Center for Health & Wellbeing

Certificate students are required to complete two core courses and two approved health-related electives.

WWS597 The Political Economy of Health Systems: This course explores the professed and unspoken goals nations pursue with their health systems and the alternative economic and administrative structures different nations use to pursue those goals. The emphasis in the course will be on the industrialized world, although some time can be allocated later in the course to approaches used in the developing countries, if students in the course desire it.
Instructor: Uwe Reinhardt

WWS598 Epidemiology: This epidemiology course focuses on: measurement of health status, disease occurrence, survival, and the association between risk factors and health outcomes; design, analysis and interpretation of epidemiologic research studies; and bias and confounding. Other topics include synthesis of epidemiological studies, disease outbreaks, causal inference, social inequalities in health, and research ethics. The course will examine "individual-centered" epidemiology and "macro-epidemiology" to assess population impact and inform health policy. (Prereq: 507b/c or advanced statistics)
Instructor: Noreen Goldman

The list of approved electives that qualify for Certificate Program credit varies from year to year. The current academic year’s list appears below. Two half-term courses count toward one of the two electives that are required for the Certificate.

Fall 2011
WWS 571c Topics in Devt: Global Challenges of Infection, Burden and Control, Adel Mahmoud and Bryan Grenfell
WWS 591e Policy Workshop: Implementation of the Affordable Care Act, Heather Howard and Chad Shearer
WWS 593b Reproductive Health and Reproductive Rights, James Trussell (Session II)

Spring 2012
ECO 332 Economics of Health and Healthcare, Uwe Reinhardt (NOTE: In FY13 only, this course can substitute for WWS 597 for MPA2s and MPPs)
WWS 492/HIS 393* Race, Drugs and Drug Policy in America, Keith Wailoo, grad precept
WWS 564 Poverty, Inequality and Health in the World, Angus Deaton
WWS 596 Controversies in Health Policy: Historical Perspectives, Keith Wailoo
WWS 594c Maternal and child health: Culture, controversy and policy, Betsy Armstrong (Session I)
WWS 594d Challenges in State and Local Health Policy, Heather Howard (Session II)
WWS 594k The Development Challenge of HIV/AIDS, Keith Hansen (Session I)

*To receive HHP elective credit for this course, students must obtain prior permission from HHP director. 

In exceptional cases, students may be granted special permission to substitute one of the two required elective courses with either a health-related graduate-level course offered by a department outside of the Woodrow Wilson School (WWS), or a WWS graduate level course that is not on the list of approved electives.

Those who wish to receive HHP elective credit for a course that is not on the list of approved electives should seek permission from the Certificate Director before taking the course. Students are encouraged to consult with the Certificate Director about potential HHP courses as soon as they are identified. Elective course substitutions will not be approved after the third week of classes.