Health: Science, Society, and Policy Program

HSSP is one of the most popular majors at Brandeis. Each year we graduate approximately 100 students. As an HSSP major or minor, you'll enjoy an intellectually and experientially diverse range of learning opportunities focused on health, health care and health policy.

A great strength of the HSSP program is that it is interdisciplinary, which means that you can draw on the expertise of world-class faculty throughout Brandeis as well as choose from well over 100 health-related courses at Brandeis and over 100 health-related courses while Studying Abroad, as well as an array of hands-on-experience which enables students to gain firsthand experience in a health care setting or with a health organization.

As an HSSP major or minor, you'll enjoy an intellectually and experientially diverse range of learning opportunities. Our courses are clustered into three broad focal areas:

• Focal Area A:  Biological Dimensions of Health and Illness
• Focal Area B:  Social & Behavioral Dimensions of Health and Illness
• Focal Area C:  Health Care Policy and Practice

BA candidates and minors may choose from over a dozen electives to hone their research and data analysis skills.

Some students pair their HSSP major or minor with course work in Anthropology, Biology, Psychology, Sociology, and an array of others.

Reflecting the interdisciplinary nature of the program, our faculty has a diverse range of interests.

• Science: HSSP science faculty engage in research ranging from neuroscience to genetics to infectious disease.
• Society: HSSP sociologists, anthropologists, and psychologists research issues such as aging, medicalization, managing illness, and the impacts of stress on disease.
• Policy: HSSP policy faculty members with expertise in management, economics, and law, including those at the Heller School, are deeply involved in current health reform and advocacy, including public health, the development of new drug policies, disability policy, medical ethics, social justice, and evaluating the quality of medical care and new technology.

Other faculty focus on data analysis and/or work at the intersections of these areas, including epidemiological research on various exposures and adverse health outcomes, as well as social determinants of health.

Student/Faculty Research

HSSP students have opportunities to work directly with faculty researchers in their labs, as part of Brandeis fellowship programs, and/or on independent research projects, such as a year-long Senior Honors Thesis.

Senior Honors Thesis / Independent Research: If you are motivated to delve deep into a topic and analyze a body of material from the field creatively and originally, as a senior, you may consider writing an independent research project or Senior Honors Thesis. Such work can be a highly rewarding experience that requires commitment and perseverance and can fulfill the HSSP Hands-on Experience (HOE) requirement for majors.

Some undergraduates undertake student teaching opportunities to work closely with the professor to get an inside view of how courses are created and conducted. There may be opportunities to work as a Peer Assistant (PA) or Teaching (TA), often in larger courses. Prospective PAs and TAs must demonstrate a good grasp of the course material, as well as the ability to help other students and contribute positively to the class. Maintaining a good relationship with the professor is also important.

• Peer Assistants - PEER 94a: Opportunities to serve as PAs are generally limited to juniors and seniors who have demonstrated exceptional academic achievement in completing the course to which they are assigned or its equivalent. These students register for PEER 94a after meeting with the professor to develop a written plan of responsibilities and mentoring, under the guidelines of the Peer Assistantship Add Form. Successful completion of PEER 94a yields four credits and is counted in semester credit totals. All PEER 94A courses are graded on a credit/no credit basis.
• Undergraduate Teaching Assistants: Undergraduates can be paid to work as an undergraduate TA to assist the professor with courses, including HSSP100B - Introduction to Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Population Health, HS104b - American Health Care, SOC 83a - Sociology of the Body & Health, Food, Justice. Opportunities for undergraduate TAs can be found through departmental announcements and university job boards like Workday.

Instead of assisting with one class, there are other Brandeis-wide opportunities, including:

• Brandeis Undergraduate Guided Study (BUGS) Peer Tutors: Undergraduates can be paid to work as a BUGS peer tutor for specific courses through one-on-one sessions or small groups. Opportunities can be found on Workday job postings.
• Roosevelt Fellow Peer Advisors: The Roosevelt Fellows are a trained group of junior and senior peer academic advisors who provide an informed and accessible peer perspective on navigating academics at Brandeis. They work closely with staff in Academic Services. All first-year and transfer students at Brandeis are assigned a Roosevelt Fellow peer advisor to support them in their academic transition. Their name stems from the late Eleanor Roosevelt, an early trustee of Brandeis known for her care for others and service to the community.

Faculty/student research opportunities that may interest HSSP students include some unique fellowships and grants, including:

• Lurie Fellows: Student Fellowship Program - This fellowship offers undergraduate and graduate students the opportunity to develop research skills and expand their knowledge of disability policy through direct research training with established Lurie Institute investigators. Usually, several HSSP students apply and are accepted each year.
• ENACT Research and Advocacy Fellowship - This fellowship provides students with the opportunity to engage in original research, with the ultimate goal of creating evidence-based policy. Usually, each year, several HSSP students apply and are accepted.
• Jerome A. Schiff Undergraduate Fellowship - This fellowship offers undergraduates funding to perform an innovative research, creative, or pedagogical project over the course of the academic year under the guidance of a Brandeis faculty mentor.
• COMPACT Community Engaged Pedagogy Fund - This grant supports recipients in bringing ethical, reciprocal and sustainable community engagement into Brandeis classrooms.
• COMPACT Community Health Internship Program (CHIP) - This Program provides impactful Summer internship opportunities for five Brandeis undergraduate students committed to advancing population health in Waltham.
• Heller Atkins Undergraduate Fellowship - Through the Heller School, motivated undergraduate students work directly with social policy researchers conducting funded projects. This paid fellowship introduces selected juniors and seniors (usually, up to 6 in the Spring Semester) to the research process and policy analysis. Fellows receive a stipend.

