Environmental health sciences represent the study of environmental factors including biological, physical and chemical factors that affect the health of a community.*

Competencies: Upon graduation a student with an MPH should be able to,

• Describe the direct and indirect human, ecological and safety effects of major environmental and occupational agents.
  
• Describe genetic, physiologic and psychosocial factors that affect susceptibility to adverse health outcomes following exposure to environmental hazards.
  
• Describe federal and state regulatory programs, guidelines and authorities that control environmetnal health issues.
  
• Specify current environmental rish assessment methods.
  
• Specify approaches for assessing, preventing and controlling environmental hazards that pose risks to human health and safety.
  
• Explain the general mechanisms of toxicity in eliciting a toxic response to various environmenal exposures.
  
• Discuss various risk management and risk communivation approaches in relation to issues of environmental justice and equity.
  
• Develop a testable model of environmental insult.
  
  

*Definitions are provided to define the context by which the workgroups' competency modeling development activities took place and are not intended to describe the entire field of the particular discipline's scholarship and practice.