DrPH HPAL – Comprehensive Examination

Purpose
The doctoral comprehensive examination is a single examination consisting of essay questions from interdisciplinary and concentration coursework. Timing of the comprehensive exam is determined via consultation with the DrPH program faculty and/or DrPH Program Director. The purpose of the examination is to assess students on the following areas:

• Knowledge of foundational issues that transect the broad field of public health. This includes students’ recognition of important questions and issues, as well as their resourcefulness, judgment and understanding regarding information acquisition, integration, and synthesis within the field.
• Mastery of an area of specialization within, or complementary to, the field of public health.
• Student’s readiness for the research phase, including their knowledge of research methods appropriate to their particular area (s) of specialization.

Eligibility

To be eligible, the student must meet the following criteria:

• Complete all interdisciplinary and concentration courses. Documentation must be provided to the student’s academic advisor indicating their successful completion; this includes no deferred or missing grades.
• Have a minimum grade-point average of 3.00 at the time the examination is given, for graduate work done at East Carolina University.
• Satisfy the English Competence requirement.
• At this time, the student needs to provide their academic advisor that all interdisciplinary and concentration course requirements must have been completed and students must provide documentation that all the requirements have be met prior to setting a comprehensive exam date.

There are three steps to the comprehensive examination:

1. The pre-comprehensive examination meeting with the student’s academic advisor
2. The comprehensive examination itself
3. The post-comprehensive examination meeting with the student’s academic advisor to discuss the results

Comprehensive Exam Procedures

1. Request to take comprehensive exam – Doctoral Student completes “comprehensive exam request form.” (See Appendix A for form).

2. Develop the questions – The comprehensive exam comprises a question from each of the PUBH interdisciplinary and core classes developed by the faculty member teaching the course. Note HUMS 7004 is excluded.

3. Exam is developed – Each respective faculty member will send the program director the question developed from their course. These questions are collated and reviewed by both the teaching faculty and program director before the comprehensive exam questions are finalized. Each professor will specify the desired response length of their question(s).

4. Schedule the written and oral examinations – The student must complete the Examination Request Form (Appendix A) available from their academic advisor. Eight weeks’ notice is required by the program for scheduling the written examination. It is the student’s responsibility to initiate the scheduling process with their academic advisor. Once the date is set, the exam is set up in Canvas) on the predetermined date and time for administration. Students have one (1) calendar week to complete the written exam via blackboard. They may use course documents, notes, books, etc. for responding to the exam questions. While the written exam is “open book” students may not seek outside assistance or use additional resources not utilized in coursework.

5. Emergencies and deadlines – In the event of an emergency (e.g., critical illness, death in the family) during the exam period, a student may ask their academic advisor or program director to extend the deadline (see ECU Policy for Excused Absence from Dean of Students).

6. Comply with academic integrity policies – The written comprehensive exam is a take- home, open book exam, representing the student’s independent work. In preparing to write the examination, learning resources from previous classes may be used. However, the comprehensive exam questions should not be discussed with anyone, including faculty, except in cases where clarification is needed for their specific question(s). The final written product must represent the student’s unassisted work. Prior to the submission of the examination, no one except the student should read or edit the written responses for any reason. A signed statement certifying that the comprehensive exam answers are the student’s original work and that the exam has been completed without the assistance of other students, colleagues, or faculty members is required as part of the exam. This attestation includes no sharing of exam questions with any other students during or after the exam.

7. Formatting the essays (style) – The examination document should consist of separate, coherent essays (unless otherwise noted) in answer to the questions. The essays should conform to APA or AMA style. Each essay should be answered as a separate question in Blackboard (Canvas).

8. Formatting the essays (length) – Answers to each question need not be of equal length. Each professor will specify the desired length of a response. Submissions must be double-spaced pages with one-inch margins and 12-point font.

9. Submitting the essays – Responses for each exam question are to be upload to (Canvas) through Safe Assign. Students have one (1) calendar week to complete the exam; work submitted after the deadline will not be accepted.

10. Reviewing student responses – Faculty teaching in the DrPH will have four weeks to review their question(s). Individual committee members may choose to return the written examination with comments, but it is not required.

11. Student Notification of Comprehensive Examination Grade Students will be notified by their academic advisor within four (4) weeks of taking comprehensive examinations on whether they have 1) successfully passed; 2) partially passed but require remediation by “retaking” the exam for a specific course(s) in which their answers were unsatisfactory; or 3) “failed” by providing unsatisfactory responses to a each exam question post 2nd attempt .

12. Remediation Students are allowed one opportunity for remediation to retake all or portions of the comprehensive examination with new questions on the same subject matter. Remediation must occur within two (2) weeks from time of notice. Students can not enroll in further coursework until successful passage of the comprehensive examination has occurred. Students who fail to be successful in passing the comprehensive examination after remediation will be terminated from the program.