Courses

The listing of a course description here does not guarantee a course’s being offered in a particular term. Please refer to the published schedule of classes on the MyBU Student Portal for confirmation a class is actually being taught and for specific course meeting dates and times.

• SPH MC 820: Managing Public Health Programs and Projects
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH718 or instructor permission. This course provides hands-on experience in program and project management by applying core management principles, implementation strategies, budgeting, and quality improvement techniques. Designed to mirror a real-world work environment, the course emphasizes professional skill development through teamwork and practical application. Students will collaborate to analyze an existing public health program or organization and produce tailored deliverables for a real public health client. Class sessions function like a workplace, with students expected to be active and responsible team members. Dedicated team meeting time simulates workplace practices such as agenda setting, meeting facilitation, workflow management, peer evaluation, and oral presentations. Individual skills will also be strengthened through teaching cases and assignments. This interactive, student- centered approach prioritizes both professional growth and hands-on experience to prepare students for real-world public health careers.
• SPH MC 840: Gender, Intersectionality and Health Policy
  Graduate Prerequisites: SPH PH720 or instructor permission. The course critically examines health policy through a gender-expansive and intersectional lens, centering the experiences of cis and trans women, people assigned female at birth (AFAB), and gender nonbinary persons. The semester begins with an exploration of policy mechanisms while applying feminist strategies to assess health inequities. Students will learn to analyze and advocate for policy change by integrating evidence, political strategy, and stakeholder engagement into their work. Using an intersectionality-based policy analysis framework, the course investigates how health policies are shaped by gender, race, socio-economic status, geography, and sexual orientation, and how these factors interact to create disparities. Students will apply these concepts to a variety of case studies on gendered health policies, including mammography guidelines, trans-affirming healthcare access, BMI as a public health measure, social security policies, and protections for domestic workers. Each case study will encourage students to assess the structural, social, and economic forces influencing policy decisions and identify levers for change. By the end of the course, students will have developed practical skills in policy analysis, stakeholder mapping, and effective advocacy. They will be prepared to craft compelling arguments for diverse audiences, including legislators, media outlets, private foundations, and public health policymakers, equipping them with the tools to advance gender-equitable health policies.
• SPH MC 931: Directed Studies in Maternal and Child Health
  Directed Studies provide the opportunity for students to explore a special topic of interest under the direction of a an SPH faculty member. Directed studies with a non-SPH faculty member or an adjunct faculty member must be approved by and assigned to the department chair. Students may register for a 1, 2, 3, or 4-credit directed study by submitting a signed proposal and registration form. Students are placed in a section by the Registrar's Office according to the faculty member with whom they are working. Students may take no more than eight credits of directed study or directed research during their MPH education.
• SPH MC 932: Directed Research in Maternal and Child Health
  Directed Research provides the opportunity for students to explore a special topic of interest under the direction of an SPH faculty member. Directed research with a non-SPH faculty member or an adjunct faculty member must be approved by and assigned to the department chair. Students may register for 1, 2, 3, or 4 credits. To register, students must submit a signed proposal and registration form. Students are placed in a section by the SPH Registrar’s Office according to the faculty member with whom they are working. Students may take no more than eight credits of directed study or directed research during their MPH education.
• SPH OM 700: Online MPH Launch
  Students are introduced to the program's learning platforms, tools, and resources to support their success in an online learning environment. Students learn the foundations of public health, including public health history, its core functions and disciplines and biological and social factors that affect health.
• SPH OM 701: Data, Determinants, and Decision-Making for Health Equity
  In this module, students learn about public health approaches for health and health equity, including social determinants of health. Students learn fundamental quantitative skills to analyze, synthesize, and apply data to inform decisions, and improve population health outcomes. Students are also introduced to different data collection methods for qualitative and quantitative analysis, population health needs assessments, techniques for budget and resource management, and strategies for effective leadership including managing conflict.
• SPH OM 702: Policy, Programs and Public Health Communication
  In this module, students learn about policymaking, and culturally and context appropriate communication and strategies to improve health in diverse populations. Students learn to design theory - and evidence-based policies, programs, and interventions. The module also covers ethics, and local and global politics in policymaking's, and how to assess health care and regulatory systems.
• SPH OM 703: Applied Methods in Population Health Science
  In this module, students develop both quantitative and qualitative research design and analysis skills to identify and address sources of health inequities. Students develop skills in epidemiologic methods, exposure assessment, and health impact assessment to apply to current challenges in climate and environmental health. The module includes techniques for data management, data visualization and translation, coding and thematic analyses.
• SPH OM 704: Public Health Policy, Advocacy, and Community Organizing
  In this module, students learn strategies to address public health challenges affecting their communities. Students learn to translate knowledge into practice by using effective communication and education strategies to integrate different perspectives, audiences, and sectors. Students develop skills in stakeholder engagement, public health advocacy, resource-mapping, coalition building, community health organizing, and policy evaluation.
• SPH OM 705: Applied Public Health Practice
  In this practice-based module, students learn to apply research public health skills in real- world settings to improve health outcomes of individuals, communities, and populations. Students gain real-world experiences in areas such as: community health needs assessments, intervention design, implementation, and cost estimation, and monitoring and evaluation of programs for impact and implementation fidelity.
• SPH OM 706: Integrative Seminar
  In this final capstone module, students demonstrate the skills and knowledge they gained throughout the program in the form of a high-quality written product. Students address the ways that structural bias and social inequities undermine health and they design strategies to communicate evidence-based findings to diverse audiences.
