REVIEW FOR ACCREDITATION OF THE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH AND HEALTH PROFESSIONS AT THE UNIVERSITY AT BUFFALO STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK

Transcription

1 Council on Education for Public Health Adopted on June 13, 2015 REVIEW FOR ACCREDITATION OF THE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH AND HEALTH PROFESSIONS AT THE UNIVERSITY AT BUFFALO STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK COUNCIL ON EDUCATION FOR PUBLIC HEALTH SITE VISIT DATES: September 15-17, 2014 SITE VISIT TEAM: Cheryl L. Addy, PhD, Chair Phillip L. Williams, PhD Nancy M. Hunt, MPH, RD, CAE SITE VISIT COORDINATOR: Brittney D. Lilly, MPH

2 Table of Contents Introduction... 1 Characteristics of a School of Public Health THE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH Mission Evaluation and Planning Institutional Environment Organization and Administration Governance Fiscal Resources Faculty and Other Resources Diversity INSTRUCTIONAL PROGRAMS Degree Offerings Program Length Public Health Core Knowledge Practical Skills Culminating Experience Required Competencies Assessment Procedures Other Graduate Professional Degrees Bachelor s Degrees in Public Health Other Bachelor s Degrees Academic Degrees Doctoral Degrees Joint Degrees Distance Education or Executive Degree Programs CREATION, APPLICATION AND ADVANCEMENT OF KNOWLEDGE Research Service Workforce Development FACULTY, STAFF AND STUDENTS Faculty Qualifications Faculty Policies and Procedures Student Recruitment and Admissions Advising and Career Counseling Agenda... 29

3 Introduction This report presents the findings of the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH) regarding the School of Public Health and Health Professions at the University at Buffalo The State University of New York. The report assesses the school s compliance with the Accreditation Criteria for Schools of Public Health, amended June This accreditation review included the conduct of a self-study process by school constituents, the preparation of a document describing the school and its features in relation to the criteria for accreditation and a visit in September 2014 by a team of external peer reviewers. During the visit, the team had an opportunity to interview school and university officials, administrators, teaching faculty, students, alumni and community representatives and to verify information in the self-study document by reviewing materials provided in a resource file. The team was afforded full cooperation in its efforts to assess the school and verify the self-study document. The University at Buffalo (UB) is one of 64 state-supported academic institutions in the State University of New York (SUNY) system. A research-intensive university, UB is SUNY s largest and most comprehensive university with a $360 million research infrastructure, operating revenues of $680 million and an endowment of nearly $625 million. Across its three campuses (north, south and downtown campuses), UB offers over 100 undergraduate programs, over 200 master s programs and nearly 100 doctoral and professional degrees. The institution enrolls nearly 20,000 undergraduate students and over 10,000 graduate and professional students and employs nearly 1,500 faculty. As one of the institution s 13 academic colleges and schools, the School of Public Health and Health Professions (SPHHP) combines public health and allied health disciplines. The integration dates back to 1965 with the founding of UB s School of Health Related Professions (HRP), which included programs such as physical therapy, occupational therapy and medical technology in a unit separate from the medical school. The vision of a combined school of public health and health related professions came 36 years later, in 2001, when the chair of the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine (SPM) in the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences became the HRP interim dean. Under the leadership of the interim dean (later appointed as permanent dean), the SPM Department joined with the HRP to form the School of Public Health and Health Professions in In 2004, the SPM Department was renamed as the Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health. The SPHHP received initial accreditation from CEPH in The school was granted an accreditation term of five years, with required follow-up interim reporting. All interim reports have been accepted to date. This current review constitutes the school s review for reaccreditation as a CEPH accredited School of Public Health. 1

4 Characteristics of a School of Public Health To be considered eligible for accreditation review by CEPH, a school of public health shall demonstrate the following characteristics: a. The school shall be a part of an institution of higher education that is accredited by a regional accrediting body recognized by the US Department of Education. b. The school and its faculty shall have the same rights, privileges and status as other professional schools that are components of its parent institution. c. The school shall function as a collaboration of disciplines, addressing the health of populations and the community through instruction, research, and service. Using an ecological perspective, the school of public health should provide a special learning environment that supports interdisciplinary communication, promotes a broad intellectual framework for problem-solving, and fosters the development of professional public health concepts and values. d. The school of public health shall maintain an organizational culture that embraces the vision, goals and values common to public health. The school shall maintain this organizational culture through leadership, institutional rewards, and dedication of resources in order to infuse public health values and goals into all aspects of the school s activities. e. The school shall have faculty and other human, physical, financial and learning resources to provide both breadth and depth of educational opportunity in the areas of knowledge basic to public health. As a minimum, the school shall offer the Master of Public Health (MPH) degree in each of the five areas of knowledge basic to public health and a doctoral degree in at least three of the five specified areas of public health knowledge. f. The school shall plan, develop and evaluate its instructional, research and service activities in ways that assure sensitivity to the perceptions and needs of its students and that combines educational excellence with applicability to the world of public health practice. These characteristics are evident in the SPHHP at UB. For the last 93 years, the institution has held regional accreditation status with the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. The school and its faculty have the same rights, privileges and status as other professional schools at the institution. Faculty and students of the SPHHP share in the exchange of cross-disciplinary knowledge through mechanisms that include the following: annual J. Warren Perry Lectures, weekly public health seminars and collaborations through campus centers such as the Center for Assistive Technology and the Women s Health Initiative. Through the Office of Public Health Practice, the SPHHP s mission and the mission of public health are advanced through partnerships with organizations across greater western New York. The SPHHP has the financial and physical resources, sustained community ties and scholarship portfolio needed to foster an academic environment that embraces the visions, goals and values of public health. 2

