Simon Fraser University
Engaging the World

Course Outlines

Spring 2025 - HSCI 403 D100

Health and the Built Environment (3)

Class Number: 3501

Delivery Method: In Person

Overview

  • Course Times + Location:

    Jan 6 – Apr 9, 2025: Thu, 11:30 a.m.–2:20 p.m.
    Burnaby

  • Prerequisites:

    60 units including HSCI 230 (or 330) with a minimum grade of C-.

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

Relationships between the physical environment in which people live and their health and well being. How the built environment affects physical activity, obesity, exposure to pathogens and toxins, health status, mental health, and risk of illness and injury. How urban form, physical infrastructure, and landscape and building design can promote health. Students with credit for HSCI 309 may not complete this course for credit.

COURSE DETAILS:

Course Description: This course will explore the interconnections between planning and public health, and equip students with skills and experiences to plan healthy communities. The planning and public health disciplines emerged together with the common goal of preventing infectious disease outbreaks. Since that time, the disciplines diverged; public health following a clinical model and planning focusing on urban design and physical form. However, as the intimate connections between the built environment and disease continue to surface, the planning and public health fields have begun to converge once again. This course is organized in 4 units: (1) planning and public health foundations; (2) natural and built environments; (3) vulnerable populations and health disparities; and (4) integration and health policy.

COURSE-LEVEL EDUCATIONAL GOALS:

Learning Objectives:                        
1) Foundational Knowledge. To understand public health and planning history and evolution, as well as current theories and associations on the relationship between the built environment and public health.
2) Application. To identify features of the built environment that reflect efforts to influence health.
3) Human Dimensions. To learn about the context in which people operate within their environment to better understand how built environments, socioeconomic positions, social and cultural backgrounds affect health status.
4) Integration and Communication. To develop skills to identify studies and engage communities, critique methods and findings, and apply lessons from planning and public health research to current and future problems.

Grading

  • Homework and In-class assignments 25%
  • Communication assignment 20%
  • Research overview and bibliography 25%
  • Product and summary report 30%

NOTES:

The instructor may make changes to the syllabus if necessary, within Faculty/University regulations.

Materials

REQUIRED READING:

Readings available electronically through the Library (see links in weekly outline).


REQUIRED READING NOTES:

Your personalized Course Material list, including digital and physical textbooks, are available through the SFU Bookstore website by simply entering your Computing ID at: shop.sfu.ca/course-materials/my-personalized-course-materials.

Registrar Notes:

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: YOUR WORK, YOUR SUCCESS

SFU’s Academic Integrity website http://www.sfu.ca/students/academicintegrity.html is filled with information on what is meant by academic dishonesty, where you can find resources to help with your studies and the consequences of cheating. Check out the site for more information and videos that help explain the issues in plain English.

Each student is responsible for his or her conduct as it affects the university community. Academic dishonesty, in whatever form, is ultimately destructive of the values of the university. Furthermore, it is unfair and discouraging to the majority of students who pursue their studies honestly. Scholarly integrity is required of all members of the university. http://www.sfu.ca/policies/gazette/student/s10-01.html

RELIGIOUS ACCOMMODATION

Students with a faith background who may need accommodations during the term are encouraged to assess their needs as soon as possible and review the Multifaith religious accommodations website. The page outlines ways they begin working toward an accommodation and ensure solutions can be reached in a timely fashion.