PHCA3515 Public Health Project Development A (Capstone)

This capstone topic provides students with an opportunity to apply their learning in an authentic professional context, developing a small-scale project with a partner public health organization. It develops skills in project development, evaluation, and management, and allows integration and application of theoretical perspectives and knowledge from previous topics within the Bachelor of Public Health. The topic is the first phase of the project, and will be actioned in the PHCA3516 Public Health Project Development B (Capstone) topic.

This topic aims to provide students with an opportunity to consolidate and apply their learning into professional practice in a workplace setting. It is designed to challenge and grow the student’s higher-level communication, dissemination and critical thinking through the development and implementation of a small-scale project in a public health organization. This topic is the first of two related topics in which the student develops a project proposal and plan relevant and appropriate to their public health partner organisation. It includes a simulated interprofessional learning workshop to develop communication and team-based problem-solving skills.

1. Critically apply public health theoretical knowledge to develop a small-scale public health project proposal and plan to be implemented with a partner public health organisation
2. Create a project proposal and plan grounded in the relevant literature which identifies a health service delivery or health promotion activity for a targeted population, and considers a range of factors, such as key stakeholders, ethics, risks, resources, to ensure that the project can be successfully implemented
3. Communicate effectively with a range of stakeholders, individually and as part of a team, to achieve positive outcomes
4. Demonstrate the capacity to critically reflect on communication and responsiveness to the needs of the public health partner organisation in the development of the project
5. Integrate within the project plan an evaluative framework to measure outcomes and impact