Global Health Educators Community (GHECo)

The CUGH Global Health Educators Community (GHECo = “gecko”) provides professional development and networking opportunities for professors who teach global health courses, design curricula and experiential learning activities for nonclinical undergraduate and graduate programs, and oversee baccalaureate majors and minors, academic master’s degrees, and research-based doctoral degrees.

    GHECo is an international, multidisciplinary community of practice for global health educators that began hosting monthly Virtual Teachers’ Lounges (VTLs) and other events in September 2023. GHECo membership is free to everyone; CUGH membership is not required. To receive invitations to the monthly online GHECo meetings and special events, please sign up for the mailing list using the form at https://cugh.groups.io/g/gheco. Questions about GHECo may be directed to the founding co-chairs, Kathryn H. Jacobsen (University of Richmond) and Caryl E. Waggett (Allegheny College)

    Join the list

    To receive invitations to the monthly GHECo meetings and special events, please create an account at https://cugh.groups.io/g/gheco. All global health educators are welcome to join the listserv and attend GHECo events. CUGH membership is not a requirement for participation in the community.

    DomainGlobal Health Learning Objective
    ValuesDescribe the history, values, and functions of global health.
    GlobalizationExplain how travel, trade, and other aspects of globalization contribute to health, disease, and health disparities.
    SocioeconomicsSummarize the economic, social, cultural, and political contributors to individual and population health.
    EnvironmentExamine the connections between human health and environmental health, including considerations of water, sanitation, air quality, urbanization, ecosystem health, and climate change
    EthicsDiscuss the relationship between human rights and global health.
    Healthcare SystemsCompare the financing and delivery of medical care in countries with different types of health systems and different income levels.
    GovernanceExamine the roles, responsibilities, and relationships of the agencies and organizations involved in prioritizing, financing, and implementing public health interventions locally and internationally.
    EpidemiologyCompare the burden of disease, disability, and death from infectious diseases, reproductive health issues, malnutrition, noncommunicable diseases, mental health disorders, and injuries in countries with different income levels
    InterventionsIdentify evidence-based, cost-effective, sustainable interventions for promoting health and preventing illness across the lifespan from the prenatal period through older adulthood.
    EvaluationEvaluate policies that seek to solve major population health concerns and achieve health equity.
    Reference:  Jacobsen KH, Waggett CE, Bayles BR, Berenbaum P, Carlson GL, English R, Faerron Guzmán CA, Gartin ML, Grant L, Henshaw T, Iannotti LL, Landrigan PL, Lansbury N, Li H, Lichtveld MY, McWhorter KL, Rettig JE, Sorensen CJ, Wetzel EJ, Whitehead DM, Winch PJ, Martin KW.  Planetary Health Learning Objectives: foundational knowledge for global health education in an era of climate change.  The Lancet Planetary Health.  2024 Sept; 8(9): e706–713.  doi:10.1016/S2542-5196(24)00167-0

    DomainPlanetary Health Learning Objective
    Earth System ChangesIdentify the natural and human-generated causes of altered biogeochemical flows, climate change, biodiversity loss, environmental pollutants, land-system change, freshwater change, ocean acidification, atmospheric aerosol loading, stratospheric ozone depletion, and other global environmental changes.
    Ecological SystemsDescribe how the ecosystems formed by human, domestic animal, wildlife, plant, and other biotic populations are affected by human actions across trophic levels, geographies, and time.
    Human Health OutcomesExplain how extreme temperature and precipitation events, reduced air and water quality, population displacement, and other global changes increase incidence, prevalence, and mortality from infectious diseases; malnutrition; respiratory, cardiovascular, and other noncommunicable diseases; sexual and reproductive health issues; psychosocial health disorders; and injuries.
    Risk AssessmentAnalyze how economic, social, cultural, political, environmental, technological, and health systems affect ecosystem and human vulnerability and resilience to environmental change.
    GovernanceEvaluate how local, national, and international laws and policies have contributed to environmental problems and solutions.
    ActionsCompare the roles and responsibilities of governments, the commercial sector, civil society organizations, communities, and individuals in promoting conservation, restoration, mitigation, and adaptation related to environmental change
    EthicsArticulate the principles of intragenerational, interspecies, and intergenerational environmental justice.
    CommunicationDemonstrate environmental and health literacy by accessing, evaluating, and communicating reliable scientific information about global environmental change.
    Reference:  Jacobsen KH, Waggett CE, Bayles BR, Berenbaum P, Carlson GL, English R, Faerron Guzmán CA, Gartin ML, Grant L, Henshaw T, Iannotti LL, Landrigan PL, Lansbury N, Li H, Lichtveld MY, McWhorter KL, Rettig JE, Sorensen CJ, Wetzel EJ, Whitehead DM, Winch PJ, Martin KW.  Planetary Health Learning Objectives: foundational knowledge for global health education in an era of climate change.  The Lancet Planetary Health.  2024 Sept; 8(9): e706–713.  doi:10.1016/S2542-5196(24)00167-0

    Most Recent GHECo Newsletter

    30 November 2025

    This is CUGH Virtual Global Health Week 2025!
    • The annual CUGH Virtual Global Health Week will be held December 2–4. Details about the 16 free webinars are posted at https://www.cugh.org/our-work/events/. The themes include palliative care training, anti-corruption in health, children in war zones, human security in global health, global health education in Asia, clinical trial capacity building, food security, health communication, peace through health, global health governance, AI in global health, protecting the global health workforce in an era of financial contraction, gun violence, and other topics.
    • Stop by the GHECo Virtual Open House on December 5 between 9am and 11am New York time to chat with other GHECo members about trends in global health education and how to apply the themes from week’s CUGH webinars to your teaching, mentoring, and advising. Register at https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_8YQwbnoiTJGCZJtV8T-nGA to receive a link to the Open House. All are welcome to stop by for a few minutes or stay for the full 2 hours.
    Other Upcoming Webinars (all are free to participants!)
    New Publications
    • GHECo members Myrian Vuckovic and Margaret Baker authored “Host perceptions of an undergraduate semester abroad: strengthening partnerships in global health education” in BMJ Global Health. Key informants from Australia, Bangladesh, Ghana, India, Mexico, the Philippines, and Tanzania identified partnership, communication, and cultural competence as critical for the development of strong educational programs. Read the full article https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/15/10/e104435.
    • In case you missed it… The Koplan et al. definition of global health that was published in The Lancet in 2009 was written by a CUGH working group. “An updated definition of global health” was published in Global Health Research and Policy: “Global health is a field of academic study, research, policy, and applied practice that advances the equitable protection and improvement of population and planetary health.” The full article, which includes an illustration of the “5 Ps” model of global health (people, planet, priorities, policies, practices) is available at https://rdcu.be/eM1jT.
    Job Openings
    Help us grow GHECo

    If you have colleagues and friends who are involved in global health education but are not yet on the “gecko” mailing list, please invite them to sign up at https://cugh.groups.io/g/gheco.

    Do you have items for the GHECo Newsletter?

    Is your institution hosting an upcoming webinar or seeking job applicants?  Is your professional society seeking submissions for an upcoming conference?  Have you recently published a journal article about global health education?  Would you like to host a special-topics VTL for a geographic region, an area of professional practice, or another theme?  Please email information about upcoming events and new resources related to global health education to kjacobse@richmond.edu and/or cwaggett@allegheny.edu so that we can share them in the next GHECo newsletter!