Shape the Future with a Master of Public Health (MPH)
Committed to Health Equity. Grounded in Social Justice.
Why complete your MPH at Simmons?
Develop the scientific, leadership, and advocacy skills needed to address health inequities and ensure fair and equitable health opportunities locally, nationally, and globally. At Simmons, you will benefit from a well-rounded public health curriculum with room for personalization, allowing you to customize your studies and develop expertise in issues about which you are passionate.
Our Core Values
Social Justice
We value social justice, a core concept of health equity, which embraces the uniqueness, dignity, and inherent value of all individuals and communities and challenges power differentials and structures that preclude fair opportunity for optimal health for all.
Community Partnership
We strive always to work alongside communities seeking health equity, through partnered knowledge production, community-identified priority setting, and collaborative action towards social change.
Scientific Rigor and Integrity
We strive for outstanding performance in enacting health equity that is built on the foundation of scientifically rigorous research, evidence-based public health practice, and personal and professional integrity and ethics.
Critical Systems Thinking
We employ a critical lens to understand, assess and address broad systems and structures that produce and reproduce inequities and injustices in health.
Transformative Leadership
We advance a model of leadership that challenges existing paradigms, imagines new systems and structures, and embraces innovative approaches to create sustainable change for health equity.
spacer
Attend live classes virtually and come together with your classmates and faculty for two multi-day in-person experiences.
Hands-On Opportunities
The MPH program at Simmons provides you with practical, hands-on opportunities during which you work with real communities to examine and address public health issues that matter to you. You can shape these research opportunities around your passions, career goals, and interest areas:
- During the Health Advocacy, Community Organizing, and Innovation course, you will partner with an organization and participate in community organizing and/or advocacy.
- As part of the Community-based Research for Health Equity class, you will identify a local health inequity and engage with community stakeholders to develop a research plan and tools to carry out research on the issue.
- Additionally, you will participate in two immersive learning experiences (in Boston and the US-Mexico borderlands region of Arizona), providing you with the transformative on-ground public health experience that many employers seek.
Alumni Voices
“I have developed community-based care programs, analyzed health disparities statistics, and worked with communities at the organizational level to influence anti-racism structural changes. These opportunities and avenues would not have been made available to me had it not been for this program.”
- Lydje Lahens, MPH '19 Senior Research Administrator, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard
“My Health Equity Change Project (HECP) was to develop a Service-Learning curriculum for first-year medical students that focused on the structural issues impacting population health. My project has become the next phase in my career. I am currently implementing the curriculum that was designed during my HECP.”
- Dr. Resa Caivano, MPH ‘20, physician and faculty at Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine
“My Simmons MPH gave me the foundational knowledge needed to approach public health work. From the very beginning of the MPH program, we were taught to always look upstream, see everything with a health equity lens and to be outcomes driven. With every task or responsibility in my current role, I am always analyzing how I am addressing a social determinant of health, or uplifting parts of the community that have historically been under-resourced or marginalized.”
- Stephanie Gomez, MPH ‘23, , Manager of Community Partnerships, Boston Children’s Hospital
Apply by July 15 for the Fall 2025 term
Public Health at a Glance
42
Credit Hours
The MPH curriculum consists of 42 credit hours that can be completed in the 15-month accelerated masters program or the 24 month traditional program.
2
Immersion Experiences
Participate in two unique hands-on in-person experiences in Boston (3 days) and Arizona (7 days) to explore health equity challenges connected to racism, oppression, the migrant experience, and indigenous communities.
9
Core Courses
The curriculum includes 9 core courses, 1 elective, and 1 practicum experience. With multiple opportunities to customize your MPH degree, you’ll develop content expertise in your areas of passion and make an impact on the issues that matter most to you.
150+
Practicum Hours Through the Health Equity Change Project
You will Identify a local health inequity, collaborate with a community organization, and design and implement a project to address the inequity. You’ll graduate with an e-portfolio featuring your applied public skill set and public health competencies.
Accredited by the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH)
The Master of Public Health program at Simmons University is accredited by the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH).
HERE4Justice
HERE4Justice is the student organizing group of the MPH program, founded by MPH students passionate about health equity and putting into practice the skills you will learn in the program.
Spotlight on MPH Students and Alums
Changes in Reproductive Health Laws Impact Perinatal Hospice Care
Emily (Orlando) Cane ’23MPH was interviewed by Hospice News about how changes in reproductive health laws have impacted perinatal hospice care.
With HERE4Justice, MPH Students Work to Advance Social Justice
For many students in the Department of Public Health, activism begins at Simmons. In 2018, MPH students established HERE4Justice, a student-run organization that works to advance health equity, racial equity, and social justice. "Students started this collective because they saw...