5 1.0 THE SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH. 1.1 Mission. The school shall have a clearly formulated and publicly stated mission with supporting goals, objectives and values. This criterion is met. Guided by its statement of values, the SPHHP s mission, vision and goals are clearly stated and align with those of the university. The school s stated values are: 1) commitment to public health, 2) evidence-based scientific and professional practice and 3) professionalism and communication, which includes the importance of cultural competence and diversity. The school s senior leadership reviewed the mission, vision, values, goals and objectives during the spring 2014 semester to ensure congruency with university expectations and the current expectations in public health and allied health fields. The mission, goals, objectives and values are publicly available on the school s website. The school s mission statement is as follows: The mission of the School of Public Health and Health Professions (SPHHP) is to improve the health of populations, communities and individuals through disciplinary and interdisciplinary education, research and service. The school has adopted one goal statement for each of its major functions - education, research and service. Each goal statement is aligned with a set of measurable objectives. The educational goal statement has seven corresponding objectives, the research goal has three objectives and the service goal has four objectives. A small percentage of the objectives focus on processes, such as maintenance of accreditation in a variety of fields, but most objectives require continuous measurement and ongoing monitoring, such as objectives related to student enrollment numbers and faculty involvement in service. 1.2 Evaluation and Planning. The school shall have an explicit process for monitoring and evaluating its overall efforts against its mission, goals and objectives; for assessing the school s effectiveness in serving its various constituencies; and for using evaluation results in ongoing planning and decision making to achieve its mission. As part of the evaluation process, the school must conduct an analytical selfstudy that analyzes performance against the accreditation criteria. This criterion is met with commentary. The school has in place a number of planning processes and evaluation procedures (accompanied by outcome measures) that allow for the assessment of its education, research and service activities. Academic departments are thoroughly reviewed on a five-year cycle, and the school performs evaluations of its courses and surveys its students and alumni. It uses the findings from these sources to evaluate performance and to identify methods for improving. The SPHHP self-study document provides an informative and comprehensive picture of the school. It provides information that allows for assessment of the school and the extent to which it meets the accreditation criteria and achieves its mission, goals and objectives. The self-study was prepared through 3

6 a process that was inclusive of faculty, staff, students and external stakeholders. Preparation of the selfstudy began in 2013 with the completion of a preliminary draft in January This version was made available on the internet and comments were solicited from a variety of constituents. All faculty, staff and students were invited to comment, as well as the Dean s Community Advisory Council, alumni, a number of health leaders from western New York and community members. During the site visit, reviewers perceived that faculty and students were actively involved in the development of the self-study and that the school actively sought input from alumni and professionals in the region. The process used to establish the school s goals and objectives was driven by the school s Executive and Planning Committee (EPC). Composed of the school s senior leadership and a student representative, the EPC developed the goals and objectives to meet the school s strategic plan, which is aligned with the university s strategic plan. Once developed, the goals and objectives were reviewed by the school s Strategic Plan Evaluation Committee (SPEC). The SPEC provided general suggestions and feedback to the EPC on the reasonableness of the goals and objectives. The EPC then solicited feedback from a variety of external constituents before finalizing the goals and objectives. There are currently 85 performance metrics for which the school collects data annually across its three goal areas. Over 50% did not meet the stated performance target in academic year (AY) , though some of these metrics contain binary targets (eg, five part-time students and 20 full-time students enrolled in the biostatistics PhD program annually) in which one of the two targets had been met. The commentary relates to the seemingly ambitious nature of some objectives and the lack of specified actions steps to achieve them. It should be noted, however, that while many targets are currently unmet, the school has set its targets as a five-year goal to be achieved by AY The EPC plans to review performance of goals and objectives biannually to determine if different approaches are needed to reach the five-year performance targets. Because the school has established over 65 performance metrics, strategic priority items have been identified in areas related to administration, education and research. 1.3 Institutional Environment. The school shall be an integral part of an accredited institution of higher education and shall have the same level of independence and status accorded to professional schools in that institution. This criterion is met. The university is regionally accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, with its most recent reaffirmation of accreditation granted in June UB is concurrently accredited by the New York State Board of Regents and holds membership with a number of collegiate associations. Each of the university s schools and colleges contain degree programs that are recognized by professional accreditors in their field such as the American Bar Association, the American Council of Pharmaceutical Education and the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology. Also, the 4

