Programs	Public Health Nutrition
About Our Program Program Delivery Curriculum Design Criteria for Admission Program Faculty Student Handbook	Public Health Nutritionists integrate the knowledge, skills, and experience fundamental to all public health disciplines and apply this integrated knowledge to alleviate diet-related health problems among diverse population groups. Graduates will be prepared to advance knowledge regarding the role of nutrition in disease prevention and health promotion and apply this knowledge to planning, managing, delivering, and evaluating nutrition services and programs. Employment often includes health departments, federal and private food assistance programs, worksite health promotion programs, nutrition advocacy organizations, health centers and schools. The understanding of human nutrition is important to maximize the health of individuals in a diverse society that faces nutrition-related diseases of both deficiency and excess. A complete understanding of human nutrition is built upon knowledge of its fundamental biological bases. It also involves an understanding of societal, psychological, cultural, and behavioral influences that affect food consumption, and therefore, human well being. Public health nutrition advances knowledge regarding the role of nutrition in disease prevention and health promotion and applies this knowledge to planning, managing, delivering, and evaluating nutrition services and programs. The proposed MPH major in public health nutrition will train students to integrate the knowledge, skills, and experience fundamental to all public health disciplines and to apply this integrated knowledge to alleviate diet-related health problems among diverse population groups. The program is designed to train professionals to assume leadership positions in assessing community-nutrition needs and in planning, directing, and evaluating the nutrition component of health-promotion and disease-prevention efforts. Graduates of the program would be expected to participate in policy analysis, program development, and to design and manage population-based community wide interventions as part of large-scale public health programs. Public Health Nutrition graduates are prepared to:  •  Identify and assess diet-related health problems of undernutrition and overnutrition among diverse population groups.  •  Identify the social, cultural, economic, environmental and institutional factors that contribute to the risks of undernutrition and overnutrition among diverse populations.  •  Develop educational and other population-based intervention strategies to improve food security.  •  Develop policies to reduce barriers to food insecurity and to improve the food choices and nutritional status of diverse populations.  •  Describe techniques to guide consumers in selection of food and nutritionally adequate diets.  •  Communicate nutrition related issues skillfully, utilizing different media in varied settings.  •  Apply the principles of management to community-nutrition programs.  •  Participate in advocacy efforts to improve the nutritional status of various populations.  •  Monitor and recommend public policies to protect and promote nutritional status and health of diverse populations.  •  Contribute to the body of nutrition knowledge through active research of an applied nature.