Rafael Pérez-Escamilla, Ph.D., Co-Director
Donna Spiegelman, Sc.D., Co-Director

The first one thousand days are a critical window for infant growth and development. Promoting optimal nutrition, health, and care through the implementation of high-quality, evidence-based interventions during this time has the immense potential to improve immediate and long-term maternal, infant, and child outcomes. Given the complexity of health systems, achieving high quality and adhering to the fidelity of evidence-based interventions require innovative training approaches.

The Maternal and Child Health Promotion (MCHP) Track is a cutting-edge promotion education program that takes a multidisciplinary approach to implementing evidence-based practices to improve maternal and child health outcomes. This track trains students on the importance and application of implementation science to maternal and child health promotion. Students will complete three courses and an internship or practicum to receive applied experience within this area.

The MCHP Track is co-directed by Professor Rafael Pérez-Escamilla, who has extensive global maternal and child health experience.

Track Requirements

Students pursuing the MCHP Track must fulfill the requirements of their respective departments or programs. MCHP Track students are also expected to do an internship or practice experience (EPH 520 or EPH 521) focused on a project relevant to maternal-child public health program design, implementation, and/or evaluation, to be approved by the MCHP faculty executive committee. In order to ensure that internships completed during the summer of the first and second years satisfy the requirements of the track, students are strongly encouraged to declare their interest in the second term of year one.

Students in the MCHP Track are strongly encouraged to focus their master’s thesis (if applicable) on a maternal and child health promotion issue as determined by their department/program.

In addition to EPH 520 or EPH 521, the MCHP Track requires the student to complete the following three courses:

EMD 533	Implementation Science	1
HPM 542	Health of Women and Children	1
SBS 594	Maternal-Child Public Health Nutrition	1

For additional training in MCHP, students may take the following recommended courses as electives; they are not required for the track: BIS 505, BIS 628, CDE 516, CDE 534, CDE 566/EHS 566, CDE 572, CDE 588, HPM 575, SBS 541, SBS 560, SBS 574, or SBS 580.

Once the track requirements have been met, upon graduation, the track will be listed under the student’s major on the transcript.

Competencies

Each student in the MCHP Track will master the core curriculum competencies and the competencies for the student’s department/program. In addition, upon receiving an M.P.H. degree in the MCHP Track, the student will be able to:

• Understand implementation science theory and frameworks, in particular as they apply to MCHP programs.
• Demonstrate knowledge of the range of evidence-based interventions currently available or under consideration to promote improved maternal and child health outcomes, including their strengths, weaknesses, and contexts.
• Be able to propose sustainable, evidence-based solutions to address key maternal and child health challenges.
• Be able to evaluate the quality and fidelity of MCHP interventions.
• Apply knowledge and skills learned in the classroom to an applied MCHP project.