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DOCTOR OF PUBLIC HEALTH The Doctor of Public Health (Dr.P.H.) degree with concentration in Epidemiology and Biostatistics is an advanced degree for experienced health professionals. The major objectives of the Dr.P.H. program are to prepare practicing professionals in the application of research methods and provide them with a broad knowledge base for solving public health problems. Dr.P.H. In Epidemiology and Biostatistics
Doctoral Progression After admission to a doctoral program in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, each student will be assigned an academic advisor from the faculty of the department. The assigned advisor will advise the student about prerequisite course work and courses needed to prepare the student for the Qualifying Examination and will generally work with the student until admission to candidacy. The student and advisor will develop a preliminary program of study. The Qualifying Examination should be attempted as soon as possible after completion of the master’s degree in Epidemiology or Biostatistics and no later than one year after full admission. This exam must be passed before admission to doctoral candidacy and continuation in the program. After admission to candidacy, the student should select a faculty member to direct the doctoral work and, in consultation with this major professor and the department chair, ask other faculty members to serve on the Doctoral Advisory Committee. The Doctoral Advisory Committee approves a program of study (see page 57) including any cognates that are related to the student’s dissertation research interests; no program prerequisite courses can appear on the program of study. A student’s Program of Study must be filed with The Graduate School no later than two (2) years after being fully admitted. Further registration will be blocked if the program of Study is not on file by that time. Members of the Doctoral Advisory Committee can also serve on the Doctoral Comprehensive Exam Committee, Dissertation Committee and Dissertation Exam Committee; the major professor typically chairs all four committees. With the approval of the Doctoral Advisory Committee, the student may begin development of the dissertation proposal while completing course work and preparing for the Comprehensive Examination. Required course work includes a teaching practicum and a consulting practicum.. Upon completion of doctoral course work as specified on the program of study, the student must satisfactorily complete a Comprehensive Examination. Either in conjunction with or after the oral component of the Comprehensive Examination, the student must defend his/her dissertation proposal to the Dissertation Committee. The student must then complete his/her dissertation research, present the results in an open seminar and defend the work to the Dissertation Examination Committee. Further details for each of these components of the doctoral program are described below.
Advisement and Doctoral Committees After admission to a doctoral program in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, each student will be assigned an academic advisor from the faculty of the department. The assigned advisor will advise the student about prerequisite course work and courses needed to prepare the student for the Qualifying Examination and will generally work with the student until admission to candidacy. The student and advisor will develop a preliminary program of study. After admission to candidacy, i.e., passing the Qualifying or Doctoral Candidacy Examination, the Department Chair will appoint a Doctoral Advisory Committee. This committee should have three or more members, including the major professor and one faculty member of a cognate college or department, to guide the student’s work, offer advice on the program of study and to determine whether a foreign language is appropriate. The student’s program of study must be approved by this committee and filed prior to the beginning of the semester during which the student plans to graduate. This committee also may serve as the Doctoral Comprehensive Exam Committee, to prepare and evaluate the student’s Comprehensive Exam; however, the Comprehensive Exam Committee must have at least four members, including one faculty member from a cognate college or department. This committee may serve as the Dissertation Committee and Dissertation Examination Committee, although these committees may have different memberships. The dissertation committees are appointed by the Chair of the department no later than successful completion of the Comprehensive Examination. Selection is made in consultation with the student’s major professor and is subject to approval by the Dean of the Graduate School. The dissertation committees consist of at least four members, one of whom must be from a department outside the student’s major department. The committees are chaired by the student’s dissertation advisor. When the committees are selected and all faculty members have agreed to serve, the Chair of the Department should be notified to approve and formally appoint the committee(s) in writing. There is a Graduate School form that also must be completed for approval of the Committees by the Dean of the Graduate School. There are specific guidelines for approval of outside members of the doctoral committees who are not tenure-track graduate faculty at U.S.C. The goal of the Dr.P.H. in Epidemiology or Biostatistics is to prepare practicing professionals in the application of research methods and development of a broad knowledge base for solving public health problems in a variety of public health settings. A student may select to take a concentration of course work and conduct dissertation research with a focus on either an epidemiologic or biostatistical problem. The following objectives are premised upon the student having successfully acquired the competencies spelled out in the objectives stated for the M.P.H. degree.
Course work for the Dr.P.H. is predicated upon the applicant having at least three years of working experience in a public health field, and an advanced professional degree in an area such as public health, medicine, dentistry, or veterinary science. College level courses in algebra are required and a course in calculus is considered desirable. For applicants entering the Dr.P.H. program with a Master's degree outside of public health, preparatory course requirements are set by the faculty advisor. As a minimum, applicants should have mastered the knowledge and skills taught in the following basic courses: EPID 701, EPID 741, BIOS 701, BIOS 710, BIOS 757 and the core Public Health courses ENHS 660, HPRE 700 and HADM 700. Applicants without evidence of the above knowledge base will be expected to take the necessary basic courses immediately upon entry. The preparatory courses as specified by faculty are in addition to the minimal 50 hours of doctoral course requirements.
