I am writing to ask if you are able to provider your expertise as a moderator of a three-person panel which will be the feature event for the 19th National Health Equity Research Webcast. The event takes place on June 3-4, 2012 in Chapel Hill, NC
This invitation is extended on behalf of an interdisciplinary committee co-led by Marco Barker, Sr. Director for Education Operations & Initiatives (on behalf of UNC Diversity and Multicultural Affairs) and Vic Schoenbach (on behalf of the Minority Health Project in the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health) planning the 19th National Health Equity Research Webcast. The topic area for this year is early childhood development, including the effects of poverty on non-cognitive skills and interventions to improve them.
The broadcast is scheduled for the first Tuesday in June (June 4, 2013), and we are hoping that you will be the moderator for the panel presentation, comprised of three national experts. One is Yvette Sanchez-Fuentes. The broadcast is produced in the School of Social Work auditorium. The local audience (100-150) consists largely of students participating in "pipeline" programs, such as the NC Health Careers Access Program , the Medical Education Development program, and the Summer Public Health Fellowship program. Others in attendance include faculty, graduate students, public health workers, and a small number of persons from the community. The remote audience usually has about 500 students, faculty, researchers, and public health practitioners, though last year we estimated about 1,800.
The format consists of a 20-minute presentation by each of our three speakers, after which they respond to questions and comments from studio and broadcast participants, for about 75 minutes. The moderator facilitates this exchange. The entire program runs from 1:30pm to 4:00pm. You can view last year’s broadcast at http://www.sph.unc.edu/media/webcasts.html?webcast=2012-06-05_wc1800sd2012. That webpage has direct links to each of last year’s presentations and to the question-and-answer period, so you can easily sample each section of the entire webcast. Previous webcasts in this series can be found at www.minority.unc.edu.
Specific moderator responsibilities in the past include the following: The moderator gives a short welcome, thanks the sponsors, and introduces the speakers - about 15 minutes in all, read from a teleprompter. After the three presentations and a quick stage re-arrangement, the moderator directs the questions to the presenters, who are seated on the stage as a panel. The producer (O.J. McGhee) speaks with the moderator via an IFB ear piece to direct which question to take (from the studio audience, email, etc. - we're uncertain whether or not to take telephone questions this year, since it's a lot of work to set up technically, and people seem to be going more toward email and Twitter these days). After about an hour of questions and responses, the moderator gives a short close-out, from the teleprompter.
The time commitment involves a session beforehand with O.J. McGhee (our producer), meeting the speakers at the reception on Monday afternoon (6/3), several hours before the 6/4 broadcast itself to run through the teleprompting, adjust audio, work things out with the floor manager, etc., and then the 2.5 hour broadcast itself. It is also very helpful to have some interaction with the presenters during the months or weeks leading up to the broadcast, especially since you have a deep understanding of early childhood issues and the kinds of information that would be valuable to share.
Our past moderators (Stefanie Crayton, media relations manager at UNC-H and a former TV medical reporter; senator Howard Lee, Barbara Pullen-Smith, and Cedric Bright) have generally enjoyed the role, and it's an opportunity to put North Carolina talent on display!
We have a reception the afternoon before (Monday, June 3) so that graduate students, faculty, and administrators can meet the presenters and moderator, followed by a dinner with the planning committee. The broadcast begins with a lunch at 11:30, followed by set-up in the studio and then the broadcast itself. Occasionally other organizations on campus or in the community invite presenters to meet with them over the weekend or the day after the broadcast.
We very much hope that you will be able to come to Chapel Hill to moderate the panel presentation on June 4, and, if possible, attend the reception on June 3, 2013. We also hope you can help us spread the word about the webcast through your network across the state and the nation.
On behalf of the committee, thank you for considering this invitation,