Health Sciences Bulletin

Program in Public Health

DIRECTOR: Lisa A. Benz Scott
OFFICE: Health Sciences Center, Level 3, Room 071
PHONE: (631) 444-9396
EMAIL: publichealth@stonybrookmedicine.edu
WEB: publichealth.stonybrookmedicine.edu

  • About the Program

    About the Program

    Welcome to the Program in Public Health at Stony Brook Medicine

    Dynamic Academic Programs 
    The Program in Public Health (PPH) trains people to integrate the knowledge, skills, and values of public health and health management into their careers and provide leadership in their field. The PPH offers a variety of degree programs including:

    Strong Foundations in Public Health 
    Public health is distinct from medicine in both its emphasis on prevention and its focus on populations. One of the hallmarks of our program is that we create a learning environment that emphasizes a collaborative, multidisciplinary approach to the root causes of public health problems, while instilling the skills necessary to develop innovative and practical solutions for positive impact. Changing political, economic, and social conditions in the United States and the world make the application of new knowledge and technologies all the more important. In addition to the traditional knowledge, including epidemiology and biostatistics, our graduates leave with:

    • an ecological understanding of the determinants of health – from genetics and behavioral all the way up to environmental and policy factors;
    • a systems approach to solving health problems;
    • an emphasis on proactively stabilizing and improving health among all populations;
    • a thorough understanding and appreciation of the cultural heterogeneity of populations;
    • an insistence on accountability, evidence-based practice, and continuous performance improvement;
    • an understanding of the medical, dental, and public health systems that address health - including organization, financing, regulation, quality, & effectiveness;
    • skills to develop comprehensive health information systems;
    • tools to assess, develop, implement, and evaluate policy options;
    • the conceptual and analytical tools to prioritize problems and make sound decisions.

    Exceptional Faculty and Scholarship 
    One of the many strengths of our program is our exceptional faculty who are public health scholars in clinical, social and behavioral sciences, and the humanities. The PPH faculty are committed to excellence as teachers and mentors, and many are also leading exciting programs of research, which they translate into the student experience in the classroom, laboratory, clinic or in service to other spheres of public health practice. Current areas of research include racial disparities in healthcare access; sleep health; cognitive functioning and aging; environmental epidemiology; resilience and adaptation in the context of disability and illness.

    A Growing Impact on Long Island and Beyond 
    Our program attracts a competitive pool of outstanding students with diverse backgrounds, unified by a shared passion to improve quality of life locally and globally. Many of our students either work as practitioners in related fields or are in training concurrently, integrating an ecological understanding of health into careers in medicine, dentistry, business, nursing, social work and beyond. The PPH staff work closely to connect students to a growing network of alumni who are public health practitioners. Our alumni network serves as a valuable resource for student field placements and employment. Our students have earned competitive practicum placements and have gone on to obtain full-time employment offers at State and County Departments of Health, non-profit organizations such as IPRO and VIBS (Victims Information Bureau of Suffolk), and university medical centers such as NYU, Stony Brook, and Mt. Sinai.

  • Mission, Vision, Goals

    OUR VISION

    Our vision is a society in which all people have equitable access to high quality healthcare that enables them to live up to their full human potential.

    OUR MISSION

    Our mission is to create a fulfilling education for the next generation of public health practitioners and health management leaders, who are committed to promoting the health of local and global communities through research, interdisciplinary training, and service.

    The SPECIFIC DEGREE Program Vision, Mission and Goals FOR THE MHA AND MPH PROGRAMS CAN BE FOUND ON OUR WEBSITE.

  • Program Values

    Our mission is informed by the following values:

    • Excellence: In all our programs we strive for a high degree of excellence, measured by external metrics and standards whenever available.
    • Synergy: Public health is not a single discipline but a collection of disciplines, which enrich each other; we strive to promote this synergistic approach in both our educational and research endeavors.
    • Support: Our obligation to our students goes beyond assuring academic success. We design our educational programs and PPH support systems to facilitate career success, whether it is initiating a new career, advancement in a current career, or attainment of leadership positions.
    • Equity and inclusiveness: In everything we do we seek to promote health equity among, and environmental justice for, all people and populations.

    THE SPECIFIC DEGREE PROGRAM VALUES FOR THE MHA AND MPH PROGRAMS CAN BE FOUND ON OUR WEBSITE.

  • Education

    Education

    The Program in Public Health values high-quality education that moves beyond the simple transmission of information to production of creative and critical thinkers who will be able to maintain public health's value to society in the future. This value is operationalized through provision of the Core and Concentration curricula leading to the MPH degree, which is supplemented by a variety of combined and concurrent degree options, the PhD in Population Health & Clinical Outcomes Research, the Master of Health Administration, the MS in Epidemiology & Clinical Research, and the Advanced Graduate Certificate programs. They have as their conerstones the development of analytical and critical thinking skills and and ecological approach to health improvement and disease prevention that will produce public health problem solvers and health management professionals with a population health perspective.

  • Research

    Research

    The Program in Public Health values research that contributes to the health improvement of all populations and the elimination of health disparities. This value is operationalized by leading and facilitating interdisciplinary and collaborative research by the faculty and students, including work that emphasizes health improvement through community engagement and community-based participatory research (CBPR).

    Please visit the program website for more information regarding our faculty and research. 

  • Service

    Service

    The Program in Public Health values three types of service: Community; Professional; and University.

    1. Community: The Program values direct service to communities. This value is operationalized as advocating for improving population health and eliminating health disparities; and providing needs assessments and guidance for solutions to community health problems, and assisting the public health workforce.
    2. Professional: The Program values faculty members’ contributions to organizations that advance their professional fields. This value is operationalized by the faculty promotion and tenure criteria and by expectations for annual performance evaluations.
    3. University: The Program values service to the University, which is operationalized as mentoring other faculty and serving as members or leaders on committees that advance the mission and goals of the University and the Program in Public Health.
  • Accreditation

    ACCREDITATION

    The Program in Public Health (PPH) is regionally accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education (CHE MSA) as a component of SUNY Stony Brook University.

    The PPH offers two nationally accredited degree programs: the Master of Public Health (MPH) and the Master of Health Administration (MHA).

    Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH)

    The PPH’s Master of Public Health degree program received its initial accreditation by the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH) in 2008 and reaccredited in 2014. Between 2020 and 2021 the PPH conducted a thorough self-study process whereby we engaged students, staff, faculty, and community stakeholders in an assessment of our program. We had a successful site visit in April 2021 (virtual) and we are reaccredited until 2028.

    In addition, as a fully accredited program, our MPH alumni are eligible to be certified in public health by the National Board of Public Health Examiners (NBPHE). This organization was established in September 2005 for the purpose of ensuring that students and graduates from schools and programs of public health accredited by CEPH have mastered the knowledge and skills relevant to contemporary public health. The certification exam serves this purpose. More information about NBPHE and the certification exam can be found at our CPH Exam page.

    Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Management Education (CAHME)

    The MHA Program and MPH Concentration in Health Policy and Management are nationally accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Management Education (CAHME). Both the MHA Program and the Health Policy and Management Concentration of the MPH Program submitted to a process of self study in 2019-2020, participated in a virtual CAHME Site Visit in Fall 2020, and successfully received accreditation for both modalities in Spring 2021. The SBU MHA Program is the only accredited MHA program within the SUNY system. Learn more about the accreditation process here.

  • Policies

    Program Policies

    For more information about the Program in Public Health policies visit the program bulletin.

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