Sunday, March 25, 2012

Looking for A Master of Public Health


When it comes to a public health graduate degree, haven’t you decided on which path to take? There are many public health masters programs available, both professional and academic, at master and doctoral levels. Two kinds of degrees can be obtained in this field namely an MS in public health or a master of public health.

When it comes to a Master of Public Health, this is a program that helps students develop the necessary knowledge in the public health field. There are various concentrations in public health that can be considered by the people who are able to complete various MPH programs. Depending on what you like, there are different focuses that you can delve into here from health policy and administration to environmental health.

A couple of core subjects have to be taken by people who engage in MPH degree courses. In this case, graduating from the course means that you have to engage in fieldwork or prepare a thesis to serve as your culminating requirement. Something like a Master of Public Health is actually awarded by the Graduate School of Public Health to students who complete the program.

Even if your undergraduate discipline is not related to public health, you can enroll in this master's course. Here, most course enrollees are all undergraduates. There are times though when MPH degrees are only available to those who have doctorate degrees.

The stringency of admission to MPH programs may vary from institution to institution. In some facilities, admission is only pegged at around 35%. An aspiring student should obtain at least a 50th-percentile on every GRE section and an undergraduate GPA of at least 3.0.

All it takes is 24 months for a Master of Public Health degree to be completed provided that you have no other endeavor but studying. For those who have PhDs, they can engage in this type of program through various accelerated programs that only call for 12 months of studying. Similar to most professional degree programs, students are normally not accommodated with considerable grant or scholarship options to fund their education.

As a professional, if you are considering research efforts, you should think about an MS, MSc, ScM, or MSPH which are all master's of science degrees. Even if you choose to participate in a certain specialization, your coursework will not be limited to that area of expertise. Although the Master of Science in Public Health degree involves PH courses, it is still first and foremost a research endeavor.

If you want to be a professional in the public health industry, the Master of Science is really not a good degree to consider. Something that will be required from individuals is interdisciplinary education if they want to make a career out of this. Dissertations are always part of the game when it comes to this.

If you will be engaging in an MS program, it will be best if you also considered taking academic doctoral programs such as PhD or ScD as the coursework will be similar. Usually capped off with a dissertation, the coursework will take about 2 years to complete. No other body but the School of Art and Sciences can confer something like an MS.

In general, applying to MS programs is more difficult and competitive than to Master of Public Health programs because of the smaller accepted class sizes and the critical individual attention on MS students during defense phase and thesis. The acceptance rate still varies from school to school. Although it rarely happens, there is still the possibility of an MS student to get something like a training grant from the company that he or she is working for.