Employing Entrustable Professional Activities as a Standard for Outcome Measurement and Curricular Reform for Enhancing Quality of Master of Public Health Program

The transition to competency-based education in the domain of public health indicates a paradigm shift from a time-based, lecture-intensive approach to outcome-focused frameworks that give emphasis to what students need to do actually in practice. In the Master of Public Health (MPH) program, employment of entrustable professional activities (EPAs) aids in determining what a student is ready to perform in professional settings. Implementation of EPAs in the MPH program essentially requires the adoption of a step-wise approach for deriving desired results. The MPH program must consider readiness-for-practice indicators instead of traditional indicators (grade point average) to evaluate the impact of EPAs in the curriculum. These outcome metrics can be broadly categorized into performance of EPA-trained graduates, confidence and competence of students, and quality assurance. In conclusion, EPAs offer an effective approach for strengthening competency-based public health education. The need of the hour is to align academic rigor with the urgent needs of public health by moving towards a more observable, accountable, and practical curriculum to prepare job-ready public health professionals.