7 SPHHP responds to three accreditors other than CEPH for its educational offerings in dietetics, occupational therapy and physical therapy. The SPHHP is one of six health sciences schools at UB (others include the School of Dental Medicine, the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, the School of Nursing and the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences). The SPHHP dean, along with each health sciences dean at the institution, reports to both the vice president for health sciences and the provost. Budgetary and resource allocation authority are vested with the provost, as well as academic planning decisions and faculty promotion and tenure processes. The role of the vice president for health sciences is to promote interdisciplinary collaboration and education across UB s health sciences schools. The provost and the vice president for health sciences report directly to the university president. The president is supported and advised by the University at Buffalo Foundation and the University at Buffalo Council. Though not a direct report, the SPHHP dean meets twice per year with the university president. The vice president for health sciences currently serves as the dean of the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. Prior to July 2011, these position where held by separate individuals. This current reporting structure has not appeared to alter the status, independence and prerogatives of the SPHHP. As a demonstration of the SPHHP s integration and value in the institution, a position is held for the school s permanent dean on the university s senior leadership team, which exists to provide strategic direction and policy development for the institution. The SPHHP exhibits a high-degree of autonomy in regards to its use of funding allocated from the provost. The provost allocates a baseline budget to the dean that is predicated on enrollment numbers, and returns 52% of tuition and fees for exceeding enrollment targets. Departments throughout the SPHHP depend on allocations from the dean s office to support faculty start-ups. Of the extramural funding dollars that off-set salary for state-supported faculty, 25% is returned to the dean s office and 55% is returned to the principal investigator s department. Decisions on appointment and promotion of staff and non-tenure track faculty are vested with the dean but are subject to approval by the provost. Appointment and promotion of tenure-track faculty follow university procedures, which necessitates that decisions follow the chain of command from the school dean to the SUNY chancellor, who makes the final decision. For all graduate programs at UB, standards and polices concerning admissions, registration, grading, student progress monitoring and degree requirements are determined by the Graduate School. However, direct oversight of such functions, including review of curricula and new programs and courses, occur within the SPHHP through programlevel and school-wide committees. 5

8 1.4 Organization and Administration. The school shall provide an organizational setting conducive to public health learning, research and service. The organizational setting shall facilitate interdisciplinary communication, cooperation and collaboration that contribute to achieving the school s public health mission. The organizational structure shall effectively support the work of the school s constituents. This criterion is met. As the school s chief administrative officer, the dean is responsible for ensuring the school s overall success in the areas of research, education and service. The dean engages in endeavors to maintain and promote the school s interdisciplinary collaborations with other UB health sciences schools and among regional healthcare organizations. A senior associate dean, an assistant dean, a director and three associate deans are in place to ensure that the school s endeavors and initiatives in relation to the following areas are successfully carried out: academic and student affairs, faculty affairs and diversity, research, community relations and clinical affairs, resource management and communications and alumni relations. Senior administrators maintain individual responsibility over various functions of organizational management and administration while also working collaboratively, as each associate dean serves as a member of the EPC. The following positions report to senior administrators to aid in carrying out associated functions: director of communications and alumni relations, research administrative services director, information technology director, online programs coordinator, MPH program coordinator, the Office of Public Health Practice director and the Office of Global Health Initiatives director. The SPHHP s academic programs are divided among the school s five departments, each led by a chair, which include the Department of Biostatistics, Department of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences (ENS), Department of Rehabilitation Science (RS), Department of Community Health and Health Behavior (CHHB) and the Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health (EEH). Department chairs, though reporting to the dean, retain autonomy in managing the department s daily operations. 1.5 Governance. The school administration and faculty shall have clearly defined rights and responsibilities concerning school governance and academic policies. Students shall, where appropriate, have participatory roles in conduct of school and program evaluation procedures, policy setting and decision making. This criterion is met. Governance in the SPHHP follows clearly delineated and organized processes. Committees exist to oversee functions such as curriculum review, academic policy development, strategic planning and evaluation and diversity. Committee membership evidences broad faculty and student inclusion. In relation to its governance model, a discernible strength of the school is its motivation to expand the leadership capacity of its faculty by ensuring that leadership opportunities are available to 6

