Innovative mentoring and strong enrollment drive the shaping of future public health leaders through broad educational initiatives.
This year, the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health has maintained strong enrollment numbers and rigorous academic courses, allowing us to retain our position as the number one public school of public health in the country and ensuring readiness for Council on Education for Public Health reaccreditation.
by Laura Linnan, ScD (Senior Associate Dean, Academic and Student Affairs)
Based on student feedback, we strengthened the School’s faculty mentoring efforts by recognizing excellent faculty mentors from each department and organizing a comprehensive workshop to showcase best practices on faculty mentoring. These best practices and helpful strategies will be documented in a “Toolkit for Effective Faculty Mentoring,” available in 2025. We also plan to incorporate information from The Graduate School on this topic.
We have hired an experienced instructional faculty member, Yesenia Merino, PhD, MPH, to provide departments with technical assistance and support as they co-create priority plans to strengthen the curriculum around topics related to anti-racism, health equity and inclusive excellence.
We strengthened faculty mentoring, introduced anti-racism curriculum support, and enhanced student well-being through community-building and wellness initiatives.
We support continuous quality improvement efforts for the schoolwide Master of Public Health (MPH) core and concentrations. We are also offering two immersion experiences for MPH@UNC to help online students develop a sense of shared community with our residential faculty, students and staff.
The Student Affairs unit continues to leverage the Student Mental Health and Well-Being Task Force, which provides guidance in structuring the resources and environment at the School to reduce student stress and support mental health and well-being. The task force uses the “Eight Dimensions of Wellness” framework to address all aspects of well-being.
Student Affairs, in partnership with Gillings Instructional and Information Systems and Academic Affairs, also utilizes the Gillings Navigate platform, launched last year, to strengthen the connection between students, academic coordinators and University resources. Students can use Gillings Navigate to connect with their academic coordinator, network with other students who want to form study groups, or learn next steps to set up appointments with career services, mental health counseling and wellness coaching at UNC. We believe students, staff and faculty can all benefit from this technological improvement.
The unit also continues to recruit and engage with prospective students, in particular partnering with Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and high schools to educate and motivate toward careers in public health.
