Bachelor of Science Degree in Health

The overall goal of health education is the creation of healthy communities of healthy people through education.  Health educators work with people of all different ages, races, ethnicities, income levels, geographic areas, religions, occupations, and lifestyles to help them lead healthier, happier lives.  They do this through teaching, counseling, research, advocacy, community development, grant writing, and media campaigns.

Health educators work in many different settings, including schools, hospitals, communities, worksites, laboratories, unions, nursing homes, government agencies, and nonprofit organizations. 

Health majors at UTSA learn to identify health education needs of target populations, design programs that meet those needs, market, implement and evaluate the programs, provide health information, and coordinate health education services. 

As a professional health educator, you may find yourself working to prevent or manage chronic diseases including heart disease, stroke, diabetes, obesity or cancer.  Your efforts may include the prevention of infectious diseases, including food and water borne diseases, AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections, hepatitis, influenza, or anthrax.  Or you may help people modify their health risk behavior, such as abusing alcohol or other drugs, tobacco smoking, eating disorders, teenage pregnancy, fad diets, or inactivity.  You may also be employed in helping people avoid environmental health risks, such as lead poisoning, food or water contamination, radiation, ultraviolet light, excessive noise, hazardous wastes, or even bioterrorism.

School Health

The University of Texas at San Antonio’s School Health degree is design to equip future EC-12 educators with the tools to become successful and effective health education classroom teachers.  Evidence-based pedagogical strategies for teaching health education concepts to EC-12 students are fundamental to this degree.  Similarly, student health literacy standards, teacher health literacy standards, comprehensive health education, and coordinated school health programs are addressed throughout the program.  Specific areas of focus within this degree program include sexuality, substance use, nutrition, physical education, child and adolescent risk-taking, and human disease as well as general education issues such as assessment, special education, classroom management, and curriculum development.  Upon successful completion of the school health degree and TEXES exams, individuals are certified to teach grades EC-12 and therefore equipped to gain employment teaching health education within a school district in the state of Texas.