Summary of Comments on Section Two
2.0 Instructional Programs
2.1 Degree Offerings
2.1.a“I assume the distinction between these as academic and professional degrees will be made later in the document.One thing that is confusing is that usually it is the BA that is the professional degree and BS is the academic degree, but I'll look for the descriptions in the later reading.” (B)
2.1.c “These are more saying we met the basic requirements than they are ‘strengths.’Can you come up with a few unique strengths like some degrees not offered in other schools or preparing graduates to take on roles not found in other schools?” (B)
Not sure how “Getting students and faculty to electronically access degree information, course syllabi, and Departmental and SPHIS information” fits here? (U-H)
2.2 Program Length
2.2.a“Is there some rationale for requiring more than 42 hours?If so, it would be good to elaborate on it.” (B)
2.2.d“Not really strengths, more like statements of fact.I know it's hard to think up strengths for this, but see if you can.Something like, ‘All degree programs are competency based and require extensive field-based practice experiences.’” (B)
“Such as in what [emerging] areas [of PH]?” (B)
2.3 Public Health Core Knowledge
2.3.aRe: three additional courses: “This is clearly a strength of your MPH as related to the additional MPH hours.Make sure you play it up as much as possible.If you can relate these three courses to development of cross-cutting competencies not covered in the core courses, that would be great.” (B)
2.3.b“Much better list of strengths.” (B)
“Expand a bit on the value of adding these three courses.” (B)
Re: challenges: “Elaborate on this a bit.” (B)
2.4 Practical Skills
How many hours are required for practice experience? (U-H) / “About how many clock hours would this be?” (B)
2.4.a Is there a manual for preceptors? (U-H)
“If these are most of the criteria used, and it would seem to be, I don't think I would include the ‘in part’ phrase, maybe use the term ‘primarily’.” (B)
“What are the criteria for getting the exemption from having an MPH, and who decides if this is acceptable?Is there any evidence that this exemption has worked or even proved beneficial to students?” (B)
Re: practicum mentoring team: “Good, make sure this is cited as a strength.” (B)
Do members of the practicum mentoring team perform midpoint checks with students and preceptors? (U-H)
2.4.bOrganize table by program area (or at least indicate, per criteria). Might organize by site if possible; might be easier to see range of organizations. (U-H)
“May want to do a narrative summary here and put the table in the appendix.Number of students and types of placement settings.” (B)
2.4.d“You may just want to indicate you don't have such programs rather than say ‘no students in this category.’ (B)
2.5 Culminating Experience
2.5.aShould the culminating experience be listed in section 2.3.a if all take? (U-H)
2.5.bRe: first strength: “Not really a strength, but an expectation.” (B)
2.6 Required Competencies
2.6.a“What is the distinction between the BA and BS? One would expect a few different competencies for these two programs” (B)
“Picky point, but for consistency either use the not tabled/border list as before or use the tabled/border as done here for all competency lists.” (B)[Leaving out remaining style/numbering consistency comments. -EN]
2.6.bDoes each MPH concentration have competencies beyond core? (U-H)
Use same language to begin each section or might confuse reviewers. (U-H)
2.6.c“Even though the practicum, culminating experience, thesis, etc. are actually courses with numbers, I suggest you have a column for courses and include all related courses in that cell, another column for practicum/field experiences, another column for culminating experience, and one for thesis/dissertation and list the courses in those cells.This way it is much easier to see the type of learning experiences related to the competencies for each degree.” (B)
“Again, the distinction between the BA and BS is not evident.” (B)
Why not separate courses in table 2.6.4? (U-H)
“Should probably restate what P and R represent in these tables.” (B)
I would try to standardize format of tables here. Flip to landscape, write out competency names. (U-H) / “This goes for all of the tables in this section.it would be useful if brief labels of the courses could be included such as: intro epi (PHEP501) rather than just the number of the course.” (B)
“As mentioned before, if these could be put in categories of courses, practicum, culminating exp., and theses/dissertation, it would be easier to see the types of course/activities more clearly.” (B)
2.6.eSwitch order of Bachelors and MPH. (U-H)
“BA/BS distinction?” (B)
If fairly similar, would condense vs. having each separate all over the place. (U-H)
