Course Descriptions

3 Credits, Fall Semester

Prerequisite: None

Designed to provide you with a graduate‐level overview of the role of the social and behavioral sciences in understanding and addressing public health problems. Three general topics are covered. First, we examine how psychological, social, and environmental factors influence people’s health and wellbeing. Second, we explore factors that influence health behavior, including individual, social, and environmental/community influences. Third, we explore how understanding behavior and social/environmental influences on health informs public health approaches to improving health and preventing disease. The course prepares public health students to satisfy MPH competencies in social and behavioral sciences.

Format: Seated and Online

2 Credits, Spring Semester

Prerequisite: None

This course provides students with the foundations needed for public health professionals to work with other health professionals, along with key qualitative analysis and cultural competence skills. This course will also provide students with communication and conflict resolution skills.

This course satisfies some of the requirements for IPCP Digital Badges #1 and #2.

Format: Online

Prerequisite: None

This course is intended to provide a basic introduction to principles and methods of epidemiology. The course emphasizes the conceptual aspects of epidemiologic investigation and application of these concepts in public health and related professions. Topics include overview of the epidemiologic approach to studying disease; the natural history of disease; measures of disease occurrence, association and risk; epidemiologic study designs; disease surveillance; population screening; interpreting epidemiologic associations; causal inference using epidemiologic information; and application of these basic concepts in the context of selected major diseases and risk factors. Please note that this course cannot be used for degrees that require EEH 501 unless pre-approved by the program director, or as a prerequisite for courses that require EEH 501.

Format: Online

Prerequisite: None

Introduction to the basic principles, methods, and uses of epidemiology. This course is a master’s/doctoral level course designed to introduce epidemiology, its methods and its role in public health. A major portion of the course will be devoted to an overview of fundamental epidemiologic methods used in public health research and practice. The student will be familiarized with basic measures used in describing disease frequency in populations. Descriptive and analytic approaches to the study of disease will be explored, and a perspective on the role of epidemiologic methods in health services planning and evaluation will be provided. Problem solving exercises will be used to provide students with an opportunity to tabulate data and apply subject matter developed during lectures and in reading assignments. At the end of the course students should have a general understanding of the uses and limitations of epidemiologic inquiry. This understanding should provide the basis for applying epidemiologic concepts in work-related settings and in other courses in the public health curriculum.

Format: seated

The course is for students in the public health sciences who seek to develop hands-on introductory data analysis skills. Students will learn basic methods for data organization and management as well as basic skills in data exploration and presentation. The course includes emphasis on the application and interpretation of commonly used introductory statistical tests in the computer laboratory using SAS software. Topics include descriptive statistics, hypothesis testing for means, proportions, elementary non-parametric techniques, t-tests, ANOVA, correlations, and linear regression.

Format: seated

Prerequisite: None

Intended for students with little or no background in the biological sciences and health professions. The course provides a broad overview of public health topics related to human health and disease focusing on disease etiology with particular emphasis on parasitic and microbial infections plus a review of the anatomy, physiology, and pathology of selected major organ systems and associated diseases of public health importance.

Format: seated

Prerequisite: None

This course introduces students to the U.S. health care and public health systems through the lens of systems science, focusing on the historical evolution, structural complexity, and dynamic interdependencies and integration among key system components. It explores how health care systems are organized to deliver services, how various interdisciplinary subsystems—including financing, regulation, workforce, and technology—interact, and how feedback loops influence policy and operational decisions. Emphasis is placed on the systems-level factors that shape health outcomes, such as stakeholder networks, governance structures, and resource flows. Students learn to analyze health policy decisions within a systems framework, considering the roles of power, incentives, and societal values in shaping priorities and trade-offs. The course equips students with systems thinking tools and vocabulary essential for understanding the emergent behavior of complex organizations, enabling them to critically assess challenges related to coordination, innovation, and sustainability. Class sessions also examine adaptive systemic responses to emerging technological, legal, and ethical dilemmas, highlighting the dynamic nature of the U.S. healthcare system as a complex adaptive system.

Format: seated and online

Prerequisite: None

This course introduces students to the fundamental principles of budgeting and accounting in healthcare organizations through a systems science perspective, emphasizing the interconnectedness of financial management and organizational performance. Designed for students without prior experience in finance, the course focuses on how financial decisions function as integral components of broader integrated organizational systems. Students will explore how financial inputs, processes, and outputs interact to influence the efficiency and sustainability of healthcare delivery, with efficiency defined as achieving the highest quality of care with optimal resource use. Core concepts in financial management and accounting are presented as tools for system optimization, including capital and cash budgeting, cost allocation, variance analysis, and performance monitoring. The course highlights how financial data serve as feedback mechanisms that inform strategic planning, implementation, and system-level adjustments. Students will also examine financial statements—such as balance sheets and cash flow statements—as dynamic system diagnostics, providing insight into organizational health and resilience. Additional topics include the structure and function of capital markets, asset valuation, and scenario-based decision-making (e.g., lease vs. buy), all within the context of adaptive system behavior and long-term sustainability. By mastering these concepts, students will be equipped to apply financial tools to support mission-driven, data-informed decisions in diverse and complex healthcare environments.