9 faculty of all ranks. Each committee appears to be active and makes useful contributions to the school s administrative functions. The following school-wide standing committees provide structure for decision making: the Academic Affairs Committee, EPC, SPEC, Master of Public Health Program Coordinating Committee, Promotion and Tenure Committee for Faculty with Qualified (non-tenure track) Titles, Promotion and Tenure Committee for Faculty with Unqualified (tenure and tenure-track) Titles, Diversity Committee and the Communications Committee. Six standing committees have student representation, and the committees that omit student participation are those related to faculty tenure and promotion. Students involved in school-wide committees spoke highly of their experience and expressed to site visitors that their input and participation is perceived to be a valuable asset. The Academic Affairs Committee establishes academic policies and reviews curricular content at all degree levels. The committee reviews approvals for new courses and programs within the school and acts as a vetting board to filter and improve proposal content before submission to the Graduate School and the Office of the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education. The EPC is responsible for creating the strategic vision for the school and developing its strategic plan, while the SPEC is more focused on developing processes for monitoring and evaluating the school s success. Members of the EPC include the dean, associate deans, department chairs and a graduate student. SPEC membership includes a faculty member from each department, one graduate student and two external public members. The MPH Coordinating Committee exists to ensure the academic integrity and rigor of the school s instructional programs. The Diversity Committee exists to lead the school in taking advantage of opportunities to increase student, faculty and staff diversity. The two promotion and tenure committees exist to make recommendations on faculty candidates for non-tenure track and tenure-track positions. In addition to these committees, the school also has two non-standing committees the Faculty Council and the Dean s Community Advisory Council. The school also forms ad hoc committees as needed. 1.6 Fiscal Resources. The school shall have financial resources adequate to fulfill its stated mission and goals, and its instructional, research and service objectives. This criterion is met. The SPHHP is valued by the institution s senior leadership, and the school s financial security appears to be an institutional priority. The school s budget is based on five principal sources: 1) state appropriations (supports general operations and faculty, staff and student assistant salaries); 2) 7

10 state income fund reimbursable (IFR) accounts (related to faculty and staff salaries paid by externallyfunded grants and contracts); 3) extramural research grants and indirect cost recovery funds (policies describing the allocation of these funds are outlined on the school s website); 4) tuition and fees and 5) UB Foundation funds, which consist of private gifts and philanthropic support used by the school to fund scholarships and other general expenditures. The school has sufficient fiscal resources to fulfill its mission, as it has strong institutional and state support. As a result of recent economic downturns, the school experienced state budget reductions between fiscal year (FY) 2010 and 2011, but as of FY 2013, state appropriations have increased by nearly $58,000. In FY 2011, the school also received tuition share appropriations from the state in the amount of $ In FY 2012, the tuition share appropriation more than doubled, and in FY 2013 the school received nearly $1.5 million in tuition share funds. Further, the school s return on tuition and fees from the provost has increased by nearly 20% since FY The school s funds and expenditures are shown in Table 1. Table 1. Sources of Funds and Expenditures by Major Category, Fiscal Years Source of Funds Tuition and Fees 606, , , , ,020 State Appropriation 9,307,690 9,367,832 9,215,965 9,215,965 9,273,799 Tuition Share , ,000 1,463,000 University Funds (IFR and spendable UBF) 3 7,912,810 8,580,899 8,699,074 7,262,970 6,760,671 Grants/Contracts 4 5,753,696 6,865,365 7,112,301 6,890,668 7,038,689 Indirect Cost Recovery 210, , , , ,870 Endowment (Spendable) 5 82,659 87, ,064 90,801 96,146 Gifts 44,200 35,352 51,241 61,381 57,071 Total 23,917,957 25,880,890 26,405,601 25,190,084 25,760,266 Expenditures Faculty Salaries and Benefits 6,612,164 6,710,822 6,834,528 6,932,620 7,472,269 Staff Salaries & Benefits 4,993,015 5,272,735 5,691,375 5,687,552 6,147,828 Operations 3,824,293 5,110,271 4,947,046 4,617,038 4,263,943 Travel 250, , , , ,666 Student Support 1,409,277 1,351,540 1,468,143 1,554,219 1,644,770 University Tax 26, , , , ,796 Total 17,115,787 18,909,118 19,557,384 19,466,413 20,211,272 1 UB fiscal year runs July 1 to June 30 2 Non-recurring one-time state appropriation, initiated in FY University funds do not include the spendable endowments or gifts or tuition and fees, but does include carry forward from the previous years. IFR = salary recovery 4 Direct expenditures only 5 Spendable funds from endowments only 8