Additionally, there are almost infinite and ever-changing opportunities for other academic fellowships. Review this website, then connect with Brandeis’ Academic Fellowship Team to learn more about Fellowship Opportunities.

Where else can I find information?

Above are just a few examples. Brandeis’ Undergraduate Research and Creative Collaborations Office (URCC) can help you find topics, mentors, and funding opportunities for an original research or creative project in close collaboration with leading Brandeis faculty and researchers. Students can get involved in research in many ways, including as paid research assistants, through research grants and fellowships, and research for course credit.

For more on fellowships, connect with Brandeis’ Academic Fellowships Team who can help you learn more about which opportunities are a good match for your interests and then guide you through the application process, from developing your initial ideas all the way through writing your proposal or essays and ultimately submitting your application. They work with students in every class year, from any background, with any GPA, and in any area of interest.

Our faculty hail from the life sciences, social sciences and policy realms, and their research reflects this diversity:

• Our HSSP Chair, health policy expert Darren Zinner is frequently published in prestigious journals, such as JAMA, NEJM and Academic Medicine, and is the inventor on two medical device patents.

• Sarah Elisabeth Curi, JD, MPH, our Undergraduate Advising Head (UAH) and Study Abroad Liaison (SAL), has taught at Brandeis since 2007 and is still a practicing health care attorney where she has advised several hospitals, health care providers, and health tech companies and, recently, was in-house counsel to a Google subsidiary. Her areas of expertise include American health law and policy, public health, and biomedical ethics. Her students have recognized her for excellence in teaching and mentoring. She was honored to be a Visiting Lecturer in Political Science - teaching "Constitutional Law" and "Public Health in America" - at Wellesley College, her alma mater.

• Deborah Garnick's research career has been focused on healthcare quality -- working with teams at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management and collaborators across the nation to develop and test performance measures focused on treatment for substance use disorders.  
• Thuy Lam is trained in environmental and occupational health and epidemiology. Her previous research focused on evaluating the association between chlorinated pesticides and male puberty. She also has state and federal government experience as well as industry experience with various consulting firms concentrating in pharmacoepidemiology and environmental epidemiology.

• Biologist James Morris is a lead author of the college textbook “Biology: How Life Works” and the high school textbook “Biology for the AP Course.” He also regularly contributes to "The American Biology Teacher.”

• Sociologist Sara Shostak is an award winning teacher and author and the inaugural director of the Vic ’63 and Bobbi Samuels ’63 Center for Community Partnerships and Civic Transformation (COMPACT). Her books include Exposed Science: Genes, the Environment, and the Politics of Population Health and Back to the Roots: Memory, Inequality, and Urban Agriculture.

• Sociologist Siri Suh's book, Dying to Count: Post-Abortion Care and Global Reproductive Health Politics in Senegal, received the 2022 Eileen Basker Memorial Prize for scholarship in gender and health from the American Anthropological Association.  Her current project explores authorized and off-label use of misoprostol, a uterotonic medication, in West Africa.  Conducted in collaboration with social scientists from national universities in Burkina Faso and Senegal, this ethnographic project has received nearly a million dollars in funding from the Hewlett Foundation's Gender Equity and Governance Program.
• Cindy Parks Thomas PhD, Professor and Associate Dean for Research at the Heller Graduate School studies medical technology - its development, costs, contributions to medical care, and its access. This includes the development of drugs and devices, and impact of new treatments for substance use disorder and other conditions.  Her work has been featured in Health Affairs, JAMA, NEJM, and other high-impact journals, as well as the popular press. 

As an HSSP major, you will be required to complete a hands-on experience (HOE) related to medicine or a life science, a social science or public health, or policy.

To do this, you have many options to choose from, including certain approved internship seminars offered by Brandeis, independent research, a senior thesis, or a health-related study abroad experience.

We encourage HSSP majors and minors to engage in study abroad. Each year, approximately one-third of HSSP students participate in such programs. In recent years, HSSP students have gone to Mexico, Chile, Denmark, England, Geneva, South Africa, Spain, and numerous other countries for their life-enriching study abroad experiences.

While some HSSP students do not take health-related courses abroad, others go abroad to expand their perspectives on health and health care, as well as cultural differences in understanding health, illness, and well-being. Many programs offer health-related internship and field experience components that fulfill HSSP’s HOE requirement.

See the list of more than 170 pre-approved study abroad courses, including over 30 HOEs.

Students who are considering pursuing a future master's degree at Brandeis may discover their chosen path through one of these two five-year HSSP/Heller degree programs:

• HSSP MPP Advancement Program
• Global Health 5-year Bachelor-Master of Science Program

Both programs enable HSSP BA and BS students to complete a dual undergraduate and master's degree within five years.

Some HSSP alumni go on to pursue a master’s or doctoral degree in a health-related field while others, often inspired by their HSSP HOE internship, pursue careers in a wide variety of fields including medicine, public health and public policy, education and advocacy. 

Recent alumni have gone on to become public health analysts, clinical research coordinators, and teachers.