IDGH-Interdisciplinary Global Health

IDGH 620. Global Health Ethics. 3 Hours.

This course intends to prepare global health practitioners and researchers with the tools they need to work most effectively and meaningfully with communities from a broad ethical point of view. Global Health is never neutral, and is perhaps most potentially complicated, fraught, and difficult when it comes to issues surrounding individual and community health. A sophisticated and nuanced grasp not only of the ‘rules’ but also of the broader intellectual, practical, historical, and moral issues is an essential basis in this day and age for a successful – and less stressful - career as a health professional. This course uses a seminar-style format, which asks each student to take leadership in understanding and guiding in relation to our planned topics. The heart of the course focuses on the systematic exploration of the history, contexts, issues and outcomes related to specific case studies that are currently shaping how we understand the moral, ethical, and social justice implications of global health. Conversations around these cases, especially the ones that are currently ongoing, can be very difficult, even fraught. Developing skills for engaging in those conversations is an essential part of the course.

IDGH 625. Manipal Learning Symposium. 3 Hours.

This exciting Learning Symposium brings together students and faculty from nine premier universities that offer graduate studies in global and public health. Participants will be exposed to a plurality of academic and pragmatic approaches to working in the field of global health. The Symposium is hosted by the Manipal University of Higher Education and its faculty in Manipal, India. This two week conference emphasizes group work and aims to help learners create a system map on a topic area to under the local health system and its functionality. Participates are able to learn through field visits, stakeholder meetings and faculty expert lectures. Additionally, the learning symposium offers a venue for graduate students to present on their current areas of research and hear from international plenary speakers. Sponsored UAB Education Abroad program.

IDGH 687. Global Health Scholarly Prep. 3 Hours.

Each student in the MS Global Health degree must complete an evidence-based, scientific, and scholarly project. The scholarly projects can range from a scientific report or program evaluation, original research project, secondary data analysis project, or evidence-based policy brief, among others. The purpose of this course is to guide students through the development of a project proposal and site selection for their global health scholarly project. The project must be focused in an international or global setting, which can include a cross-cultural or trans-national clinical research project, policy analysis, research paper, or program evaluation, a field-based or secondary data analysis project in a non-US country, or a project focused on immigrant and migrant communities within the U.S. Proposals must address at least one global health competency that match with the student’s career goals and/or previous clinical experience (when applicable). Students can select stakeholders from any approved university partner associated with the Mary Heersink Institute of Global Health or the Sparkman Center for Global Health. The setting for the practicum can include a study abroad/ study away program, an international internship, local or international NGO, ministry of health. The projects can take the form of an intervention, clinical research, program evaluation and/or needs-assessment/quality improvement project, policy brief, or any other type of project approved by the faculty instructors on record. The project can be implemented (or fulfilled) abroad and in-person, virtually with international partners, or in the US with an immigrant, migrant, or refugee population.

IDGH 688. Scholarly Project Directed Research. 4 Hours.

The Global Health Scholarly Project is an experiential learning opportunity that provides a hands-on mastery of key global health competencies introduced in global health masters-level coursework. The experiential course aims to master the skills and competencies that students gained to real-world global health settings. Students will implement their approved global health project proposal with key international stakeholders and guided by their mentors from the Mary Heersink Institute of Global Health or the Sparkman Center for Global Health. As fulfillment to the course requirements, the students will complete their project at the approved site and submit regular project reports.
Prerequisites: IDGH 687 [Min Grade: B]

IDGH 690. Writing for Global Health. 5 Hours.

The issues of global health communication are as diverse as the audiences with whom practitioners communicate. Global health writing includes writing to colleagues, funders, researchers, politicians, and community members from various cultural and educational backgrounds. The breadth of topics and audiences involved requires exposure to, and training in, a wide range of writing types. The focus of this course will be learning how to organize, write, and peer review the range of writing through hands-on writing experiences. Through a combination of lectures and independent work, the students will learn how to organize and write in a variety of formats. By the end of the course, students will have a completed a series of documents for both the scientific and lay audience. Students will review each other’s completed projects and discuss the scientific critiques in the format like an editorial review board. Students are expected to bring a work in progress for this course related to their global health research.
Prerequisites: IDGH 687 [Min Grade: B] or GAC M

IDGH 699. Master's Directed Research. 1-6 Hour.

Independent research culminating in master’s thesis in Global Health.