摘要：Schools of Public Health historically introduced core curriculum courses in the first year of the Master of Public Health program as independent perspectives; these perspectives included epidemiology, biostatistics, environmental health, public health biology, health behaviors, and health policy. We performed a pilot project that integrated the core areas around diabetes as a cross-cutting public health issue to provide early exposure to the interdisciplinary nature of public health. In each core curriculum course, diabetes was explored in the curriculum and related to other core courses. Based on positive evaluations, this project will be replicated using a different health issue. Such an issue can be easily introduced as an overarching umbrella under which students are motivated to work through interdisciplinary collaboration. Public health is interdisciplinary in nature. However, Schools of Public Health (SPH) have historically introduced the core curriculum of public health in the first year of the Master of Public Health (MPH) program from independent perspectives, including epidemiology, biostatistics, environmental health, public health biology, health behavior, and health policy. This approach created a delay and a challenge for the demographically and educationally diverse pool of incoming students in their understanding of the interconnection among core areas of public health. To improve the appreciation for the conceptual and practical coordination of the core courses among the students, we introduced a global public health theme of diabetes mellitus in the curriculum.
