Admission Criteria

For more information, please contact Associate Professor Corinne Kyriacou, Ph.D., M.P.H. at 516-463-4553 or send an email

Public health is an interdisciplinary field that seeks to prevent injuries, illness and premature death, promote health and wellness, and prolong life at the group, community and population levels.

Hofstra’s MPH program emphasizes both the theoretical foundations of public health as well as its practical application.  Students are trained to understand, conduct, interpret, and apply public health research, to assess public health problems in communities, to apply health education and social science theory to developing interventions to improve community health, and to understand the role of public health within society.

Admission Requirements

• A completed online application form;
• Undergraduate degree from an accredited institution of higher learning, including submission of all transcripts from undergraduate institutions;
• Minimum cumulative grade point average of 3.0; 
• Graduate Record Examination (GRE)  (Other standardized test scores – e.g., MCAT, GMAT, LSAT— may be substituted. Medical school graduates are waived from this requirement; graduates with other terminal degrees may also be waived from this requirement.) Contact Graduate Admission for more information;
• Three letters of recommendation addressing the applicant’s potential for success in graduate school and the public health field;
• Written personal statement identifying areas of interest and reasons for seeking advanced training in public health;
• Resume;
• International applicants for whom English is not their first language must submit TOEFL scores;
• Interview with program director if applicant does not have any prior experience in public health or health care.

The program understands that any single criterion may not reliably predict a student’s potential for success.  Applicants who want to be considered even though they do not meet all the admissions criteria are encouraged to offer a rationale for an exception to the requirements in their written personal statement.

Program Requirements – Semester Hours: 42

The curriculum consists of 42 semester hours, with 36 semester hours of classroom instruction, 3 semester hours of internship and 3 semester hours of a culminating experience.  

The curriculum is designed to meet the Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH) accreditation standards and include Association of Schools of Public Health (ASPH) core competencies. Courses are designed around the five core public health disciplines: Biostatistics, Epidemiology, Social and Behavioral Sciences, Environmental Health and Health Policy and Management.  Seven critical cross-cutting competencies are integrated into coursework: Communication and Informatics, Diversity and Culture, Leadership, Professionalism, Program Planning, Systems Thinking and Public Health Biology. 

Core Requirements – Semester Hours: 30

The required core curriculum is comprised of ten courses and 30 semester hours. At the discretion of the program director, students may transfer up to 9 credits earned within the last five years in a comparable graduate program. The program director will need to see course bulletin descriptions and/or syllabi to evaluate such requests.

MPH 200 – Introduction to Public Health Semester Hours: 3
MPH 202 – Epidemiology I Semester Hours: 3
MPH 203 – Biostatistics I w/Quantitative Analysis Lab Semester Hours: 3
MPH 204 -  Social and Behavioral Determinants of Health Semester Hours: 3
MPH 220 – Environmental and Occupational Health Semester Hours: 3
MPH 221 – Quantitative Research Methods in Public Health Semester Hours: 3
MPH 222 – Qualitative Research Methods in Public Health Semester Hours: 3
MPH 223 – Introduction to Global Health Semester Hours: 3
HADM 200 – U.S. Health Services Semester Hours: 3
COMH 210 – Strategies for Assessing Outcomes in Community Health Programs Semester Hours: 3

Core Electives – Semester Hours: 6

Students may choose 6 semester hours of electives from the following list. Students also have the opportunity to explore additional areas linked to specific faculty expertise, such as bioethics, chronic illness and aging; suburban health disparities; clinical research management; medical anthropology; reproductive health; disaster preparedness; outbreak investigations; dental public health; advanced epidemiology; advanced biostatistics; and, advanced environmental health.

COMH 206 – Community Needs Assessment Semester Hours: 3
COMH 208 – Design and Implementation of Community Health Programs Semester Hours: 3
COMH 280A – Health Communication in the 21st Century Semester Hours: 3
HADM 201 – Health Policy and Legislation Semester Hours: 3
HADM 202 – Health Law and Ethics Semester Hours: 3
RES 387 – Skills in  Funding and Proposal Development: Government, Foundation and Corporate Semester Hours: 3
MPH 251 – Readings in Public Health Semester Hours 1-3
MPH 280-289 A-Z Special Topics in Public Health  Semester Hours 1-3

Required Field Experience – Semester Hours: 6

The internship provides experiential learning with the goal of applying skills learned in the classroom in the professional practice environment. The culminating experience demonstrates the student’s ability to integrate multiple competencies from both their coursework and their internship experience.

MPH 230 – Internship and Leadership Seminar Semester Hours: 3
MPH 231 – MPH Culminating Experience Semester Hours: 3

Graduation Requirements

Successful completion of all course requirements for the degree, with a minimum cumulative GPA of 3.0.  Courses in which the student earns below a B- will not count towards degree requirements.