11 1.7 Faculty and Other Resources. The school shall have personnel and other resources adequate to fulfill its stated mission and goals, and its instructional, research and service objectives. This criterion is met. The complement of primary faculty meets the minimum requirements needed to sustain the curricular requirements for each MPH concentration and the three public health PhD offerings (biostatistics, epidemiology and CHHB). Site visitors noted, however, the potential need for additional faculty to increase the breadth of curricular content available in the environmental health sciences and health services administration concentrations. In the last three years, the number of full-time primary faculty has increased in four of the five core public health disciplines. Current faculty resources include 14 full-time primary faculty in biostatistics, eight in epidemiology, six in health services administration and six in social and behavioral sciences. The environmental health sciences concentration currently has three full-time faculty, with additional faculty resources available through seven secondary faculty (five part-time faculty and two full-time faculty who hold joint appointments). As of fall 2014, across all graduate and undergraduate programs the student-faculty ratio averages 8.16:1. The corresponding ratio restricted to programs in the traditional public health disciplines is much lower (ranging from 0.2 in environmental health sciences to 4.4 in CHHB), as almost 80% of the school s students are in the two non-public health departments. The SPHHP has the capacity to grow the public health programs while still maintaining the student-faculty interaction expected in public health education. The staff complement appears to be appropriate for the size of the academic and research programs of the school. The school s classified and professional staff contribute FTE (31 full-time and 3 parttime). In addition, there are 61 research and foundation staff, half of whom are part-time. During the site visit, faculty indicated that staff numbers are adequate for the school s current programming. In one particular example, site visitors were impressed that the school invested in two full-time staff members to support development of classroom technology and hybrid or flipped classes. The SPHHP has 98,617 square feet of space in seven buildings located on UB s south campus. The majority of faculty offices are in two buildings in close proximity Kimball Tower and Farber Hall. The location also facilitates relationships with faculty in other schools such as the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. The school has 29 wet and dry research laboratories as well as access to clinical research facilities. The UB Clinical and Translational Research Center on the Buffalo-Niagara Medical Campus provides space for inpatient clinical research and community engaged research. The school also has access to classroom space and large lecture halls shared among the schools in the Academic Health Center. During the site visit, faculty indicated that space is adequate for their current needs. 9

12 The school provides access to desktop and laptop computers and printers for faculty and staff, along with servers for data storage and various network and administrative software. Information technology resources include network accounts, , business systems, web page hosting, wired and wireless internet access and centralized printing. The SPHHP maintains a 45-station public computing laboratory equipped with smartboard technology and a projector system for multimedia instruction. To maximize technology usage, the Office of Educational Innovation and Assessment offers resources to promote the integration of technology into instruction and research. Through the UB library system, faculty, staff and students can access some four million print volumes, 92,000 full-text electronic journals, and 5.4 million microforms across the campus. The Health Sciences Library, located on the south campus, includes over 7,455 current biomedical journal subscriptions and 80 biomedical databases. This library also provides delivery services for resources at other institutions and study space for individuals and groups. The Edwin A. Mirand Library at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute is also a valuable resource available to SPHHP faculty, staff and students. 1.8 Diversity. The school shall demonstrate a commitment to diversity and shall evidence an ongoing practice of cultural competence in learning, research and service practices. This criterion is met. Within the context of an institution that strives to be a diverse and inclusive academic community, the SPHHP has a strong foundation from which to promote diversity within its organizational culture. Resources that foster university-wide diversity are the Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, the Intercultural and Diversity Center and the Gender Institute, among others. The SPHHP notes a number of positive advances towards a community that demonstrates diversity and cultural competency in its practices. Actions that demonstrate advancements in diversity include assigning an associate dean to oversee diversity initiatives and the creation of a Diversity Committee, which seeks to capitalize on the school s opportunities to increase diversity. The SPHHP seeks to increase its diversity by increasing the percentage of under-represented minority students and faculty, the percentage of female students and faculty and the percentage of international students. The goals for under-represented minorities are reasonable as they are lower than the percentage of under-represented minorities in the state of New York (~34%). The school has exceeded its targets for female students and has just come short of its target for female faculty. The school has not yet attained its targets for international and under-represented minority students and faculty. During the site visit, the school received notice that it has been awarded grant dollars to support a number of under- 10

13 represented minority students, thereby allowing the school to increase diversity of this group by offering financial assistance. 2.0 INSTRUCTIONAL PROGRAMS. 2.1 Degree Offerings. The school shall offer instructional programs reflecting its stated mission and goals, leading to the Master of Public Health (MPH) or equivalent professional master s degree in at least the five areas of knowledge basic to public health. The school may offer other degrees, professional and academic, and other areas of specialization, if consistent with its mission and resources. This criterion is met. The school offers instructional programming in the five core areas of public health knowledge leading to an MPH degree. Reviewers found the school s website to be comprehensive, userfriendly and informative, with easy access to program requirements, course descriptions, competencies and program policies. Curricular components of the MPH degree reflect the knowledge and expertise of the faculty complement, offering content in areas most applicable to faculty training and research interests. This application of faculty expertise reflected through curricular content is most apparent in the environmental health sciences course offerings, which focus heavily on toxicological issues. In all MPH concentrations, the core and discipline-specific courses are classified as concentration courses, which may make it difficult for students to discern common core courses and courses specific to their concentration, unless a careful comparison of other curricula is performed. Table 2 presents the school s degree offerings. 11

