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COURSES
The curricular elements of the program should occupy no more than 20% of Scholars time, the rest taken up with individual research activities and personal mentoring. Please click on each of the curricular elements below for details.
Foundations of Population Health Course:We offer each Fall term a one-semester course in Foundations of Population Health. The course is a common core experience for all entering Scholars in the Program, and is also be open by permission of the instructor to other postdocs and advanced graduate students. Various Program faculty take the lead in presenting each week. The overall size will not exceed 15 in any given year. The course covers the three foundational areas of the program (social determinants, biomedical determinants, and intervention/application translation). We have sketched out a 13-week typical syllabus organized in terms of these three areas as follows:Social Determinants of Population Health Week 1: The nature and theory of intervention and policyWeek 2: The development of theory and evidence on the psychosocial and behavioral determinants of health Week 3: Biological pathways and mechanisms linking psychosocial factors to health and disease Week 4: Socioeconomic disparities in the health of populations Week 5: Introduction to constructing population health problems and policy prescriptions Week 6: Sex, gender and the health of populations Week 7: Racial/Ethnic disparities in the health of populations Week 8: Population genetics, gene-environment interaction Week 9: Spatial determinants of population health and the role of place Week 10: Community-based interventions for population health Week 11: Physical-chemical-biological environments and population health Week 12: The health of individuals and population over the lifecourse Week 13: Social and helath policy and population From Social and Biomedical Determinants of Population Health to Interventions, Policy, and Practice to Improve the Health of Community, Regional and National Populations [ back to top ] Population Health Research Seminar:We offer Research seminars and Methodology on alternate weeks during the academic year. The fundamental purpose of the research seminar is to provide an ongoing venue for interdisciplinary analysis and discussion of major issues in population health. It is open to the general university community, and would be coordinated with other related training programs as mutually appropriate. This coordination enriches the demographic, disciplinary, and substantive diversity of all of the programs involved, each of which is rather small on its own. The public nature of the seminar provides a major channel for interchange between the Program and the broader university community, which contains a rich array of resources relevant to issues of population health. The seminar consists of presentations by faculty, postdoctoral and occasionally predoctoral fellows from within the University and outside, with open and/or some structured (e.g., RWJ scholars or core faculty serving as discussants) discussion. The seminar has a topical theme some semesters, with flexibility to fit in special, if not related, presentations when the opportunity or exigency for a particularly timely or outstanding presenter/presentation arose. The topical themes would focus on a major set of issues or determinants for population health, or a major class of health outcomes. Among the thematic topics we envision:
[ back to top ] Methods in Population Health Seminar:The methodology seminar occurs on alternate weeks, from the research seminar. Its fundamental purpose is to provide a flexible vehicle for the exploration of and training in the full range of research, analytic, and statistical methods relevant to the study of population health. Presenters are drawn from within the program, the broader university, and outside the university. It is not be open to the general university community on a routine basis, as one of its functions is to allow discussion of methodological issues of special concern to scholars and faculty of the RWJ HSS Program. It includes both didactic and research presentations on particular methods or their use and application in research on population health. As appropriate, sessions or even a term of the methodology seminar are coordinated with the research seminar, e.g., sessions on multilevel and spatial analysis in conjunction with a research seminar series on Place and Health, sessions on life table, event history, or on longitudinal analysis in conjunction with a research seminar series on the Life Course and Health, or sessions on genetic and neuroendocrine methods in conjunction with a research seminar series on Biology, Genetics, and Population Health.[ back to top ] Health & Society Faculty/Scholars Seminar:Seven times a year we hold a faculty/scholars program open only to Scholars and the core faculty of the program (i.e., Steering Committee members and invited guests). The purpose would is to read and discuss a major book or related set of papers/chapters on a currently important or controversial topic in Population Health. It serves to develop social and intellectual cohesion among the Scholars and faculty of the Program, and as an incentive and reward for core faculty, such opportunities being less available than most of us would like.[ back to top ] Scholars Tutorial:As needed, but on at least a monthly basis, the Program Director (and one or more of the Associate Directors or other faculty as appropriate) meets with the Scholars as a small group over lunch to discuss their experience and progress in the Program and on their individual research, and more general issue of professional development and leadership in an interdisciplinary field. This is essentially a venue for facilitated discussion of issues of concern to the Scholars as a group, and for them to have a supportive collective forum for discussing individual issues and concerns.[ back to top ] Occasional Workshops, Seminars, etc.:Each Scholar will also develop, in consultation with mentors and the Program Directors, individualized programs of additional courses, workshops, or other learning experiences necessary for achieving their research and professional development objectives. As necessary, the Program may offer or facilitate workshops or modules of this type (e.g., on methodological techniques, professional development/leadership issues).[ back to top ] |
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