Offering an Arts and Sciences Associates of Arts Degree Transfer Program in Public Health

Peer Review, Summer 2009 by Jeffrey, Jeanette

In fall 2009, Howard Community College (HCC) will become the first two-year college in the nation to offer an arts and sciences associate of arts (AA) transfer degree program in public health. This program is designed to articulate with the Health Administration and Policy Program (HAPP) public health track at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County (UMBC). Located in Columbia, Maryland, HCC is uniquely positioned to launch this initiative. Through the city's conception, design, and development, Columbia, Maryland, models an integrated global community. Using principles of interdependence and diversity, James W Rouse, Columbia's founder and developer, envisioned a community that would bring together people of aU races, ethnicities, religions, and socioeconomic levels. The 1,092 students of the 2009 HCC graduating class, which represented 101 nations, stood witness to Rouse's vision of unity and diversity.

Located between Baltimore and Washington, D.C., HCC has ready access to global public health organizations, research institutions, and premier schools of public health (i.e., Catholic Relief Services, USAID, NIH, NCI, and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg school of Public Health), providing rich educational experiences, on and off campus, through collaborative ties. Institutionally, HCC fosters and promotes a culture of civic engagement, incorporating service as one of its eight core values: innovation, nurturing, sustainability, partnership, integrity, respect, excellence, and service. Furthermore, HCCs mission to provide pathways to success, and its vision - A place to discover greatness in yourself and others - are working ideals upheld by HCC s administration and board of trustees, who support new faculty initiatives, encourage creativity, and celebrate excellence in the workplace. It is in this environment that the arts and sciences associate of arts transfer degree program in public health was conceived, has evolved, and now can flourish.

YOU CAN GET THERE FROM HERE

As a two-year college, HCC prepares students for transfer to four-year institutions, provides career training programs (i.e., nursing, emergency medical services, radiologic technology, and biomedical technology), and establishes pathways of learning through credit and noncredit courses. HCC s motto, "You can get there from here," embodies the culture of the campus with a spirit that extends beyond academic success and transfer.

Supported through administrative funding, the HCC Center for Service Learning collaborates with the community to create meaningful service experiences that extend classroom and co-curricular learning while encouraging civic engagement, community awareness, and personal development. During the 2008-09 academic year, 525 HCC students engaged in curricular and co-curricular service- learning projects. With more than eighty partnering sites from which to choose, HCC public health program students will be introduced to service through a course tided Personal and Community Health This course will give students direct community involvement in assessment, prevention, protection, and policy - the cornerstones of public health - and, as recommended by the LEAP Principles of Excellence, will challenge students to "engage in the big questions" (LEAP principle four) and take on "real-world problems" (LEAP principle five). In preparation for their service work, students will develop a goal statement and three supporting objectives, thereby providing a compass for their own plan of excellence (LEAP principles one and two). Assessment in the form of timely reflection (submitted via e-mail within forty-eight hours of each service visit), a question-guided culminating final reflection essay, and an in-class formal presentation of the semester long service will be used to "deepen learning and to establish a culture of shared purpose and continuous improvement" (LEAP principles three and seven). Through service learning, students will forge a link between the theory and practice of public health.

EVOLUTIONARY TIMELINE OF THE HCC ARTS AND SCIENCES AA TRANSFER DEGREE PROGRAM IN PUBLIC HEALTH

Prior to my faculty appointment at HCC, I served as an adjunct instructor for two years at UMBC and continue to teach there in the Health Administration and Policy Program (HAPP). Key to this enduring partnership is a strong relationship - the feeling of being valued and respected by my HAPP colleagues, who consider my work to be an integral part of the success of our students and the HAPP program. Our shared passion for teaching and promoting public health at the undergraduate level has resulted in the evolution of a seamless pathway for HCC public health program students to transfer to UMBC.

In 2002 1 joined HCC as an assistant professor in health sciences and was immediately charged with the task of developing a promotion plan to associate professor. The diversity of the HCC community and a note from a former student, crediting my passion for teaching as the inspiration that led her to Africa to train nurses, inspired me to develop my promotion plan. Although my initial goal was to create an arts and sciences AA transfer degree program in global health, not merely an option, my department chair advised me to save that project for subsequent promotion.