14 Table 2. Instructional Matrix Degrees & Specializations Specialization/Concentration/Focus Area Academic Public Health Bachelor s Degrees Exercise Science Master s Degrees Biostatistics MA MPH Community Health and Health Behavior MPH Environmental Health Sciences MPH Epidemiology MS MPH Exercise Science MS Health Services Administration MPH Nutrition - Clinical Nutrition Track Nutrition - Nutrition Science Track MS Occupational Therapy** MS Doctoral Degrees Biostatistics PhD Community Health and Health Behavior PhD Epidemiology PhD Exercise Science PhD Physical Therapy Rehabilitation Science PhD Joint Degrees BS in Exercise Science/MS in Nutrition Science BS/MS BS in Exercise Science (MPH is in Epidemiology)* BS/MPH BS in Occupational Science/MS in Occupational Therapy MD (PhD is in Epidemiology) MD/PhD JD JD/MPH MBA* MBA/MPH MD* MD/MPH MSW MSW/MPH PharmD* PharmD/MPH Professional * Each degree is awarded distinctly. ** MS in occupational therapy is no longer accepting applicants and will be discontinued when the final student graduates. Other BS MS DPT BS/MS 2.2 Program Length. An MPH degree program or equivalent professional public health master s degree must be at least 42 semester-credit units in length. This criterion is met. The program length for the five MPH concentrations ranges from 45 to 47 credit hours. While up to 10 credit hours may be transferred from previous coursework, and seven credit hours may be waived, each student must complete no fewer than 43 credit hours in any MPH program, exceeding CEPH s 42 credit hour minimum. In the last three years, no MPH students have graduated with fewer than 42 credit hours. 12

15 The SPHHP established specific criteria defining when transfer credits may be accepted or course waivers granted. Transfer credits may only be accepted from graduate programs and must be comparable to courses in the MPH curriculum. Only elective courses may be substituted by a transferred course. Course waivers are only given in special circumstances to students who can demonstrate extensive public health experience or graduate education. Students who are granted approval for course waivers may waive the field training experience and SPM 535: Biological Basis of Public Health. The SPHHP follows the university s standards for classroom contact hours in relation to credit hour attainment. As such, in the SPHHP, 50 minutes of classroom time per week is equivalent to one semester-credit hour. In the SPHHP, most courses are three credit hours, which translates to 2.5 hours of classroom time per week each semester. 2.3 Public Health Core Knowledge. All graduate professional degree public health students must complete sufficient coursework to attain depth and breadth in the five core areas of public health knowledge. This criterion is met. The SPHHP assures that its MPH students have fundamental competence in the public health core knowledge areas. Students obtain knowledge in the five core areas through the successful completion of six core public health courses. A review of syllabi by the site team reveals that the core courses are sufficient to attain an appropriate depth and breadth of knowledge. Syllabi for core courses display the correlation between learning objectives and their associated competencies, which express essential concepts of the public health core. Each of the five core concentrations require 20 credit hours of core coursework, with the exception of the biostatistics concentration which requires 19 credit hours. To fulfill the biostatistics core knowledge requirement, students across concentrations take one of three biostatistics core courses. For example, students in the biostatistics concentration enroll in STA (Biostatistics) 502: Introduction to Statistical Inference (three credits) while students in the epidemiology concentration enroll in SPM 505: Application of Statistics to Epidemiology I (four credits). For two MPH concentrations, health services administration and social and behavioral sciences, two options are offered to complete the biostatistics requirement. One of these options, STA 527: Introduction to Medical Statistics, is cross listed as an undergraduate class (STA 427). Because the course is crosslisted, the site team was originally concerned that graduate students were being taught undergraduatelevel content. However, the site team s concern was dissolved after on-site discussion with faculty. Site visitors learned that the course is taught as a graduate class but was added to the undergraduate listing in an effort to recruit undergraduate students with strong quantitative skills into the graduate biostatistics program. Additionally, all social and behavioral sciences students take a second class in statistics CHB 13

16 505: Applied Statistics for Public Health. CHB 505 is also included in the list of electives for the health services administration concentration, and many students in this track enroll in the course. Table 3 presents the required core courses for MPH students. Table 3. Required Courses Addressing Public Health Core Knowledge Areas for MPH Degree Core Knowledge Area Course Number & Title Credits Biostatistics Biostatistics concentration: STA 502: Introduction to Statistical Inference 3 Community Health and Health Behavior concentration: STA 527: Introduction to Medical Statistics 4 Environmental Health Sciences and Epidemiology concentrations: SPM 505: Application of Statistics to Epidemiology I 4 Health Services Administration concentration: STA 527: Introduction to Medical Statistics or SPM 505: Application of Statistics to Epidemiology I 4 Environmental Health Sciences SPM 549 Environmental Health 3 Epidemiology SPM 501: Epidemiology Principles 4 Social & Behavioral Sciences CHB 501: Study of Health Behaviors 3 Health Services Administration SPM 507: Introduction to Health Care Organization and SPM: 530 Administrative Theory and Practice Practical Skills. All graduate professional public health degree students must develop skills in basic public health concepts and demonstrate the application of these concepts through a practice experience that is relevant to students areas of specialization. This criterion is met. MPH students are required to complete a three to six hour supervised field training experience that allows them to apply knowledge and skills in a practice-based setting for a required minimum of 120 contact hours. The field experience process is well organized and efficient, with instructive material for students and preceptors readily available. To complete the practicum, students enroll in STA 544 (biostatistics), CHB 544 (community health and health behavior) or EEH 544 (epidemiology, environmental health and health services administration), formerly SPH 544, for field training, depending on their concentration. Students typically begin the practicum after completing their second semester in the MPH program. The school encourages students to begin searching for a site two months prior to the conclusion of their second semester. With guidance from their academic advisor, students select a faculty member with relevant expertise to serve as their practicum supervisor. The Office of Public Health Practice plays a critical role in facilitating the practicum process, as it helps to match students with placement sites and orient preceptors. Practice sites include a variety of local and county health departments, community-based agencies, managed care organizations, a psychiatric 14

