~Lemonmacaron

I have become very interested in studying nutritional epidemiology after undergrad and have been looking into all the programs that offer this concentration. The two schools that I have become most interested in based on curriculum, faculty research areas, career opportunities, etc. are University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and Tufts University. Both schools appear to offer only partial funding; however, UNC has cheaper tuition (28K for out of state vs. 34K at Tufts). However, if I became a North Carolina resident tuition would drop to 11K per year. Neither programs offer a stipend but do have numerous scholarships; however, I don't know how competitive these would be. Tufts is more prestigious but as far as public health goes UNC is widely recognized for their programs, so I don't know if choosing one or the other would affect my job chances after school. UNC is closer to the CDC, NIH, etc. but I'm sure Tufts would have opportunities also. Also, Tufts' PhD program requires a Masters before entry, but UNC does not require a Masters. The average GPA of accepted applicants at UNC is 3.4, which seems rather low to me, but I don't know how this compares to applicants at Tufts. Has anyone else considered or is currently attending one of these schools and have thoughts? Thanks for the help!

Thank you nutellarain for your advice. So far I'm not 100% sure if I want to go the clinical/wet lab route or population-based study route. I like statistics and its applications in public health, so I'm leaning more towards epidemiology programs, but at the same time I still want to help contribute to new research. It seems that most epidemiologists look at previous sets of data and apply statistical methods to make conclusions, rather than create new sets of data from experiments and draw conclusions from them. Do you think that faculty from schools I am interested in applying to would respond well if I asked them questions about their work/research, or should I wait until I actually start applying to grad schools to contact them? Maybe in the mean time I can look for undergrad research programs that focus on both areas.

I will definitely start looking at the faculty from these schools and see which ones relate the most to my interests. Thank you so much for your help pasteltomato!!

So far I have looked into UNC-Chapel Hill, Emory, UW, and UW-Madison for Epidemiology/Nutritional Epidemiology. Out of all these UNC appeals to me the most because it has the most information about post-graduation job opportunities and has the largest nutritional epidemiology course selection. However, I would have to pay out of state tuition and funding is not guaranteed. Madison has a great Nutrition program with guaranteed funding but does not have as many specific epidemiology courses, while UW has a huge selection of epidemiology classes but again does not have guaranteed funding. Does anyone have experience with these schools? I have seen many coordinated Masters/RD programs but I do not know of any PhD/RD programs--only about 3-4% of dietitians have doctoral degrees. I am actually majoring in dietetics right now but I am considering switching to a chemistry major with a biology and nutrition minor to allow more time for research and advanced courses. Most epidemiology programs I have looked at only require a background in biological sciences and 1 semester of calculus. I am more interested in chemistry but could take genetics and microbiology (I already took physiology) to earn enough credit for a biology minor... should that be sufficient?

Hello all (please move if this isn't in the right area), I'm currently a sophomore in undergrad deciding what to do with my career. My biggest interest is in nutrition currently, and I could see myself doing research as part of a team in a teaching hospital or academic department. I'm worried, however, that there aren't many openings available for nutrition researchers (I've tried searching job websites, the NIH, FDA, etc.). I'm thinking that going through an epidemiology program would give me practical training to find a job, but I don't know if it would be possible to specialize in nutritional epidemiology within a general epidemiology program. Many programs I have looked into focus on infection control, epidemics, etc. whereas I'm more interested in studying patterns between nutritional habits and subsequent development or delay of disease. So what I'm thinking of doing so far would be completing a MS program in epidemiology to get the training needed to become an epidemiologist, and then applying to a PhD program in nutrition to obtain more advanced knowledge of nutrition and apply skills from the epidemiology program to do research. I'm hoping this would make me more marketable, as I would prefer to stay in the Midwest if possible. Is this a feasible idea, or would it look strange to have a MS and PhD in two different areas? Or, would it be better to switch the two and do a MS in nutrition then a PhD in epidemiology? Thanks for your help!