New Opportunities Abound as Six UK Colleges Offer New Majors, Minors, Certificates and Graduate Programs

LEXINGTON, Ky. (June 12, 2014) – From the University of Kentucky's College of Agriculture, Food and Environment (CAFE) to the College of Public Health and from undergraduate students to graduate and professional students, the university has several new majors, minors and certificate options to consider for their studies.

CAFE has welcomed two new majors, technical systems management and modern agronomic crop production (agronomy). 

Technical systems management (TSM) will be housed in the UK Department of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering. The major links agricultural, environmental, manufacturing, and machinery theory with industry practice, providing business and management skills from a hands-on, engineering point of view. TSM students will learn practical, theoretical and managerial skills, including how to prevent and solve problems, make decisions and manage teams. The undergraduate degree combines educational theory and workplace experience partly because of an awareness of the United States’ reported “skills gap” but also because, as a hands-on engineering department, its faculty expertise strongly lends itself to teaching these technical skills.

TSM students will complete six work-based learning courses (supervised internships) to gain practical, hands-on experience, and to make the critical link between theory and industry practice. As a TSM graduate, alumni will be prepared to enter the workforce in areas such as manufacturing, agriculture, environment and systems management. TSM is available now as an Individualized Program in Agriculture (IPA).

CAFE's second new major modern agronomic crop production integrates the scientific knowledge and practical management skills needed by agronomists involved in modern crop production. Requirements focus on the basic sciences/principles needed by the modern agronomist. These are refined into the soil and crop science courses underlying agronomic crop management. Additionally, courses in pests (weeds, insects, diseases) are required in support of the field agronomist.

As the student advances in the modern agronomic crop production curriculum, the advanced courses provide more detailed information (crop ecology, statistics) and situation analysis (field schools) for grain, oil seed fiber, bio-fuel or forage crop production. Production sustainability is emphasized. Many classes consist of both lecture and active learning (field, greenhouse or lab) portions. Each student is required to have an internship or an international study abroad experience and to selects a specialty support area that supports the student’s professional goals.

The College of Arts and Sciences has opportunities for both undergraduates and graduate students. The college has added a new health major and a Master of Fine Arts program in creative writing this fall.

Health, society and populations (HSP) recognizes that health isn’t a simple physical matter, that society and the environment also play a crucial role in our well-being. The major focuses on understanding health outcomes and their unequal distribution as a product of multiple interacting influences, including health care, behaviors, environmental conditions, genetic and biological factors and social and cultural characteristics of groups and individuals.

Effective this semester HSP students can obtain a stand-alone degree or pursue the area of study as a second major with any other department or discipline-specific bachelor’s degree. The HSP program will draw on the expertise of numerous faculty members within the College of Arts and Sciences, as well as coursework across a number of colleges at the university. It is a complement to current undergraduate health-related programs, providing students the opportunity to pursue their interests in health-related issues through the analytical lens of the social sciences. The program simultaneously fosters collaboration with other health-related disciplines on campus through shared coursework. For more about the new HSP program, listen to co-directors Erin Koch, professor of anthropology, and Carrie Oser, professor of sociology, discuss the new program.

With realistic aspirations to be among the nation’s best programs by 2020, the UK College of Arts and Sciences will offer its students a full-residency Master of Fine Arts in creative writing this fall. Modeled after some of the finest graduate-level creative writing programs in the nation, UK’s curriculum will feature a faculty of prominent award-winning authors, from Kentucky Poet Laureate and NAACP Image Award winner Frank X Walker to the young author Manuel Gonzales, who just received an American Academy of Arts and Letters award for his first book.

Designed to dovetail with the Department of English’s undergraduate program in creative writing, the UK experience will feature exposure to diverse genres of writing, the full range of career possibilities, a combination of artistic and literary study, and the ever-expanding paths to publication.

A new major in the College of Communication and Information is placing students at the forefront of today’s increasingly interconnected world. The Bachelors of Science in information communication technology (ICT) focuses on the intersection of technology, people who use that technology, policies and regulations that govern the use of that technology and communities or environments in which that technology is used.

