Program Overview

Master of Public Health (M.P.H.) Program

The Master of Public Health (M.P.H.) program at the O'Donnell School of Public Health is designed to equip students with the knowledge and skills necessary to transform health for individuals, families, and communities. The program offers a comprehensive education in public health, with a focus on methodological skills, health systems sciences, implementation science, and health promotion.

Program Pathways

The M.P.H. program offers two pathways: a full-time two-year pathway and a part-time three-year pathway. Both pathways lead to the same M.P.H. degree, but the three-year pathway has a lighter course load each semester.

• Two-Year Path: Full-time, starting in the fall semester, with 9 or more hours per fall/spring semester and 6 hours per summer semester.
• Three-Year Path: Part-time, starting in the summer semester, with fewer than 9 hours per fall/spring semester and fewer than 6 hours per summer semester.

M.P.H. Courseload by Semester

The courseload for each pathway is as follows:

Two-Year M.P.H.

• Year One:
  • Fall: 11 credits
  • Spring: 10 credits
• Year Two:
  • Summer: 6 credits
  • Fall: 9-10 credits
  • Spring: 8-9 credits
• Total: 45 credits

Three-Year M.P.H.

• Year One:
  • Summer: 4 credits
  • Fall: 7 credits
  • Spring: 5 credits
• Year Two:
  • Summer: 6 credits
  • Fall: 6 credits
  • Spring: 4-5 credits
• Year Three:
  • Summer: 3 credits
  • Fall: 5-6 credits
  • Spring: 3 credits
• Total: 45 credits

Concentrations

The M.P.H. program offers four concentrations:

Applied Epidemiology

Students learn about various types of data used in public health research and practice, and how these data are collected, managed, analyzed, and reported.

Social & Behavioral Sciences

Students build skills to drive transformative change in health and health equity, designing, implementing, and evaluating evidence-based programs.

Health Economics, Systems, and Policy

Students acquire knowledge and skills about the economics of health decisions, health care delivery, and health policy, developing evidence-based platforms to drive transformation.

Health Data Science

Students gain rigorous data-science knowledge and advanced computational skills to address public health challenges, applying statistical and analytic techniques to solve real-world problems.

Practicum Requirement / Applied Practice Experience (APE)

All M.P.H. students complete three credit hours of a community service-learning experience, working with advisors to connect with UT Southwestern mentors and community partners.

Integrative Learning Experience (ILE)

The ILE represents the culmination of the M.P.H. program, where students demonstrate mastery of concepts taught throughout the program. Students work with advisors to choose foundational and concentration-specific aims, producing a scholarly paper as part of the ILE requirement.

Program Details

• The student-to-faculty ratio is less than 2-to-1.
• Most courses have about 10-15 students per course.
• The program is primarily delivered in person in Dallas, TX.
• Scholarships are available for full-time students, with 93% of full-time M.P.H. students receiving scholarship assistance.
• The acceptance rate for the class enrolling in the previous year was 46%.
• There are no formal course prerequisites for admission, but students are encouraged to familiarize themselves with statistics, R programming, qualitative and quantitative skills prior to beginning their studies.