Graduates of the Bachelor of Public Health program will be able to contribute in meaningful ways in entry-level positions to the conduct and advancement of the 10 essential services of public health as adopted in 2020, which include:
- Assess and monitor population health status, factors that influence health, and community needs and assets.
- Investigate, diagnose, and address health problems and hazards affecting the population.
- Communicate effectively to inform and educate people about health, factors that influence it, and how to improve it.
- Strengthen, support, and mobilize communities and partnerships to improve health.
- Create, champion, and implement policies, plans, and laws that impact health.
- Utilize legal and regulatory actions designed to improve and protect the public’s health.
- Assure an effective system that enables equitable access to the individual services and care needed to be healthy.
- Build and support a diverse and skilled public health workforce.
- Improve and innovate public health functions through ongoing evaluation, research, and continuous quality improvement.
- Build and maintain a strong organizational infrastructure for public health.
These contributions will be enabled by a broad knowledge base and specific skill sets appropriate to the Department's ASPPH-adopted 2012 competencies within the areas of study important to public health practice and outlined below.
Skill Areas
- Communications: Students should be able to communicate, in both oral and written forms and through a variety of media, to diverse audiences.
- Information Literacy: Students should be able to locate, use, evaluate, and synthesize information.
Public Health Domains
Overview of Public Health: Students should have an introduction to the history and philosophy of public health as well as its core values, concepts, and functions across the globe and in society.
- Role and Importance of Data in Public Health: Students should have an introduction to the basic concepts, methods, and tools of public health data collection, use, and analysis, and why evidence-based approaches are an essential part of public health practice.
- Identifying and Addressing Population Health Challenges: Students should have an introduction to the concepts of population health, and the basic processes, approaches, and interventions that identify and address the major health-related needs and concerns of populations.
- Human Health: Students should have an introduction to the underlying science of human health and disease including opportunities for promoting and protecting health across the life course.
- Determinants of Health: Students should have an introduction to the socio-economic, behavioral, biological, environmental, and other factors that impact human health and contribute to health disparities.
- Project Implementation: Students should have an introduction to the fundamental concepts and features of project implementation, including planning, assessment, and evaluation.
- Overview of the Health System: Students should have an introduction to the fundamental characteristics and organizational structures of the U.S. health system as well as to the differences in systems in other countries.
- Health Policy, Law, Ethics, and Economics: Students should have an introduction to basic concepts of legal, ethical, economic, and regulatory dimensions of health care and public health policy, and the roles, influences, and responsibilities of the different agencies and branches of government.
- Health Communication: Students should have an introduction to the basic concepts of public health-specific communication, including technical and professional writing and the use of mass media and electronic technology.
Cumulative Experience and Field Exposure
Students should have opportunities to integrate, apply, and synthesize knowledge through cumulative and experiential activities that include:
- Cumulative Experience: Students should have a cumulative, integrative, and scholarly or applied experience or inquiry project that serves as a capstone to their educational experience.
- Field Exposure: As an integral part of their education, students should be exposed to local level public health professionals and/or to agencies that engage in population health practice.
Graduates of the Master of Public Health program will be able to contribute in meaningful ways in more advanced positions to the conduct and advancement of the 10 essential services of public health adopted in 2020, which include:
- Assess and monitor population health status, factors that influence health, and community needs and assets.
- Investigate, diagnose, and address health problems and hazards affecting the population.
- Communicate effectively to inform and educate people about health, factors that influence it, and how to improve it.
- Strengthen, support, and mobilize communities and partnerships to improve health.
- Create, champion, and implement policies, plans, and laws that impact health.
- Utilize legal and regulatory actions designed to improve and protect the public’s health.
- Assure an effective system that enables equitable access to the individual services and care needed to be healthy.
- Build and support a diverse and skilled public health workforce.
- Improve and innovate public health functions through ongoing evaluation, research, and continuous quality improvement.
- Build and maintain a strong organizational infrastructure for public health.
These contributions will be enabled by a broad knowledge base and specific skill appropriate to the Department's ASPPH-adopted 2014 critical core common content within the areas of study important to public health practice and outlined below:
- History and philosophy of public health as well as its core values, concepts, functions, and leadership roles.
- Concepts, methods, and tools of public health data collection, analysis, and interpretation, and the evidence-based reasoning and informatics approaches that are essential to public health practice.
- Systems thinking regarding the dynamic interactions among sectors, organizations, and actors with which public health professionals interact to achieve health improvements.
- Population health concepts, and the processes, approaches, and interventions that identify and address the major health-related needs and concerns of populations.
- Biological, environmental, socio-economic, behavioral, cultural and other factors that impact human health, influence the global and societal burden of disease, and contribute to health disparities.
- Identification and pursuit of opportunities for promoting health and preventing disease across the life span and for enhancing public health preparedness.
- Concepts of project implementation and management, including planning, budgeting, human resources, assessment and evaluation.
- Characteristics and organizational structures of the U.S. health care system and how they compare to health care systems in other countries.
- Legal, ethical, economic, and regulatory dimensions of health care and public health policy, the roles, influences, and responsibilities of the different agencies and branches of government, and approaches to developing, evaluating, and advocating for public health policies.
- Public health-specific communication and social marketing, including technical and professional writing and the use of mass media and electronic technology.
- The cultural context of public health issues and respectful engagement with people of different cultures and socioeconomic strata.
- Principles of effective functioning within and across organizations and as members of interdisciplinary and interprofessional teams.
- Globalization and sustainable development and their relationship to population health.