Colorado School of Public Health News and Stories

The Colorado School of Public Health (ColoradoSPH) has been ranked #16 by U.S. News & World Report for graduate programs in public health. The rankings were announced publicly on April 9. Previously, ColoradoSPH had been ranked #17.

As a newer school of public health, founded in 2008, ColoradoSPH, has risen steadily through the ranks from #35 to #16 in just 15 short years. The rankings of more than 200 schools and programs of public health are based on expert opinions about program excellence and other statistical indicators that measure the quality of a school's faculty, research, and students.

Colorado School of Public Health | April 09, 2024

Dear ColoradoSPH Community,

Over the past 2+ years, we prepared for our school’s Council on Education for Public Health (CEPH) reaccreditation process that occurs every 7 years (this time 8 years due to the pandemic), with our last reaccreditation in 2016, accrediting the school into 2024.

Colorado School of Public Health | February 27, 2024

ColoradoSPH Community,

Colorado School of Public Health | October 17, 2023

Each year, the Colorado School of Public Health honors exceptional students, faculty, and staff at an annual awards ceremony coinciding with graduation.

Colorado School of Public Health | May 19, 2023

Rodolfo (Rudy) Vargas ’13, ‘22, was born in Matamoros Coahuila, Mexico, and moved to the U.S. at the age of 12. He graduated from Greeley Central High School, then enrolled at UNC with plans to become a teacher. Those plans followed a different path, though, as he realized he wanted to help other students transition from high school to college – and from college to a successful career. Here’s how his UNC experience shaped him – and how he’s helping the students who’ve come after him.

University of Northern Colorado | July 12, 2022

Each year, the Colorado School of Public Health honors exceptional students, faculty, and staff at an awards ceremony coinciding with graduation. The following individuals have made outstanding contributions to public health and our school. Congratulations to this year's award winners!

Colorado School of Public Health | May 26, 2022

As an undergraduate student at Mississippi College, Steven Burton studied biological and medical science and saw his future as a physician assistant or a medical doctor. A stint in the pediatric emergency department at the University of Mississippi Medical Center changed that.

Tyler Smith | August 19, 2021

Rudy Vargas knows about earning success the hard way. He’s faced challenges in his life with limited resources and support. He overcame them, but he doesn’t want others to have similar experiences. Along the way, he determined that he would devote himself to serving under-resourced communities.

Tyler Smith | August 19, 2021

Each year, the Colorado School of Public Health honors exceptional students, faculty, and staff at an awards ceremony coinciding with graduation. The following individuals have made outstanding contributions to public health and our school. Congratulations to this year's award winners!

Colorado School of Public Health | May 25, 2021

UNC senior Rosie Glaser realized there was a problem when she visited Colorado State University’s campus in Fort Collins. She saw something there that did not exist at UNC: free menstrual products in every all-gender restroom. Glaser then thought of a way she could influence change at UNC.

Ian Gross | May 04, 2021

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, University of Northern Colorado (UNC) students in the Master of Public Health (MPH) program would typically spend their first year attending night classes, in study groups with friends or cramming for an exam at a coffee shop. For the incoming cohort of 2020, the largest in recent years, earning a graduate degree online in a global pandemic has been anything but typical.

Rose Grose | April 02, 2021

In February 2020, Grace Franklin ’15 had just stepped into her new role as the public health director for San Miguel County in southwest Colorado. She was excited about the opportunity to revamp the county’s programs in family planning, WIC (Women, Infants and Children), and immunizations.

Debbie Pitner Moors | December 21, 2020

While watching events unfold across the country over recent months, Professor Dawn Comstock was left feeling like she needed to do something tangible to address the ongoing systemic racial and ethic disparities. That’s when she decided to help establish a new scholarship fund to accelerate the Colorado School of Public Health’s efforts to increase the diversity and inclusive excellence of the school’s student body.

Colorado School of Public Health | October 15, 2020

The Colorado School of Public Health’s COVID-19 modeling team has developed and launched an interactive online application that shows a variety of data that affect epidemic modeling. The new interactive app lets people see the possible course of COVID-19 under a variety of scenarios, and project the COVID-19 epidemic curve from the comfort of their homes.

Using interactive sliders on a website, users are able to see how the four key interventions to control the spread of COVID-19 can impact the future course of the virus in Colorado. Users can alter the percent of the population wearing masks, introduce contact tracing, improve case detection and isolation, and see how changes in social distancing can impact the future course of COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths. 

Colorado School of Public Health | July 09, 2020

Wearing a mask or face covering in the US has become about more than just slowing the spread of COVID-19 — some experts say it's a political statement, signalling another layer in the deep divisions within America.

ABC News | June 30, 2020

Traditionally, women’s health has been defined by its contrast to men’s health, but using a male/female gendered dichotomy to define entire fields of medical care has resulted in entire populations, like transgender and nonbinary (TNB) individuals, falling through the cracks.  According to a new commentary co-authored by Colorado School of Public Health researchers and published in Women’s Health Issues, there isn’t enough research on TNB health needs to help restructure health services in an evidence-based way to better serve these populations.

Tori Forsheim | January 02, 2020

Faculty at the Colorado School of Public Health are adamant when it comes to best practices in working alongside with and in service to the community. “We need to ask what the health needs of the community actually are before embarking on any project,” says professor Evelinn Borrayo. “It’s easy to make assumptions about concerns that may not be the primary concerns for a community, or may not even exist.” 

Tori Forsheim | December 13, 2019

Melissa Rivera, MPH student at ColoradoSPH at UNC, was selected as the student speaker for the May 2019 ColoradoSPH Convocation. She spoke on the joy of public health work and saying goodbye to health inequality. 

Colorado School of Public Health | July 09, 2019