research team conducted indepth interviews with kindergarten to secondary school administrators, teachers, and students, as well with parents, emergency managers, building officials, and engineers (N = 118) in earthquake-affected communities. Our findings indicate that the most common action among children across the study locations was to drop, cover, and hold on. Adults, however, did not always follow current recommended guidance and exhibited more variability in the actions they took in response to shaking, such as trying to protect others, getting in doorways, freezing in place, or rapidly exiting buildings. This research suggests that a generational gap exists that could compromise the safety of young people as well as the adults who care for them. We recommend that earthquake training in schools be strengthened to better prepare both child and adult populations for the threat of earthquakes. Moreover, the emergence of new technologies, like ShakeAlert – the earthquake early warning system for the West Coast of the United States – can create new opportunities for disseminating alert and warning information and preparing populations for impending hazards. Recognising how children and adults may react in an earthquake can improve drills and messaging, refine risk communication strategies, and reduce injury and loss of life. 

There is an expansive and growing body of literature that examines the mental health consequences of disasters and large-scale emergencies. There is a need, however, for more explicit incorporation of mental health research into disaster risk reduction practices. Training and education programs can serve as a bridge to connect academic mental health research and the work of disaster risk reduction practitioners. This article describes the development and evaluation of one such intervention, the CONVERGE Disaster Mental Health Training Module, which provides users from diverse academic and professional backgrounds with foundational knowledge on disaster mental health risk factors, mental health outcomes, and psychosocial well-being research. Moreover, the module helps bridge the gap between research and practice by describing methods used to study disaster mental health, showcasing examples of evidence-based programs and tools, and providing recommendations for future research. Since its initial release on 8 October 2019, 317 trainees from 12 countries have completed the Disaster Mental Health Training Module. All trainees completed a pre- and post-training questionnaire regarding their disaster mental health knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Wilcoxon Signed Rank tests demonstrated a significant increase in all three measures after completion of the training module. Students, emerging researchers or practitioners, and trainees with a high school/GED education level experienced the greatest benefit from the module, with Kruskal–Wallis results indicating significant differences in changes in knowledge and skills across the groups. This evaluation research highlights the effectiveness of the Disaster Mental Health Training Module in increasing knowledge, skills, and attitudes among trainees. This article concludes with a discussion of how this training can support workforce development and ultimately contribute to broader disaster risk reduction efforts. 

Older adults are especially vulnerable to disasters due to high rates of chronic illness, disability, and social isolation. Limited research examines how gender, race/ethnicity, and forces of nature—defined here as different types of natural hazards, such as storms and earthquakes—intersect to shape older adults’ disaster-related mortality risk. We compare mortality rates among older adults (60+ years) in the United States across gender, race/ethnicity, and hazard type using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Wonder database. Our results demonstrate that older adult males have higher mortality rates than females. American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) males have the highest mortality and are particularly impacted by excessive cold. Mortality is also high among Black males, especially due to cataclysmic storms. To address disparities, messaging and programs targeting the dangers of excessive cold should be emphasized for AI/AN older adult males, whereas efforts to reduce harm from cataclysmic storms should target Black older adult males.