During the course of graduate study doctoral candidates will be expected to participate in research projects, organized instruction, and professional service activities of the department. There will be consulting and teaching experiences as part of the program of study. These are currently recorded as Independent Studies, EPID 890 or BIOS 890, with appropriate objectives, requirements and evaluation. The teaching experience must occur in a department core course for biostatistics (BIOS 701 or 757) and in an epidemiologic methods course (EPID 741) for epidemiology and be supervised by a full-time faculty. Qualifying (Candidacy) Examination The intent of the Qualifying Exam (Admission to Doctoral Candidacy Exam) is to measure potential for doctoral study and to assess the student’s basic technical and professional knowledge. It should be attempted as early as possible after completion of the Master’s program in the field, or after the first year of graduate study (or 18 hours for part-time students) for students entering with an advanced degree outside of Epidemiology or Biostatistics. This exam will be offered early in the spring semester and in August prior to the beginning of the fall semester classes. The Qualifying Examination must be completed at least one full academic year prior to the date the doctoral degree is awarded. A student who completes his/her master’s degree in Epidemiology or Biostatistics at USC and passed the Master’s Comprehensive Examination within the past three years may request waiver of at least part of the Qualifying Examination. This request will be evaluated on an individual basis. A student must register with his/her advisor’s approval to take the Qualifying Examination; the deadline for this registration is posted as soon as the examination date is set and must be at least three weeks prior to the examination date. If a student registers to take the Qualifying Examination and does not take it, this will count as one failed attempt unless the registration is canceled at least one week prior to the examination date. For Epidemiology students, the examination will focus on design and methodology issues and on content areas. Advanced material from EPID 701, EPID 741, BIOS 701 and BIOS 757 may be reflected on the examination. The exam may include reading a published manuscript (distributed prior to the exam) and responding to conceptual, design and methodological questions related to this publication or its subject matter. The examination can be written at a computer to allow use of a word processor; however, no other software can be used and no further research can be done (e.g., via e-mail or the Internet). For Biostatistics students, the examination will focus on the theory and methodologies presented in the various Biostatistics and Statistics courses, possibly including more advanced concepts from BIOS 701, BIOS 753, BIOS 757, and EPID 701. Students will be given a set of questions based on all the courses completed; each individual will be allowed to choose a subset of these questions to answer, based on what courses he/she completed. Because of calculations and formulas, writing the examination at a computer is not efficient; therefore Biostatistics students will complete the examination using pen/pencil and paper. Students will be allowed to use a calculator but not any statistical software. They will be given a sheet of relevant formulas. The Qualifying Examination, actually one exam for epidemiology and one exam for biostatistics, is prepared by a committee of at least three members of the Department faculty in that discipline. The committee evaluates the results and determines the outcome. The Qualifying Examination will be evaluated as a whole; the student will either pass or not pass the entire Examination. Students taking the Examination will be notified in writing of the results as soon as possible after faculty evaluation of the Examination. Faculty members are not to discuss exam results with any individual student until all students have received official notification. A debriefing session will be held after examination results are released to students. At this session, students are allowed to see their exams while faculty members review appropriate responses, but they will not be given their individual scores. The student may also meet with his/her faculty advisor to discuss performance on the exam. Each student is allowed two attempts at the Qualifying Examination. The second attempt should occur within one year of the first attempt, preferably the next semester. If a student does not pass the examination on the second attempt he/she is not allowed to continue in the program. Comprehensive Examination The purpose of the Comprehensive Exam is to evaluate in-depth knowledge acquired by the student in the major area of concentration and in the cognate area. The exam is taken after the completion of doctoral course work and is scheduled for the individual student. The exam will contain written and oral components. It is prepared and administered by the Doctoral Comprehensive Exam committee consisting of the student’s major professor, two other members of the graduate faculty and an outside member appointed by the Department Chair and approved by the Dean of the Graduate School. The Doctoral Comprehensive Examination Committee is responsible for choosing the format of the Comprehensive Examination. The oral component of the exam should follow within one month of the written examination. The examination committee will prepare the oral component based on the student’s performance on the written component and on material not covered on the written component. As in the written component, any topic on the student’s program of study could be represented in the oral component. The committee evaluates both the written and oral components of the exam to determine whether the exam has been passed. Since the two components of the exam are evaluated together, the committee is not expected to give any response concerning the written component to the student before the oral component. If a student does not perform satisfactorily, both components must be repeated. The student is allowed two attempts to pass the examination. If a student does not pass the examination on the second attempt he/she is not allowed to continue in the program. The examination must be completed at least 60 days before the date of graduation. The intent of doctoral residency is to ensure that doctoral students benefit from and contribute to the complete spectrum of educational and professional opportunities provided by the graduate faculty of a comprehensive university. When establishing residency, the student should interact with faculty and peers by regularly attending courses, conferences, and seminars, and utilize the library and library facilities and resources needed to support excellence in graduate education. The granting of a doctoral degree by the University of South Carolina presupposes a minimum of three full years of graduate study (or equivalent) and a minimum of 30 graduate hours of study after admission to the doctoral program. The doctoral residency requirement may be satisfied only after admission to a doctoral degree program and must be fulfilled by enrollment in at least 18 graduate credit hours within a span of three consecutive semesters (excluding summers). Enrollment in a summer term is not required to maintain continuity, but credits earned during summer terms will count towards residency. In the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, dissertation hours (BIOS 899 or EPID 899) will not count toward the minimum requirement. Independent studies and seminars (BIOS 790, 845, and 890, EPID 790, 845, and 890) will normally not count toward the minimum residency requirements.
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