Housed in the School of Library and Information Science, ICT is an applied information technology degree program that provides students with the knowledge and skills needed to effectively apply, use and manage technology when solving problems specifically related to information and communication. It provides a human and organizational focus on technology – teaching students how to be effective users of technology. Students who major in ICT can expect to work in positions where they are the communication link between people, organizations, and the technologies used to support those organizations’ information infrastructures. 

ICT majors may pursue one of two concentrations, ICT commercialization or technology management. ICT Commercialization focuses on ICT as an enabling tool to drive economic growth. The concentration in technology management focuses on using technology to provide a stable operating environment.  Information and course descriptions can be found on the new ICT program website. 

In the College of Fine Arts, two long-awaited programs of study on campus now are being offered as minors in the School of Art and Visual Studies. UK undergraduates can now officially minor in photography and digital media and design (graphic design).

With over a billion photographs being created every day, it has never been more important to understand how to make compelling images. The UK photography minor offers students an opportunity to study a wide range of techniques and approaches, ranging from historic 19th century processes to cutting-edge digital, Photoshop and lighting techniques. In addition to still photography, students can also choose from courses in video and web-based design. The photography minor complements course work from a wide variety of majors and will equip students with the skills they need to navigate and create in a world in which we increasingly use images to communicate.

Experts in digital media are in high demand in today’s creativity and technology driven workforce. With career opportunities in graphic design, web design, animation and more, the digital media and design minor gives students multimedia skills that complement any major, especially ones in the Colleges of Fine Arts, Design and Communication and Information.

College of Health Sciences (CHS) has several new opportunities this fall. The college is offering a new health advocacy minor and clinical healthcare management certificate as well as a new freshman track in clinical leadership and management.

With an increasingly complex and dynamic health care system and an aging population, qualified health advocates are in demand across the U.S. Health advocates, also referred to as patient navigators, guide patients and their families through the health care system. The minor in health advocacy lays the foundation for pursuing a career as a health advocate or furthering graduate educational opportunities.

Want to acquire the skills necessary for a management position in health care? You will benefit from the undergraduate certificate in clinical healthcare management. The certificate is a great option for currently enrolled UK students, as well as practicing health care professionals who want to enhance their management skills.

The bachelor’s degree in clinical leadership and management is ideal for students who plan to enter a health administration or health law program or who plan to assume policy/administration roles in the health care field.

Students interested in adding the health advocacy minor, clinical healthcare management certificate or the track in clinical leadership and management, should contact CHS Office of Student Affairs, room 111 Wethington Building.

For professional students, College of Law is offering a Juris Doctor and Master of Health Administration (JD/MHA) dual degree program with the College of Public Health. Through this program, the student earns both degrees in a total of four years, one year sooner than if each degree was completed individually. The JD/MHA dual degree is designed to prepare a lawyer to work in and through many areas of health care management, a large and growing industry. This is the fourth dual degree program offered through the College of Law.

This fall also marks the first time the College of Public Health will offer an undergraduate degree. The public health major, which is the first professional undergraduate public health program in the state of Kentucky, will offer students a new opportunity to contribute to work that seeks to remedy long-standing health disparities in the Commonwealth and beyond.

UK’s Bachelor's of Public Health (BPH) program is designed to provide exposure to students in a number of important areas of public health, including disease control and prevention, environmental health, health behavior, health care management, global health, local health, aging and nutrition. The program seeks to prepare graduates for work in public health that allows them to contribute to the improvement of quality of life for both individual citizens and the community as a whole. With the expansive introduction to the public health field that the BPH degree provides, students are prepared to either enter directly into population health service population in either community or public health or extend their education further into graduate study.

Public health is a growing field, with more than 250,000 public health workers needed by the year 2020.  It is a challenging area of study that allows students the opportunity to tackle complex health problems and work toward finding solutions that better the lives of individuals, families, and entire communities. Students who are interested in learning more about the BPH program are invited to attend an Open House noon to 2 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 24, in room 115 of the College of Public Health. 

MEDIA CONTACT: Whitney Hale, 859-257-8716; whitney.hale@uky.edu