Prerequisite: None

This course utilizes systems science frameworks to analyze the United States (US) public policymaking process. Students learn about the complexity and dynamics of the policymaking process that affect the population’s health status including environmental, socio-cultural, ethnic, demographic, economic, lifestyle, service access and other factors. Students gain skills necessary to understand empirical policy analysis in all aspects of the US healthcare system. They examine the supply and demand for health services, and examine the analysis of healthcare systems and current health care policies. The course covers the fundamentals of policy development at a systems level from formulation to enactment at federal, state, and local levels. Various US healthcare policies will be explored in relation to the concepts introduced throughout the course. Discussion will include the application and analysis of policymaking in the United States.

Format: Online

Prerequisite: None

This course provides the ability to apply economic reasoning to health care markets. Topics include organization of the hospital, payment systems, costs and charges, the market for physician services, cost-effectiveness analysis, outcomes research, and health care reform. Students gain the foundational skills necessary to plan, conduct, and interpret economic evaluations in healthcare. The course will introduce key economic concepts like supply and demand for health services, markets and competition in health care, and the effects of government regulation on both private and public health programs, such as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) and Medicare. During the class lab, students will have an opportunity to plan and conduct economic evaluations of healthcare interventions, programs, and policies. Where appropriate, discussion will also include local and regional examples as well as current events regarding these topics and healthcare reform.

Format: Online

Prerequisite: None

Allows students to synthesize the knowledge and skills developed during the academic portion of their program in a practical application setting. Field training experiences vary depending upon the student’s interest and concentration area; experiences need to be approved by the MPH concentration director.

Learn more about MPH Field Training.

Prerequisite: None

Introductory course that explores the role of environmental factors in health with an emphasis on characterization, assessment, and control of environmental hazards. Topics include application of toxicologic and epidemiologic methods in assessing risk and setting exposure limits; the nature of and control of hazards associated with food, water, air, solid and liquid waste, occupation, and radiation; risk communication and management, environmental justice; and environmental laws. The course concludes by examining the impact of human activity, such as energy use and pollution, on the environment and how human-induced environmental change, in turn, impacts public health and that of the planet as a whole.

Format: seated and online

Prerequisite: None

This course introduces students to public health issues from a systems-based perspective. Through presentations by public health leaders and practitioners, readings, group discussion and class activities, students practice integrating public concepts to better understand issues, and develop responses. Emphasis is placed on systems thinking and skills necessary to align diverse parts of healthcare and public health systems to achieve common goals. Course content focuses on public health issues from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), American Public Health Association (APHA), World Health Organization (WHO), local and state health departments or other organizations.

This course partially satisfies the requirements for IPCP Digital Badge #1.

Format: online and seated

Prerequisite: Permission of instructor

The purpose of the culminating projects is for MPH students to integrate core public health knowledge and skills. It will take the form of a paper prepared during the concluding semester of the student’s program.

Corequisite: Students must enroll in STA 527 LEC and STA 527 REC in the same term.

This course is designed for students concerned with medical data. The material covered includes: the design of clinical trials and epidemiological studies; data collection; summarizing and presenting data; probability; standard error; confidence intervals and significance tests; techniques of data analysis including multifactorial methods and the choice of statistical methods; problems of medical measurement and diagnosis; and vital statistics and calculation of sample size. The design and analysis of medical research studies will be illustrated. MINITAB is used to perform some data analysis. Descriptive statistics, probability distributions, estimation, tests of hypothesis, categorical data, regression model, analysis of variance, nonparametric methods, and others will be discussed as time permits.

Instructor: Kuhlmann

Format: seated and online

Prerequisite: None

Provides students with an overview of the development of management and leadership concepts within health care organizations. Delves into the strategic and policy issues challenging health care systems (access, financing, defining and quantifying quality, etc.). Provides a practical framework of the professional competencies and skills needed to be an effective administrator within a complex health care system.

Format: Online, asynchronous

Prerequisite: None

Provides an understanding of how the law serves as a tool in advancing a public health agenda. The class is interdisciplinary, including law students and students from public health-related fields. The course examines the history of public health law, the tension between state and federal governments in the regulation of the publics health, and the conflicts between governmental powers and individual autonomy. The course considers the standard practice of public health professionals to prevent disease and promote healthy behaviors in the wake of emerging public health challenges such as racial disparities in health care, a potential flu pandemic, the obesity epidemic, and the abortion debate.

Prerequisite: None

This course is designed to be an overview of the health care industry and a framing of the severe challenges facing leaders in field. It will take a business approach to the issues presented, but will always juxtapose financial issues with value creation. It begins with a short look at classic economics, and why they do not always apply in health care. It will take an in-depth look at the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and the implications it has on all parts of the industry. It will follow with a review of each component of the industry: government, health plans, employers, providers, and suppliers. Each review will focus on the unique challenges leaders are facing in a dynamic, changing environment.

Prerequisite or Corequisite: EEH 544

This course is a field training experience that serves as an elective course, and must be taken concurrent with or after a student takes the required EEH 544 field training course. This elective experience allows students to synthesize the knowledge and skills developed during the academic portion of their program in a practical application setting. Field training experiences vary depending upon the student’s interest and concentration area; experiences need to be approved by the MPH concentration director.