Director: Hyeyoung Oh Nelson, Assistant Professor
Office: North Classroom 3031
Telephone: 303-315-7157
Fax: 303-556-8501
Email: hyeyoung.nelson@ucdenver.edu
Website: https://clas.ucdenver.edu/hbsc/

Introduction

Please click here to see Health and Behavioral Sciences department information.

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS) and the Colorado School of Public Health (CSPH) together created the undergraduate Public Health program. Public health professionals work to protect the environment, identify sources of illness in population groups, control disease outbreaks, evaluate the economic ramifications of changing demographics, develop interventions to promote healthy behavior and produce health policy legislation. Public health draws from a broad array of disciplines, including a range of social, behavioral, and natural sciences, each provides unique insights for the diverse set of activities involved in public health practice.

Students in the BA program develop a specialty in the social sciences and public health. Graduates with a BA in Public Health will be prepared for pursuit of graduate degrees in a broad range of fields, including the social and behavioral sciences, public health, law, social work, business administration, and health services research. The program is especially appropriate for students intending to pursue careers in public health, as well as health policy and administration.

These degree requirements are subject to periodic revision by the academic department, and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences reserves the right to make exceptions and substitutions as judged necessary in individual cases. Therefore, the College strongly urges students to consult regularly with their major advisor and CLAS advisor to confirm the best plans of study before finalizing them.

Program Delivery

• This is an on-campus program.

Declaring This Major

• Click here to go to information about declaring a major.

General Requirements

To earn a degree, students must satisfy all requirements in each of the three areas below, in addition to their individual major requirements.

• CU Denver General Graduation Requirements
• CU Denver Core Curriculum
• College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Graduation Requirements
• Click here for information about Academic Policies

Program Requirements

1. Students must complete a total of 43 credit hours from approved courses.
2. Students must complete a minimum of 16 upper-division (3000-level and above) credit hours from approved courses.
3. Students must earn a minimum grade of C- (1.7) in all courses that apply to the major and must achieve a minimum cumulative major GPA of 2.0. Courses taken using P+/P/F or S/U grading cannot apply to major requirements.
4. Students must complete a minimum of 26 PBHL credit hours with CU Denver faculty, including a minimum of 5 of the following PBHL 2001 Introduction to Public Health, PBHL 3001 Introduction to Epidemiology, PBHL 3020 Introduction to Environmental Health,PBHL 3030 Health Policy, PBHL 3070 Perspectives in Global Health, PBHL 4040 Social Determinants of Health or PBHL 4099 Capstone Experience in Public Health.

Course List

Code	Title	Hours
Complete the following program requirements:
Complete all of the following required courses:		23
A minimum of five must be taken at the University of Colorado Denver.
PBHL 2001	Introduction to Public Health
PBHL 3001	Introduction to Epidemiology
PBHL 3020	Introduction to Environmental Health
PBHL 3030	Health Policy
PBHL 3070	Perspectives in Global Health
PBHL 4040	Social Determinants of Health
PBHL 4099	Capstone Experience in Public Health
Complete one of the following Quantitative Methods courses, or another statistics course that has been approved by the undergraduate program director/advisor in advance:		3
ANTH 4050	Quantitative Methods in Anthropology
MATH 2830	Introductory Statistics
MATH 4830	Applied Statistics
PSYC 2090	Statistics and Research Methods
Complete six credits (2 courses) of PBHL electives.		6
Complete one of the following Biological Sciences Options:		8
Biological Sciences Option 1
Biological Sciences Option 2
Complete three additional PBHL elective credits, or choose one of the following pre-approved electives from another department, or another course that has been approved by the undergraduate program director/advisor in advance:		3
ANTH 4010	Medical Anthropology: Global Health
ANTH 4080	Global Health Practice
ANTH/PBHL 4090	Psychedelic Anthropology
ANTH 4290	Anthropology and Public Health
ANTH 4600	Medical Anthropology
COMM 4500	Health Communication
COMM 4525	Health Communication and Community
COMM 4550	Rhetorics of Medicine & Health
COMM 4575	Designing Health Messages
COMM 4620	Health Risk Communication
ECON 4660	Health Economics.
ENVS 1342	Environment, Society and Sustainability
ETST 3002	Ethnicity, Health and Social Justice
GEOG 3501	Geography of Health
GEOG 4230	Hazard Mitigation and Vulnerability Assessment
GEOG 4235	GIS Applications in the Health Sciences
HEHM 3100	Foundations of Health Humanities
HEHM 3570	Death & Dying: Social & Medical Perspectives
HIST 4345	Gender, Science, and Medicine: 1600 to the Present
PHIL 4242	Medicine, Health Care, and Justice: Bioethics
PSCI 4215	Women's Rights, Human Rights: Global Perspectives
PSCI 4330	U.S. Health Policy
PSYC 3262	Health Psychology
PSYC 3265	Drugs, Brain and Behavior
PSYC 3305	Psychopathology
PSYC 3822	Aging, Brain and Behavior
SOCY 3440	Medical Sociology
SOCY 3570	Death & Dying: Social & Medical Perspectives
SOCY 4110	Sociology of Health Care
SOCY 4220	Population Change and Analysis
Total Hours		43

Biological Sciences Option 1

Course List

Code	Title	Hours
Complete two of the following courses:		8
BIOL 1550	Basic Biology: Ecology and the Diversity of Life
BIOL 1560	Basic Biology: From Cells to Organisms
ANTH 1303	Introduction to Biological Anthropology

Biological Sciences Option 2

Course List

Code	Title	Hours
Complete the following courses:		8
BIOL 2010	Organisms to Ecosystems (Gen Bio)
or BIOL 2030	Honors Organisms to Ecosystems (Gen Bio)
BIOL 2011	Organisms to Ecosystems Lab (Gen Bio)
or BIOL 2031	Honors Organisms to Ecosystems Lab (Gen Bio)
BIOL 2020	Molecules to Cells (Gen Bio)
or BIOL 2040	Honors Molecules to Cells (Gen Bio)
BIOL 2021	Molecules to Cells Lab (Gen Bio)
or BIOL 2041	Honors Molecules to Cells Lab (Gen Bio)

To learn more about the Student Learning Outcomes for this program, please visit our website. 

To review the Degree Map for this program, please visit our website.