• SPH PH 510: Essentials of Public Health
  Students will gain an understanding of public health as a broad, collective enterprise that seeks to extend the benefits of current biomedical, environmental, social, and behavioral knowledge in ways that maximize its impact on the health status of a population. The course will provide an overview of the public health approach including epidemiology, disease surveillance, sustainable solutions, social determinants of health, and disease prevention. Through active learning, students will learn skills in identifying and addressing an ever-expanding list of health problems that call for collective action to protect, promote and improve our nation's health, primarily through preventive strategies. Specific topics will include: food safety, toxics reduction, HIV/AIDS & COVID-19, vaccines, and tobacco control and prevention. PH510 is a requirement for obtaining an undergraduate minor in public health. It is appropriate for undergraduates and others who are not in an SPH degree program. It does not carry degree credit for MPH students. Effective Fall 2020, this course fulfills a single unit in each of the following BU Hub areas: Ethical Reasoning, Social Inquiry II, Critical Thinking.
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  • Critical Thinking
  • Ethical Reasoning
  • Social Inquiry II
• SPH PH 517: Quantitative Methods for Public Health
  Public health is an evidence-based discipline. Understanding the distribution and determinants of disease and engaging in prevention efforts requires the ability to collect, analyze, and communicate quantitative data. This course equips students with essential quantitative skills to evaluate data and make informed, evidence-based decisions as public health professionals. Students will gain core training in epidemiologic study design, basic biostatistical analysis, the use of statistical software, and foundational knowledge in exposure and outcome assessment.
• SPH PH 700: Foundations of Public Health
  Addressing current and emerging public health challenges requires a diverse skill set and effective collaboration across multiple disciplines. This online, asynchronous course is designed to provide students with foundational knowledge of the field, from core scientific principles to the factors influencing public health. This required academic component (0 credits) meets the foundational knowledge criteria set by CEPH for all MPH and DrPH students.
• SPH PH 712: Public Health Response to Emergencies in the United States
  This course provides students with the necessary knowledge and skills to understand the public health impacts and roles during emergencies and disasters in the United States. The course uses simulations and real world case studies to explore the persons, events, decisions, policies, and systems involved in planning, preparedness, response, and recovery. Through team assignments, lecture and discussion, students will develop knowledge and skills to use assessment resources to develop communication tools. Students will understand the importance of public health professionals partnering with community organizations. Students will learn to assess the disproportionate impact of a variety of incidents on populations, such as the 2013 Boston marathon bombing, the Ebola epidemic, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Students will consider the question that plagues governmental authorities and residents alike: ARE WE READY? In the end, students will possess a command over how the public health system can provide essential services and support healthy communities during times of emergency. This is accomplished through a combination of case studies, panel discussions, team activities, and exercises.
• SPH PH 717: Quantitative Methods for Public Health
  Public health is an evidence-based discipline. Understanding the distribution and determinants of disease and engaging in prevention efforts requires the ability to collect, analyze, and communicate quantitative data. This course equips students with essential quantitative skills to evaluate data and make informed, evidence-based decisions as public health professionals. Students will gain core training in epidemiologic study design, basic biostatistical analysis, the use of statistical software, and foundational knowledge in exposure and outcome assessment.
• SPH PH 718: Leadership and Management for Public Health
  Public health professionals engage with individuals, groups, communities, and systems, requiring strong leadership and management skills to achieve their goals. Leadership involves influencing, motivating, and empowering others to share a vision, while management focuses on organizing, coordinating, and facilitating activities. Both are essential in public health practice. This course is a hands-on seminar designed to provide practical tools and strategies for effective public health leadership and management. Students will explore primary levels of interaction and develop skills that apply across different levels and settings.
• SPH PH 719: Health Systems, Law, and Policy
  Policies and laws strongly influence health outcomes at individual and population levels. This course examines the constitutional, regulatory, policy, and socio-economic foundations for federal and state policies that determine access, quality, cost, and equity in health services and population health programs. Students gain a comprehensive understanding of processes from policy development through implementation in the public and private sectors. While the course primarily focuses on U.S. examples, it complements the World Health Organization’s framework for organizing and analyzing national health systems.
• SPH PH 720: Individual, Community, and Population Health
  Public health is shaped by overlapping social, economic, and environmental forces. This course uses various conceptual frameworks and theories to explore the root causes of individual choices and behaviors and their impacts on health, vulnerability, and illness. Students will learn to identify effective intervention strategies, such as advocating for legal and policy changes, addressing social inequities, implementing targeted programs that meet community needs, and persuading individuals to change their lifestyles. Additionally, students will learn the art and science of designing and implementing evidence-based approaches to collaborate with communities and health professionals to improve health outcomes, reduce vulnerability, and address the structural foundations of inequity.
• SPH PH 728: Religion, Ethics, and Public Health
  This course will introduce students to the health related aspects of a variety of Western and Eastern religious and ethical traditions, health controversies that exist within those traditions, methods that can be used to reconcile public health needs with religious and ethical traditions. Through review of case studies, students will be challenged to harmonize public health priorities with cultural beliefs in a way that best serves the community. For example, we will study the religious and ethical controversy inherent in major public health issues such as exemptions to mandatory vaccination laws, sex education in public schools, statues outlawing female genital cutting, life support withdrawal, determination of death, faith healing, fetal stem cell research and allocation of scarce resources. Ultimately, students will generate a robust conceptual framework, enabling a nuanced approach to some of the most critical topics in the field of public health.