17 center and environmental health coalitions, among others. Students who met with site visitors mentioned the ease of identifying an experience using the school s on-line tool. Community members who have served as preceptors also thought highly of the practicum experience and of the students, as some have hired field experience students as full-time employees. Community partners specifically mentioned recent improvements to the practicum process, as faculty now make the initial contact with the practice site, rather than the student. This change is just one demonstration of the school s receptiveness to constituent feedback and how it is utilized to make improvements. Students must complete a report at the conclusion of the experience. Student performance is evaluated by the preceptor, and the student also evaluates the site and preceptor. The faculty advisor assigns a pass/fail grade. Students with extensive public health experience or graduate education may request practicum waivers, although such requests are not common. The school has established rigorous standards for granting practicum waivers. Students requesting a waiver must complete an extensive waiver request form and demonstrate that their previous experience is relevant to their MPH concentration. Over the last three years, three students received six credit hour practicum waivers. The site visit team concluded that these waivers were acceptable on the basis of the students previous work experience. 2.5 Culminating Experience. All graduate professional degree programs, both professional public health and other professional degree programs, identified in the instructional matrix shall assure that each student demonstrates skills and integration of knowledge through a culminating experience. This criterion is met. All MPH students complete the MPH integrative project during their final semester. Students enroll in STA 630 (biostatistics), CHB 630 (community health and health behavior) or EEH 630 (epidemiology, environmental health and health services administration), formerly SPM 630, for the integrative project, depending on their concentration. The project can be independently chosen or related to the field experience. The student chooses two or three credit hours for the project in consultation with his or her advisor based on the scope of the proposed project. Most students have completed the project for three credits. The self-study reports that students generally find the integrative project to be a valuable experience. A project can be designed in one of six ways: analyzing a public health problem, writing a public health research grant proposal, designing a program or community intervention, proposing a program evaluation, conducting a research project or describing the epidemiology of a selected health problem. The student must complete a paper summarizing the project and make an oral presentation. 15

18 Regardless of the topic or approach chosen, each student is expected to demonstrate integration of the five core public health disciplines. The oral presentation is evaluated on visual organization, analysis/coherence, originality and delivery. The paper is evaluated on the following: internal consistency/logic of material presented, absence of factual or other errors, organization, quality of writing (including grammar, syntax, spelling, etc.) and professionalism. Review of the integrative project competencies and the evaluation instrument confirm that students must demonstrate achievement of at least a subset of the program s competencies. 2.6 Required Competencies. For each degree program and area of specialization within each program identified in the instructional matrix, there shall be clearly stated competencies that guide the development of degree programs. The school must identify competencies for graduate professional public health, other professional and academic degree programs and specializations at all levels (bachelor s, master s and doctoral). This criterion is met. The school maintains a set of over 100 core competencies to be attained by all graduate professional public health degree students, which pertains solely to the MPH degree. Many of the school s core competencies were adopted from the ASPPH competency sets, though the school omitted some ASPPH competencies and adopted new competencies to its core list. In this regard, the school has demonstrated a thoughtful selection and application of ASPPH competencies to its curriculum. The school s concentration-specific competencies for its MPH concentrations range from sets of five to thirteen competencies. Most concentration-specific competencies consist of complex statements demonstrating the accumulation of knowledge, skills and abilities acquired across the curriculum. The school provided a list of competencies and a curriculum matrix for each MPH concentration. Each competency set includes a small number of competencies that are clearly unique to the concentration and several others that are more closely related to the cross-cutting competencies. Competency sets and curriculum matrices were also provided for the academic programs in public health disciplines (MA and PhD in biostatistics, MS and PhD in epidemiology and PhD in CHHB). Competencies and matrices for the bachelor s degree and non-public health graduate degrees were provided as well. 2.7 Assessment Procedures. There shall be procedures for assessing and documenting the extent to which each professional public health, other professional and academic degree student has demonstrated achievement of the competencies defined for his or her degree program and area of concentration. This criterion is partially met. Assessment is largely accomplished through grades in required courses, student self-assessment and completion of the field training experience and integrative project. All courses require the successful completion of examinations, papers and/or oral presentations. The primary approach to monitoring MPH students and students in academic programs in public health disciplines is through the advisement process that includes monitoring program progression. 16

