CDPH InternAt — California Department of Public Health

The CDPH intern will support the Surveillance Unit of the California Tobacco Prevention Program (CTPP) within CDPH by completing mandatory trainings, attending meetings, and contributing to tobacco prevention projects. Key responsibilities include:

• Training & Skill Development: Complete required CDPH/CTPP trainings and, if interested, additional sessions on plain language, ADA compliance, AI tools (e.g., Microsoft Copilot), data analysis (SAS/R), and ArcGIS mapping.
• Meeting Participation: Attend Surveillance Unit (SU), Evaluation and Surveillance Section (ESS), and branch-wide meetings, webinars, and provide project updates.
• Project Support: Assist SU staff with tobacco prevention initiatives such as survey development/testing (e.g., Spring 2026 Online California Adult Tobacco Survey), database management, literature reviews, and creating factsheets/infographics.
• Data Analysis: Gain hands-on experience cleaning and analyzing complex datasets (e.g., Online CATS, CYTS) to assess tobacco use prevalence.
• Research & Administrative Tasks: Conduct literature reviews, ensure ADA compliance in documents, and provide general support.
• Optional Research Project: Depending on skills and program requirements, address a tobacco control research question using state or national public-use datasets.

Tasks:

Complete all CDPH/CTPP mandatory trainings and participate in meetings.
Attend Surveillance Unit (SU), Evaluation and Surveillance Section (ESS), and Branch-Wide CTPP meetings in addition to webinars and other relevant trainings. Provide updates on relevant projects at section meetings.
Collaborate with and assist Surveillance Section Unit (SU) staff on tobacco prevention projects. Projects may include:
Databases of survey items, analyses, reports on tobacco statistics, literature reviews, and/or factsheets/infographics.
Survey program development and testing (e.g., Spring 2026 Online California Adult Tobacco Survey).
Gain experience in data analysis and processing. For example:
Data processing/cleaning the other (specify) responses using datasets such as the Online CATS and California Youth Tobacco Survey (CYTS).
Analyzing tobacco use prevalence using programs such as SAS or R.
Provide research and administrative support (e.g., literature review, note-taking, ADA-document compliance).

Training:

General employer orientation (mandatory), weekly one-on-one mentor meetings, job shadowing, workshops/skills training, training in writing literature reviews and writing analytic code relevant for tobacco control and public health research.

Learning Outcome:

Communicate public health findings clearly to an academic and lay audience. Use acquired analytic skills to write code to analyze tobacco related datasets. Contribute to team projects and develop tobacco control research insight.