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Mcgurrin and Leahy Hall at dusk.
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Department of Health and Human Performance

What We Do:

We educate students in the study of three undergraduate majors: Public Health, Kinesiology, and Communication Sciences and Disorders. The department promotes and integrates scientific research and active learning in each of these areas. We are dedicated to the delivery of programs and coursework that promote health, facilitate rehabilitation, encourage disease prevention, and enhance overall human performance.

How We Stand Out:

  • Labs are integrated into classwork
  • Community based learning projects focusing on community outreach
  • Excellent lab facilities with cadaver lab
  • $47.5 million, state-of-the-art facility, Leahy Hall
  • Jesuit Education inspires reflection and a deeper level of thinking

Programs:

  • - Dedicated to the scientific inquiry of physical activity and exercise as they affect human performance across a spectrum of settings and populations.
  • - Students study public health to learn how to use behavior change theories, communication strategies and advocacy efforts to improve the health status of individuals, communities, states and the nation.
  • - Prepares students for careers as speech-language pathologists and audiologists. The program explores the many types of communication impairments in speech, language and hearing, and how to treat them.
  • - This online program will prepare students to provide services for individuals from culturally/linguistically diverse backgrounds with various types and severities of communication and/or related disorders, differences and disabilities, across the lifespan.
  • - Based on the American Sport Education Program (ASEP) the coaching concentration helps meet the needs of those who wish to coach and work more effectively with young athletes from youth through interscholastic sports.
  • - Designed to increase the knowledge base of the depth and implications of nutritional problems and their effects on chronic illnesses.
  • - Designed so students from different fields of study, and professional practice, can extend profession-specific perspectives to create transdisciplinary, integrative strategies to innovatively address health issues and health inequities.

Inside the Classroom:

  • Challenging and rigorous academics
  • Service learning projects embedded in class requirements
  • Hands-on, laboratory experience

New Facility

Leahy Hall, the $47.5 million, eight story home for the undergraduate and graduate departments of exercise science, occupational therapy and physical therapy, has 25 state-of-the-art laboratories, nine traditional and active-learning classrooms, nine group study rooms, more than 50 faculty offices and multiple simulation environments.

The new building is designed to facilitate research, expand service-learning projects, and put the best simulation environments, applied-science laboratories, equipment and technology directly in the hands of students and faculty. Learn more.

Student Research:

The department is committed to the advancement of knowledge in Kinesiology. Faculty research in contemporary topics gives students the opportunity to work alongside experts.

Kinesiology majors are often represented during the ÐÓ°ÉÔ­°æ's annual Celebration of Student Scholars, recognizing scholarly work through poster and verbal presentations. Students also present this research at local and national conferences such as the American College of Sports Medicines (ACSM) annual conference.

Career Outcomes:

Scranton graduates with kinesiology degrees work in diverse positions in a variety of programs including:

  • Corporate wellness
  • Community/hospital wellness programs
  • Cardiopulmonary rehabilitation
  • Research Centers
  • Athletic teams (strength and conditioning specialists)

Graduate Study:

Approximately 85% of kinesiology graduates continue their studies. The largest percentage continues into the DPT (Doctorate of Physical Therapy) program at the ÐÓ°ÉÔ­°æ. Others pursue study in areas include:

  • Physician's assistant
  • Clinical exercise physiology
  • Medicine
  • Nutrition
  • Biology
  • Physiology
  • Exercise science
  • Biomechanics

Accreditation:

Logo of the Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs - a blue square with the letters CAA on top and HEP on bottom. 

The ÐÓ°ÉÔ­°æ (white text)