19 Students in the MPH program must maintain a 3.0 GPA to graduate and earn a grade of B (3.0) or better in each required course. Students are encouraged to meet with their advisors each semester to assess progress toward the degree and complete an annual progress report. Students work on the integrative project and field experience is assessed using a subset of the program s competencies, with an emphasis on some of the professional (cross-cutting) skills. Students in the academic programs have similar monitoring of progression. The student and advisor meet at least once per year to update the student s academic plan. The graduate director also reviews student performance each semester to monitor progress. There are several programmatic benchmarks for progress (eg, preliminary exam, comprehensive exam, dissertation or thesis). MPH alumni and MPH employers were separately surveyed about job preparation. Alumni were asked to self-assess preparation in the core and cross-cutting competency domains. Assessments revealed that biostatistics is the weakest, and epidemiology and social and behavioral sciences are the strongest. Employers were asked to evaluate knowledge and skill areas, focusing more on professional skills. Assessments revealed that students strengths were written communication and presentation skills, while understanding of organizational operations was the weakest area. The SPHHP also tracks graduation rates and employment rates. The maximum allowable time for graduation for master s students is four years. The MPH cohort that began in AY had a 100% graduation rate within four years. Currently, the cohort that entered in AY has a 75% graduation rate. The cohort entering in AY (43 students) has a 23% withdrawal rate and a graduation rate of 61%, which falls 9% below the 70% CEPH threshold. Graduation rates for non-public cohorts entering in AY (the one cohort that has reached maximum allowable time to graduate) reveal rates of 50% for the MA in biostatistics (four students at start of cohort), 100% for the MS in occupational therapy, exercise science and nutrition science (six, 12 and four students at start of cohort respectively), 33% for the MS in epidemiology (two students at start of cohort) and 60% for the MS in clinical nutrition (15 students at start of cohort). PhD students are given a maximum period of seven years to graduate. Graduation rates in PhD programs for the one cohort that has reached maximum allowable time to graduate (the AY cohort), reveal rates of 100% for the PhD in biostatistics (three students at start of cohort), 100% for the PhD in exercise science (four students at start of cohort) and 0% for the PhD in epidemiology because students transferred to other programs (two students at start of cohort). The concern relates to the graduation rates. It is difficult to assess a program s ability to consistently yield graduation rates above the CEPH threshold. An examination of student progression across cohorts for 17

20 some programs do not indicate the likelihood of reaching graduation thresholds in the maximum allowable time to graduate. For master s and PhD programs with a small number of students at the onset of the cohort, one or two student withdrawals greatly impacts the program s ability to meet CEPH graduation thresholds. While the resulting cumulative graduation rates may be acceptable in some programs, the high proportion and consistency of withdrawals in some cohorts merits attention. 2.8 Other Graduate Professional Degrees. If the school offers curricula for graduate professional degrees other than the MPH or equivalent public health degrees, students pursing them must be grounded in basic public health knowledge. This criterion is met. The SPHHP offers three non-public health graduate professional degrees: MS in nutrition, MS in occupational therapy and the doctor of physical therapy (DPT). All non-public health graduate professional degree students are required to enroll in one of two courses to gain a broad introduction to public health CHB 550: Public Health and Population Wellbeing or ES (Exercise Science) 568: Epidemiology and Public Health for Health Professionals. ES 568: Epidemiology and Public Health for Health Professionals is cross-listed as ES 468/568 and is offered through the ENS Department. The vast majority of students enrolling in this course are undergraduate exercise science students. CHB 550: Public Health and Population Wellbeing course is cross-listed as CHB 450/550 and is offered through the CHHB Department. The two courses employ different approaches to introduce public health core knowledge, with ES 568 addressing each core discipline separately in weekly modules and CHB 550 addressing aspects of public health core knowledge in every lesson as students consider the impact of core disciplines on impending public health problems. Upon review of the curricular requirements for the non-public health graduate professional degrees, site visitors found that an introduction to public health course is a required curricular component for master s students. However, no evidence was found that indicates this requirement for DPT students. 2.9 Bachelor s Degrees in Public Health. If the school offers baccalaureate public health degrees, they shall include the following elements: Required Coursework in Public Health Core Knowledge: students must complete courses that provide a basic understanding of the five core public health knowledge areas defined in Criterion 2.1, including one course that focuses on epidemiology. Collectively, this coursework should be at least the equivalent of 12 semester-credit hours. Elective Public Health Coursework: in addition to the required public health core knowledge courses, students must complete additional public health-related courses. Public health-related courses may include those addressing social, economic, quantitative, geographic, educational and other issues that impact the health of populations and health disparities within and across populations. 18