Skip to Main Content

Executive MPH Hybrid Curriculum: Online & In-Person

  • EMPH Year 1

    Summer Semester - 2 Credits

    • Biostatistics in Public Health (EPH 535E)
    • Foundations of Behavior Change (EPH 533E)

    Fall Semester - 3 Credits

    • Foundations of Epidemiology and Public Health (EPH 534E)
    • Frontiers of Public Health (EPH 537E)
    • Onsite intensive: Design Thinking in Public Health (EPH 530E; fall break)
    • Online short course: Ethics in Public Health (EPH 539E; two 3-hour synchronous sessions, typically two Fridays in late Sept.-early Oct., )

    Spring Semester - 2.5 Credits

    • Evidence-Based Decision-Making in Public Health (EPH 536E)
    • Health Policy and Health Care Systems (EPH 538E)
  • EMPH Year 2

    Summer Semester - 2.5 Credits

    • Onsite Intensive: Executive Communication Skills for Public Health and Healthcare (EPH 529E, mid-June)
    • 2 Electives

    Fall Semester - 3 Credits

    • Executive M.P.H. Capstone (EPH 540E)
    • 2 Electives

    Spring Semester – 3 Credits

    • Onsite Intensive: Everyday Leadership (EPH 528E; second week of spring break)
    • Executive M.P.H. Capstone (EPH 541E)
    • 2 Electives

Our courses

Our core public health courses required in Year 1 of the EMPH provide students with a broad foundation in the skill sets, frameworks, and perspectives essential to careers in public health. Focusing on biostatistics, epidemiology, frontiers in public health, health behavior change, health policy and health care systems, and ethics, these classes are designed for working professionals and use cases and small group discussions to enrich the learning experience. Each course is described in further detail on the Yale Bulletin.

Putting the E in EMPH: Emphasizing Management and Leadership Skills

As a program tailored to the needs of working professionals, core coursework also includes training focused on essential skills in problem-solving, management, and leadership. Combining conceptual learning of key frameworks and principles with opportunities to apply newly acquired skills, you will develop a practical skillset to serve you now and in the future. The EMPH’s three intensives—four-day courses on the Yale campus—allow students to develop and practice these skills under the guidance of expert instructors, in collaboration with other members of their cohort. The pedagogical and social elements of in-person intensives also provide opportunities for students to build lasting relationships and grow their professional networks through interactions with peers and faculty.

  • Design Thinking Intensive (Year 1, Fall Intensive)
    Solution-focused problem-solving is an essential competency for public health professionals. This intensive will introduce design thinking as an iterative framework to elevate the perspective of user groups in the innovation process to solve complex challenges. Students will leave the course with a firm understanding of tools and processes to address complex public health challenges, accounting for users' desires and needs, financial and political viability, and technical feasibility.
  • Evidence-Based Decision-Making in Public Health (Year 1, Spring Course)
    Students study and apply principles of evidence-based decision-making in public health to their specific areas of interest, with particular attention to ensuring that evidence-based practice is culturally-informed and tailored to the population of interest. In exploring different types of data and information that are used in evidence-informed public health decision-making, you will learn how to examine and define evidence, drawing on lessons learned from historical examples, and apply different frameworks for evidence-based decision-making to real-world public health challenges through case studies.
  • Executive Communication Skills for Public Health and Healthcare Intensive (Year 2, Summer Intensive)
    This course addresses strategies for articulating ideas to engage a spectrum of stakeholders and skills for advocating change. The course begins with a scientific examination of the markers of credibility in oral communication, followed by an exploration of the role of culture and diversity in framing suggestions to groups. Students will consider modes of persuasion as participants build facility in appealing to a variety of decision-making styles, while maintaining personal authenticity. Students then examine modes of inquiry as well as team collaboration from strategic and linguistic viewpoints. The course concludes with participants completing a high-stakes presentation tailored for a policy group, scientific panel, or venture capitalists.
  • Everyday Leadership Intensive (Year 2, Spring Intensive)
    Leadership encompasses a multi-dimensional set of skills that need to be leveraged based on situation and context. Understanding what leadership is and how to grow these skills requires the capacity to be a constant learner and adapt in the face of new situations and circumstances. This course will develop a learner-leader framework for students to maximize their own leadership capacity. Students will understand their own leadership styles and effectiveness, develop strategies for self-improvement, practice how to non-judgmentally seek, receive, and develop feedback from others on one’s leadership style and effectiveness, study and incorporate everyday leadership practices, and develop a personal leader-learner framework.