141st APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

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Recorded Annual Meeting Presentations (RAMP) are now available for purchase.
Only $90 for presenters, $140 for registered attendees and $200 for non-attendees.

Online Program

281046
Teaching to transform global health: Promising models for competency development and assessment of learning


Wednesday, November 6, 2013 : 8:30 a.m. - 8:50 a.m.

Ian Lapp, PhD, School of Public Health, Harvard University, Boston, MA
Peter Berman, PhD, Department of Global Health and Population, Harvard University, Building 1, Room 1117, MA

Joshua Glasser, MS, Harvard University, Boston, MA
The Harvard School of Public Health has been carrying out an intensive review of global health education within its educational programs and around the world with the goal of formulating competency sets, curriculum frameworks, and new pedagogical approaches.

The first phase of this project (year one) has grappled with a number of questions including definitions of “global health” and their impact on educational design and processes that are needed to design robust competency-based curricula and assessment methods. The study was guided by the work of Frenk & Chen (2010) and the process was data-driven including analysis of data sources including hundreds of graduate student surveys and alumni placement records, a survey of 150 undergraduate students aspiring for careers in global public health, interviews with nearly 40 global health employers, and a comprehensive analysis of global health curriculum and competencies from across North America and around the world. The result, we now have a clearer picture of the relationship between schooling and work for prospective, current, and past students. Also, we have guidance from the labor market about the skills and experiences needed both to enter the profession, and advance towards leadership roles. We have also mapped the types of institutions that make up the global health education ecosystem.

The result is we have designed new competencies and more importantly for generalizability a promising strategies to guide design and implementation of competencies, curriculum and pedagogical approaches that foster stronger educational outcomes for SPHs in the Global North and Global South.

Learning Areas:

Administration, management, leadership
Other professions or practice related to public health

Learning Objectives:
Explain how the definition of "global health" impacts educational design. Delineate key features of the global health education ecosystem. Identify several strong models for competency-based education in global health. Evaluate data sources for conducting their own institutions competency development. Implement process-oriented practices for competency creation and assessment methods for global health education.

Keyword(s): Competency, Education

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: As an Associate Dean for over a decade at two leading Schools of Public Health who has been highly engaged in issues of competencies and curriculum design I am qualified to speak to the issues of this abstract.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 5022.0: Global Learning and Public Health