Master of Public Health Program expands to Bismarck and Minot campuses

Document Type

News Article

Publication Date

3-3-2016

Campus Unit

School of Medicine & Health Sciences

Abstract

GRAND FORKS, N.D.— The University of North Dakota Master of Public Health Program now offers the MPH Program to students in Bismarck and Minot, North Dakota.

The UND School of Medicine and Health Sciences (SMHS), starting with the fall semester 2016, will offer the MPH Program at a distance to classes based at the SMHS’s Southwest Campus in Bismarck and its Northwest Campus in Minot.

The UND MPH classes will be offered synchronously online, right from the classroom at UND where they are held. Though students in Bismarck and Minot will be encouraged to join their cohort in class on the college campuses there, students from all over North Dakota will be able to participate online—just like many students already do in other UND programs from locations around North Dakota and the country.

“We are highlighting the cohort, in-class aspect of this program for students in Bismarck and Minot, but we encourage any students across North Dakota to participate,” said MPH Program founder and director Raymond Goldsteen, DrPH.

“This program will offer Bismarck and Minot students the full benefit of our curriculum in real time, interactively with our instructors in the classroom here at UND,” said Goldsteen, who also directs the program’s Center for Comparative Effectiveness Analytics.

The Bismarck and Minot extensions of the UND MPH Program will be administered from the MPH Program offices at the SMHS in Grand Forks.

“The synchronous delivery means students in a cohort class will get all the benefits of being in the classroom with a teacher, interacting with students in Grand Forks,” said Goldsteen, coauthor with his wife, Karen, of the textbook Introduction to Public Health: Promises and Practice. Karen Goldsteen, MPH, PhD, is a research associate professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine and in the Center for Rural Health at the SMHS. She serves as a faculty fellow for the MPH Program.

Goldsteen says this distance education effort will include both of the specializations offered at UND—Population Health Analytics and Health Management and Policy.

About the UND Master of Public Health Program The MPH Program at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences welcomes applicants from a wide variety of backgrounds, including the social and behavioral sciences; the biomedical sciences; mathematics, statistics and computer science; and the humanities.

In addition, the MPH is an excellent partner for all clinical degrees, including medicine, nursing, medical laboratory science, physician assistant, physical therapy, and occupational therapy, as it expands professional opportunities in these fields. Also, those who wish to apply for a clinical program find that the MPH degree can enhance their application as well as their preparation for their clinical career. Because of the diversity of our students, the program is designed for full- and part-time study, as well as distance education through live broadcast of all classes.

The MPH Program at UND has two specializations: Population Health Analytics, and Health Management and Policy. Both prepare students for the work of population health improvement in the diverse communities of the Northern Plains and similar regions. Understanding the multiple determinants of population health—medical care, public health interventions, the social environment, the physical environment, and individual behavior—and learning how to optimize population health in the region are complex, fascinating, and important undertakings.

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