Southern Connecticut State University

Alumni Association

Public Health Alumni Chapter

Alumni Surveys Program

Mission, Goals and Objectives

Mission: To support the efforts of the Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU) Department of Public Health (DPH)'s pursuit of professional accreditation of its undergraduate baccalaureate program and the re-accreditation of its graduate Master of Public Health program.

 

Goal: To meet the Council on Education for Public Health's Accreditation Criteria for Public Health Programs that was amended June 2005, as it pertains to the gathering of alumni feedback and alumni services to the educational and professional community, as well as the new accreditation criteria for undergraduate public health programs

 

Objective 1: Meet Criteria 1.1: Mission. The program shall have a clearly formulated

and publicly stated mission with supporting goals and objectives. The program shall foster the development of professional public health values, concepts and ethical practice.

 

This document seeks to delineate the mission, goals and objectives of the Alumni Surveys Program (ASP). The MPH Accreditation Committee has been conducting alumni surveys since 1994, and has done so in an ethical manner. All graduate alumni are contacted to voluntarily participate. Alumni are assured by the Committee Chair that all information submitted is treated confidentially. This protocol will also be used with the BS alumni surveys that will be administered during the summer and fall of 2007.

 

Alumni surveys are basically evaluation activities that seek to gather from practitioners input that would be useful for informing curriculum development and review. After all, ASP does view professional development as beginning in the classroom and honed in future practice opportunities.

                         

Objective 2: Meet Criteria 1.2: Evaluation and Planning. The program shall have an

explicit process for evaluating and monitoring its overall efforts against its mission, goals and objectives; for assessing the program's effectiveness in serving its various constituencies; and for planning to achieve its mission in the future.

 

The program should have regular data collection mechanisms to provide information needed for its own evaluation, management and planning. Information should be obtained on a regular basis from alumni and from public health agencies concerning careers in public health, the value of graduates educational experiences, and current and future needs for professional education. Planning should reflect the program's accommodation to changes in health needs of populations and in society and institutional responses to such change.

 

Evaluation and planning processes should provide for participation of the program's major constituent groups, including administration, faculty, students, alumni and the community. A wide variety of methods for achieving their input is possible.

 

MPH alumni are requested to provide feedback four times during the first ten years they have graduated from the program. Feedback is gathered by paper surveys that are sent out during the fall of every year, and can also be submitted electronically. A written report is completed by the MPH Accreditation Committee and submitted to the Coordinator of Graduate Studies at the end of each academic year. Response rates are posted at: http://www.bettycjung.net/Macomm.htm

 

The following is the explanation provided in the cover letter that accompanies the surveys:

 

         These surveys collect data required by the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH) for graduate public health program accreditation. They gather basic demographic data, your perceptions regarding the value of your graduate education in preparing you for a career in Public Health, and its impact on general career growth and development. Analyses of responses are meant to assist the Department of Public Health (DPH) in its curriculum development and review activities.

         You will be receiving 4 surveys over the first 10 years out of school. We try to get them to you in a timely fashion but we don't always get the addresses, so we send them out when we can. If you get more than one survey, please complete them and send them back. Except for demographics, each collects different data.

         The SCSU Foundation provides the mailing labels, and DPH provides the postage. As a service to DPH, the Public Health Alumni Chapter's MPH Accreditation Committee has volunteered its efforts to the collection, maintenance, analysis and reporting of alumni data in aggregate form. This is done to ensure confidentiality and to encourage your continual participation in our endeavor to see that alumni interests are fully represented in the CEPH accreditation process.

 

Based on the responses from the first BS alumni survey to be conducted by ASP in 2007, a protocol will be developed for conducting future surveys of its undergraduate alumni. Response rates will be posted at: http://www.bettycjung.net/Bacomm.htm

 

Objective 3: Meet Criteria 2.7: Assessment Procedures. There shall be procedures for

assessing and documenting the extent to which each student has demonstrated competence in the required areas of performance.

A table showing the destination of graduates for each of the last three years. The table must include at least the number and percentage of graduates by program area each year going to a) government (state, local, federal), b) nonprofit organization, c) hospital or health care delivery facility, d) private practice, e) university or research institute, f) proprietary

organization (industry, pharmaceutical company, consulting), g) further education, h) non-health related employment, or i) not employed.

Data describing results from periodic assessments of alumni and employers of graduates regarding the ability of the program's graduates to effectively perform the competencies in a practice setting.

 

The MPH alumni surveys gather this information annually. The following table lists the information collected from alumni, and when over the course of a 10-year period:

 

Topic	Post-grad	Year One	Year Five	Year Ten
Demographics
Residence	X	X	X	X
Age	X	X	X	X
Gender	X	X	X	X
Race/Ethnicity	X	X	X	X
Employment	X	X	X	X
Field of Employment	X	X	X	X
Primary Work site	X	X	X	X
Employer Organization	X	X	X	X
Primary Job Responsibility	X	X	X	X
Curriculum
MPH Program Emphasis	X
How Well Curriculum Prepares One for PH Career	X
Preparation for CHES competencies	X
Preparation for Public Health Content Areas (Replaces specific course ratings)	X
Areas of MPH Program Emphasis		X
Comments: Areas alumni wished they had more exposure while in school		X
Career
Comments: Improving the curriculum for real world application	X	X
Finding a job		X
Comparisons to others with MPH		X
MPH a factor in job		X
Level of preparation for PH career		X
Satisfaction with choosing Public Health as career			X	X
Why pursue an MPH career			X	X
Frequency of changing jobs			X	X
Reasons for changing jobs			X	X
Source of job opportunities			X	X
Academics and Work site Comparisons
Emphasis of Public Health disciplines		X
Skill emphases		X
Trend Analyses
How well MPH curriculum prepared one for Public Health career, by year of graduation	X
MPH program emphases ratings, by year of graduation	X
Job satisfaction, by year of graduation	X	X	X	X
Public Health career satisfaction, by year of graduation			X	X
Professional-related activities			X	X

