Establishing exposure science in education

Exposure science provides fundamental knowledge at the interface between chemicals and other stressors in the environment including workplaces and consumer goods, and their negative effects on humans and ecosystems. This knowledge is crucial for our understanding of the complex human-environment-stressor interactions in support of a safe and sustainable future. Education and training of the various exposure science topics yields important expertise required for regulatory risk assessment, for product evaluations and for scientific advances essential for health and environmental science, as well as market and societal demands. The European Chapter of the International Society of Exposure Science (ISES Europe) has initiated and reported on exposure science requirements as input for building a European Exposure Science Strategy, collated from all relevant stakeholders and the scientific community. In support of building this strategy, various topics to strengthen exposure science in Europe were discussed at the first ISES Europe workshop in 2018 along a set of thematic themes addressing: 1.data repositories and analytics, 2. regulatory exposure assessment, 3. exposure data production and monitoring, 4. building partnerships and collaboration, 5. exposure assessment methods and tools and 6. exposure science education and communication. To contribute to ISES Europe’s objectives, a working group focusing on exposure science in education, training and communication was established, with an overarching aim to anchor exposure science in academic research and education, and to establish a defined career pathway for graduates. An important building block in the European Exposure Science Strategy is to develop a tiered education/training scheme with ECTS equivalent points/certificates, and to identify ways to support and promote existing courses with focus on exposure science. The preliminary analysis, objectives and expected outcomes will be presented in this talk, alongside the action plan to achieve these outcomes.