Re: MS-BDS: “I would not include this comment, say it such as: ‘This program has not formally done this yet, but will do it in the future’ How can a program say this is not important so we don't do it?“(B)
2.6.fI’m not sure I’d do each program; can you discuss overall? Otherwise, there are red flags here. (U-H)
2.6.g“Try to reword these more as strengths than meeting expectations” (B)
2.7 Assessment Procedures
2.7.aMaybe discuss more generally > MS, PhD > for example: coursework, comp exam, thesis, dissertation > role of faculty advisor > academic probation. (U-H)
“By this do you mean you have your own exam in the format of the CPH exam or do you use the actual CPH exam for this purpose?” (B)
2.7.b So can have entering year + % completed within X years? What is completion target for MPH and PhD (e.g. 3 years, 5 years, etc.)? (U-H)
Split Table 2.7.1 by PhD vs. masters? MPH separate? (U-H)
What to do with additional outcome measures? If degree completion rate is okay, we may not need these in document; move to resource file. (U-H)
Re: Table 2.7.2: “Add percentages also. Why the lower totals across the years, absence of data? Maybe add another column for three-year total” (B)
Re: Table 2.7.6: “These rates seem very high compared with my experience.Has the denominator been adjusted for students who drop out or have been dismissed?” (B)
Move Table 2.7.8 to section 2.7.a? (U-H)
Re: comp exam PHPH 697: “Not seeing mentioned table.” Also: “Not sure what points you are trying to make here.” (B)
2.7.dRe: Table 2.7.9: “Any reason you know of for this low rate?“ (B)
remove BPH info from 2.7.d. (U-H) / “I don't believe this to be true.I just checked and found that undergraduates are not eligible to take the CPHE.“ (B) + “The exam schedule is being changed so you may want to drop this.It has been offered in Feb. the last 2 years and it may be offered more than once a year in the future.” (B)
2.7.f“Need your "Criterion Met’ statement” (B)
2.8 Other Graduate Professional Degrees
2.9 Bachelor’s Degrees in Public Health
“Again, what are distinguishing characteristics of these degrees?I do see the different courses listed below and that is helpful, but what are the graduates prepared to do that is different?” (B)
2.9.c“I was hoping by looking at the courses, I could determine if the entries in the degree matrix in section 2.2 of the BA being the academic degree and the BS being the professional degree, but I was not able to answer that question for myself.If you have labeled them as intended, that is fine, but I'm just not clear on which should be the academic degree and which should be the professional degree.” (B)
Re: Table 2.9.1: “Not sure why these are repeated as separate rows on both sides when they have the same content.Same as with PHUN-491” (B) + “If these are existing courses, shouldn't they already have course numbers and descriptions?” (B)
2.9.e“Need your "Criterion Met’ statement” (B)
2.10 Other Bachelor’s Degrees
2.11 Academic Degrees
2.11.a“This set of courses does not convince me that these students get a public health orientation. This could be an issue for reviewers.Many academic degrees include an intro to public health course to meet this criterion.Also, it is expected that every PH degree have at least one epi course.” (B)
2.11.b3 hours for intro to PH + 3 hrsEpi. Do all students take Epi? If yes, state. (U-H)
Note: likely will need more than this. Have seen this be a problem. (U-H)
2.11.cI would briefly describe (e.g. MS: thesis and/or comp exam; PhD: dissertation plus oral defense). I might do a table by dept/program. (U-H)
Program / Thesis or dissertation / Comp examA / X
B / X / X
C / X
Re: MS-BDS statement: “Not sure what this means?” (B)
2.12 Doctoral Degrees
“This would not be a long list, so I would list them here.” (B)
2.12.cRe: Table 2.12.3: “I would move this into title cell and label the Column ‘Course Title and ID’That would save a bit of space in your table and you could increase the size of some columns that are a bit narrow.” (B) + “What does this column represent? (B) + “What does ‘Uses’ refer to?I don't see any description of what these numbers represent.” (B)
2.12.dCoursework for each degree. Maybe do by degree instead of class. Not sure all info is needed. (U-H)
2.13 Joint Degrees
2.13.aAre there certain specific courses that cross credit? This is a question we were asked. (U-H)
2.13.b“So, in these cases, there is no course sharing from the non-pubic health degree?This should be specifically mentioned and if courses (say from the MD) are counted in the 47 hrs, these need to be indicated.” (B)
“Reviewers are likely going to want to see which specific courses from the MUP curriculum are counted toward the MPH so they can conclude they have a public health orientation/content” (B)
2.14 Distance Education or Executive Degree Programs