To all those who listened to me gripe about what i want to do with my life...

celle507 · Apr 13, 2005

Congratulations on pursuing your MPH at Johns Hopkins... that is such a great program!

Can I ask you why you decided to pursue an MPH? What are your career goals? I am really interested in an MPH because I want to do community/public health but I'm a little bit unclear on the job opportunities with it. Why did you decide on the MPH rather than an MPA, MBA, MHA, etc? Also, what is your concentration?

I am actually enrolled in an accelerated Master's Entry program in nursing but I am thinking about stopping after the first year (where I get licensed to be an RN) and pursuing an MPH instead. I feel badly about leaving but I'm not sure if I want to be an NP due to the increased liability and just the fact that my real interest is in a more population perspective. Do you think it would be a bad idea to leave the program?

Also, I realize you are going to one of the best programs in the nation, but do you think it matters where you get your MPH? I am only asking because I have lots of loans already from undergrad and since public health isn't the most lucrative career, I don't know if it makes sense for me to take out another 50K in loans.

Thank you so much!! I really appreciate any advice that you can give me.

Tweety, BSN, RN · Apr 13, 2005

Awesome. Congratulations and best wishes!

t2000JC · Apr 13, 2005

well,

basically i am working as a neonatal nurse which i really do love but don't see myself doing forever. i knew that if i did grad school now would be a good time as i was single and living at home. i had a hard time deciding exactly what role i would eventually want to take, and i wanted a degree that was versatile. i KNEW that i did not want to be an NP due to the fact that i wanted a job evenutally with less liability and i did not want that role in the NICU. I have always liked the ideas of health promotion, research, and patient teaching. when i mentioned this to someone they asked whether i had considered a MPH. I was taking masters of public administration courses at the time and while some were interesting for the most part i was not enjoying them. i also considered some of the other degrees you mentioned but realized that i really wasn't interested in that content, while with the MPH degree when i looked at the classes they still appealed to my nursing heart :) .

to tell you the truth, i am not sure what exact job i want to do after this degree. but, a lot of people told me that if you pick a graduate program that interests you regardless, a lot of other stuff falls into place. i know that some of the careers for mph graduates intrigue me, such as researcher, health educator, health consultant. i feel that it is versatile in that i could go in many directions afterward.

in terms of money, knowing me the job that i would like would probably pay peanuts; however, i have several family members in such areas as pharmaceutical research and marketing who work with graduates of my program and they have lucrative careers.

i am not sure how it works in terms of where you get your MPH, but i will tell you that i would rather have gone to a lesser known (and less expensive!) school near me if it had an 11 month MPH with the focus on neonatal/maternal that JHU did; that was what made it my number one choice, not really the ranking thing, although that of course is a nice bonus. my concetration will be either women's and reproductive health or child health, or a mix of the two maybe.

these are my thoughts on it, and some people may disagree on some points, but bottom line it was a program that i got excited about, so that was what made the decision for me :). t.