Community Health Educator

It takes imagination to work as a Community Health Educator. Communities and individuals alike need guidance to make healthy lifestyle choices, and the Community Health Educator is the champion for the cause. In this position, you examine the health risks of a particular group, design informational material, and schedule events to spread your message. You’re also on call during emergency situations, such as the appearance of a new virus, to advise the public on how to respond.

Knowing that a particular behavior is bad isn’t enough motivation to inspire change. As Community Health Educator, you need to find what drives a person, and how to use that to reinforce positive actions. Take a college campus. Students know that drinking too much is bad, but telling an entire campus never to drink is the wrong approach. Instead, you create an informational brochure or presentation that outlines how alcohol poisoning occurs and how to stay within a “safe” drinking limit.

The job is similar to that of an Event Coordinator. You spend the day surveying health risks in a community, scheduling speaking events, and creating informational documents to pass out to individuals. From there, it all depends on who you’re working with and what out-of-the-box ideas you come up with to solve the problem. While college campuses may focus on drinking, a women’s group may need information about breast cancer awareness.

You help others feel more confident and avoid health problems down the road. It’s a creative job that presents new challenges daily so you’ll never feel stuck in the same old routine.