Training Undergraduates in Public Health
October 8, 2018
The Gillings School BSPH prepares students to enter the workforce or pursue higher education.
We spoke recently with Melanie Studer, MHSA, health policy and management doctoral student and teaching fellow in academic affairs at the Gillings School, about the School’s Bachelor of Science in Public Health (BSPH) degree.
What is the history of undergraduate education at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health?
The Gillings School has offered undergraduate public health education to students since the 1940s. We were one of the first schools of public health with the vision to see undergraduate training as an important part of public health education. Currently, we support the BSPH degree as one of four majors – biostatistics, environmental health science, health policy and management, and nutrition.
About 250 BSPH students are enrolled in 2018-2019 across the four majors, representing about 15 percent of total School enrollment. Applications and enrollment numbers have been increasing steadily – it’s exciting to see!
What is unique about the Gillings School’s BSPH degree?
Our undergraduate degree provides outstanding public health training through a uniquely Gillings School approach.
Admission to the four majors is selective, with students applying during the spring of sophomore year for admission in the fall of junior year.
I can’t say enough about the students who matriculate into our public health majors. They are amazing! They demonstrate strong academic ability, a passion for public health, and relevant professional, service and/or research experience.
Our undergraduate majors are specialized, offering rigorous, discipline-specific training that incorporates high-impact learning experiences, including research opportunities, internships and capstone projects. For example, BSPH students in health policy and management work in consulting teams with health organizations to solve real-world problems; BSPH students in nutrition conduct research in the labs of their faculty mentors. Undergraduate students often are coauthors on faculty research publications.
Our undergraduate students frequently cite as strengths of the BSPH degree the individualized support and faculty mentorship they receive. They also acknowledge the many benefits of being part of the broader Gillings School community, including the opportunity to enroll in graduate-level coursework and interact with our graduate students and alumni.
After graduation, our BSPH students are successful, securing employment in diverse health and public healthrelated organizations and admission to top graduate and professional degree programs. A survey of recent BSPH graduates one year after graduation revealed that 57 percent of graduates were employed (at consulting firms, hospitals and other health care provider organizations, and at colleges and universities), and 36 percent were pursuing higher education (either a graduate or professional degree).
What is the vision for the future of the program?
School leaders, with input from faculty, staff, students and alumni, are at the start of a strategic planning process to determine the future direction of undergraduate public health education at the UNC Gillings School.
There has been tremendous growth in undergraduate public health education in the U.S. over the past decade. For example, the number of institutions offering undergraduate public health degree programs has increased from 83 in 2003 to more than 271 in 2016, and the number of undergraduate public health degree conferrals rose from 1,372 per year in 2003 to 12,895 per year in 2016 (see tinyurl.com/ph-reports-undergrad-ed).
Undergraduate training is a potential growth opportunity for the Gillings School, and we are exploring multiple options for growth, including increasing enrollment in undergraduate majors, offering a public health minor, expanding introductory public health course offerings across campus, expanding accelerated bachelor’s-to-master’s program offerings, and offering earlier entry into the majors.
We will discuss all these options, and we look forward to building upon the strengths of the School’s current BSPH degree programs and expanding public health training opportunities for more undergraduate students in the future.
—Melanie Studer, MHSA, health policy and management doctoral student and teaching fellow in academic affairs
Carolina Public Health is a publication of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health. To view previous issues, please visit sph.unc.edu/cph.
