YSPH Doctoral Program Ranked Among the Top in National Survey

The Yale School of Public Health’s doctoral program is ranked among the very top in the country in a long-awaited and comprehensive survey released by the National Research Council.

Unlike the NRC’s last study released in 1995, the latest survey does not assign a specific overall ranking to each program, but rather provides a range for each. Nevertheless, the 2010 study used two different ranking systems and each placed the Yale School of Public Health program as third in the nation.

“We are delighted that the NRC report emphasized objective data and confirmed what we think; that the Yale School of Public Health is one of the strongest in the country,” said Paul D. Cleary, dean of the School of Public Health. “This is extremely useful information for prospective students and faculty.”

The Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree in Epidemiology and Public Health is administered by the Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and is offered in five divisions within the School—Biostatistics, Chronic Disease Epidemiology, Environmental Health Sciences, Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases and Health Policy & Administration. Students are encouraged to engage in interdisciplinary research and to conduct dissertation research abroad. Placement of Ph.D. students upon graduation is excellent, with many former students employed in government, academia and the private sector.

The 2010 study used 21 criteria to assess various public health Ph.D. programs in the United States, including faculty publications, citation rates, grants, financial aid for students and diversity. In addition to the Epidemiology and Public Health program, 54 other Ph.D. programs at Yale participated in the survey.

“This national recognition of our program as outstanding will have a tremendous positive impact on future recruitments of graduate students, as well as faculty. In addition, the wealth of data provided by this study will form the basis for a critical and constructive assessment of our program,” said Christian Tschudi, an associate professor of epidemiology and public health and director of graduate studies at YSPH.

The 2010 NRC study is based on data that was first collected in 2006. It compares 4,838 individual research programs in 62 subject areas across 212 surveyed institutions. Nationwide, the survey involved collected data from 90,000 faculty.

Meanwhile, Academic Analytics, which published an index of faculty scholarly productivity based on publications, citations, funded research, and awards and honors, has ranked the faculty at the Yale School of Public Health as the most productive faculty of all the schools of public health in the country. In the 2010 fiscal year, YSPH received $36.4 million in federal grant support and $4.2 million in non-federal support, for a total of $40.7 million.

“This is an excellent achievement considering how difficult it has been to obtain research funding recently,” Cleary said.

For more information on the 2010 NRC study, visit http://chronicle.com/article/NRC-Rankings-Overview-Public/124702/ or http://www.nap.edu/rdp/.