 

 

The BS alumni survey will gather information annually from current year graduates. The initial BS alumni survey covers the information listed on the following table.

 

Topic	Annual Survey
Demographics
Residence	X
Age	X
Gender	X
Race/Ethnicity	X
Employment	X
Field of Employment	X
Primary Work site	X
Employer Organization	X
Primary Job Responsibility	X
Job title	X
Satisfaction with current job	X
Satisfaction with choice of profession	X
If not working in public health, why	X
Frequency of changing jobs	X
Reasons for changing jobs	X
Source of job opportunities	X
Curriculum
Why pursue a BS in Public Health	X
BS major concentration	X
Introduction and Clarification of� Professional Public Health Values, Concepts and Ethical Practices	X
How Well Curriculum Prepares One for PH Career	X
Preparation for Public Health Practice Content Areas	X
Areas of BS Program Emphasis	X
Career Development
Difficulty in finding a job	X
How long it took to find a job after graduation	X
Title of first job	X
Comments: Skills learned that were the most useful	X
Comments: greatest professional accomplishment to date	X
How well one was prepared for a public health career	X
Comparisons to others with BS in Public Health	X
BS a factor in job	X
Licensures/Certifications	X
Post-BS education	X
Reason for post-BS education	X
Competencies & skills not taught in program, but important for current job	X
Suggestions for improvements	X
Comments	X
Trend Analyses
How well BS curriculum prepared one for Public Health career, by year of graduation	X
BS program emphases ratings, by year of graduation	X
Job satisfaction, by year of graduation	X
Public Health career satisfaction, by year of graduation	X

 

                        Objective 4: Meet Criteria 4.6: Advising and Career Counseling. There shall be available clearly explained and accessible academic advising system for students, as well as readily available career and placement advice.

 

Interpretation. Each student enrolled in the program should have access, from time of enrollment, to advisors who are knowledgeable about the program's curricula overall and about specific courses and programs of study. Orientation, including written documentation, should be provided for all entering students. Career and placement counseling should be available to students. Advisors should be sensitive to the differing needs of students in regard to career and placement counseling.

Information about student satisfaction with advising and career counseling services.

• Career counseling is readily available over the Internet, from PHENOM (Public Health Expertise Network of Mentors) at: http://www.bettycjung.net/Phenom.htm
• PHENOM Program information is available, along with program evaluation results at: http://www.bettycjung.net/Phenomindex.htm

 

PHENOM is comprised of Public Health practitioners from around the world. Mentoring is a wonderful way for practitioners to share their professional values and experiences with those who are thinking of entering the field of Public Health. Approximately two thirds of its annual volunteers are graduates of SCSU, working in the field, who are looking for an effective way to provide service to the school. This program will begin its 15^th year of service in the fall of 2007, with 51 mentors from all governmental levels and settings of Public Health practice.

 

Completely online, and accessible 24/7/365, the PHENOM directory has received over 12,000 hits, since going online in 2003 (as of July 2007). It includes an extensive evaluation component in which both mentors and mentees can provide their feedback that is then used to improve the program (http://www.bettycjung.net/Phenomreports.htm)

 

Undergraduate students who have used this program for an Introduction to Public Health class assignment to learn more about the practice of Public Health, have found the contact with Public Health professionals to be invaluable. See what they have to say at: http://www.bettycjung.net/Phenomkudos.htm

 

Additional career advice can be found at: http://www.bettycjung.net/Jobindex.htm and at http://www.bettycjung.net/Phcareers.htm

 

Potential employment possibilities are readily accessible by subscribing to Public Health Jobs E-list, a free electronic mailing list available at:http://www.bettycjung.net/

This list goes out almost daily. As of July 2007, there were 1,070+ subscribers.

 

Those interested in working in the field of Public Health must keep up with developments in the field. This can be done by subscribing to the Public Health E-News, a free monthly compendium of the latest news across the many disciplines that make up Public Health Practice. One can subscribe at: http://www.bettycjung.net

 

This document has been updated by the Betty C. Jung, Alumni Surveys Program Director, on July 6, 2007, to meet additional BS program accreditation requirements. It has been reviewed and approved by the MPH Accreditation Committee Co-Chair (Mary S. Nescott) and the BS Accreditation Committee Co-chair (Lara Reintz).

 

The original document was created by the MPH Accreditation Committee, and approved at its annual meeting on July 23, 2005. It was then posted on the MPH Accreditation Web page in July 2005, after it was finalized on July 31, 2007. The Webpage was then revised September 10, 2010 to account for changes to CEPH Web site.