By Staff
NILES – A man raised in Niles will be soon be traveling to Antarctica.
Will Britton has traveled far from home to in pursuit of adventure, education and career. A former student of Ring Lardner Jr, High School, Will is now at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colo. studying Environmental Health Epidemiology researching the adverse health effects of air pollution on infants.
His research is being funded by the US Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) which will utilize advanced analytic methods to investigate the relationship of sources of particulate matter in air pollution with heart and breathing problems in infants.
Initially Will left Niles to pursue his interest in competitive freestyle skiing in New Mexico, Colorado, Washington State and eventually training with the New Zealand freestyle ski team on the South Island of New Zealand. He then turned his dedication to academics completing a degree in Mathematics in 2005 at Mesa State College in Colorado; then his master's degree in Biostatistics at the University of Vermont in 2007.
At the present he is traveling the United Kingdom, Scandinavia, Russia and the Ukraine making contacts for a non-profit organization he's been working on for the past nine months to unite graduate students interested in doing work in global/international health called the Society of Future Global Health Researchers in Action.
The aim of this new organization is to provide a platform for students to network on a global level to collaborate on projects in sustainability, health and funding graduate education.
Britton is hopeful that his good fortune of 2008 will continue.
"2008 has been amazing in so many ways! Having had the opportunity to work for the World Health Organization this summer, being named a Duke University Global Health Fellow and then becoming a US EPA STAR Fellow – things just don't get any better," he said.
Yet, things did get better. He was also named as a Colorado State University Pacesetter, awarded a Colorado Environmental Health Association scholarship and awarded a Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholarship to study abroad during the 2009/2010 school year.
He hopes to continue his studies and spread his passion for environmental health and youth by inspiring middle school students to take an active interest in the environment and sciences.
"I'm joining an expedition to Antarctica in March 2009 with explorer Robert Swan. I am working on a project through my non-profit to give middle school students an inside look at the research that is being done in climate change on the southern most continent," he said.
This project is slated to be coordinated with the service work he will be doing abroad with his Rotary International award.