The new Public and One Health (PAOH) undergraduate degree program in the Auburn University College of Veterinary Medicine is a unique public health curriculum that utilizes One Health as its guiding principle. This holistic approach prepares graduates to proactively devise and implement solutions to pressing local and global health issues, preparing undergraduate students for entry into public health positions, as well as graduate or professional programs.
By highlighting the One Health concept throughout the curriculum, students will obtain a comprehensive public health education that emphasizes the interconnectedness and mutual interdependency of humans, animals and the environment, recognizing that human health can only be improved if the health of animals and the ecosystem are concurrently addressed.
Diverse faculty from multiple scientific fields across the Auburn University campus will provide expert instruction to foster deeper insight into organismal and environmental health, and how various systems coexist and change together. The Public and One Health undergraduate degree program will educate future health professionals to take a transdisciplinary approach that establishes a conceptual framework of the complex web of factors affecting health.
There is a strong demand for professionals with bachelor’s-level public health training and this employment demand is projected to increase both regionally and nationally. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the projected change in job placement opportunities for public health professionals over the next decade is expected to grow faster than the national average for other professional fields.
PAOH students may choose various electives depending on interests and career goals. Program graduates may begin working in entry-level careers in public, animal or environmental health. Or if interested in attending medical, veterinary, or other professional or graduate programs, all prerequisite academic requirements for those programs can be completed within the credit hours required for this major.
Public and One Health also offers a Minor in Public Health open to all majors as well as an Honors Minor in Public Health. When offering advice to prospective students, Kynslie Barnett, said this of the Public and One Health programs:
“I would tell any student that was thinking about pursuing either of these degrees to try out the first class and I promise they will be immediately pulled in and intrigued! Once you take your first Public Health class, you start to see public health in every single thing you do because it truly applies to everything in the world around us. I encourage every student that is curious to just go for it and they will be so happy they did! The knowledge and skills you will learn through this degree are applicable to everything you do in your life from now on.”
Contact Information:
Webpage: aub.ie/paoh
Email: paoh@auburn.edu
