Public Policy

This introductory course provides students a broad overview of public health focusing on concepts relating to health promotion, disease prevention and epidemiology. Additionally, students learn about the core public health values, functions, population health assessment and intervention and the socio-economic, behavioral, biological and environmental determinants of health.

ACE Component: Students will write letters to elected officials and decision makers about an issue related to public health.

For the ACE component of this class, students will run community exit polls at voting sites and present the results of the poll to the general public at a mini-conference. This will help the community gain new insights into voting and political participation in the community.

Students will participate in the National Association of Social Workers Advocacy Week.

Students will participate in the MN Private Colleges Council Day at the Capitol.

Part of a multi-year project, the civic engagement component of this course built upon past work by St. Olaf students regarding immigration issues.  The Rural Immigration Network project aims to create a useful and well-used online network of national scope, which will share practical information and cultural knowledge.  It seeks to reach rural communities diversifying through immigration across the United States.  Students in this course conducted research to translate social science findings pertinent to community leaders in rural communities into a standardized format suitable for sharing online.  These findings will help to identify innovative, positive responses to immigration in rural communities.  Students also participated in a hands-on workshop with immigration scholars and leaders from around the country to help shape the next steps for this project.

Since its inception in 1916, the New Hampshire primary has attained a preeminent place in American presidential politics. This course will provide students with a broad overview of the presidential nominating process through a detailed examination of the New Hampshire primary. Students read academic analyses of the New Hampshire primary and intern with a presidential candidate. A prior version of this course is the subject of the following article from the Journal of Political Science Education: New Hampshire: The Effects of an Experiential Learning Course on Civic Engagement.