In 2025, Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health celebrated 50 years as a program and 35 years as a school by expanding its impact, even in the face of uncertain times. Here are some top highlights from the year.
Dean Daniele Fallin, PhD, speaks with Thomas R. Frieden, MD, at an event in fall 2025
A Guiding Light in a Changing Public Health Landscape
Public health has rarely seen as many changes as it did in 2025. Through the uncertainty, Rollins has continuously endeavored to be a source of truth and stability for our community, offering insights on navigating tumultuous times and career support for students, faculty, staff, and alumni.
In the face of expansive federal shifts, Rollins and its experts kept people informed. Whether breaking down executive orders and Supreme Court cases, explaining the potential impacts of the federal budget on Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or providing updates during the longest-ever government shutdown, the school shared timely content to bridge the gap between policy and health.
Changes to Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices membership were top of mind this year as longstanding vaccine policies were debated and revised. Rollins released pre- and post-meeting explainers throughout the year to shed light on the committee’s proceedings and decisions.
“The Rollins-Gallup Public Health Priorities Survey reinforces that Americans, across demographics and party lines, mostly agree on the public health issues that touch their daily lives. Public health is at a crossroads, but the survey is clear—Americans think we have more work to do. Prioritizing these issues in the new administration could be unifying.”
Stephen Patrick, MD, Chair of the Department of Health Policy and Management
Driving Conversations with Thought Leadership
Rollins experts continue to establish themselves as go-to sources of public health information. The school’s researchers are thought leaders on critical, timely public health topics including:
- Dabney P. Evans, PhD, explained the impacts of the growing problem of violence against women.
- Jeremy Sarnat, ScD, dove into the downstream health effects that could come from deregulating greenhouse gas emissions.
- Ramesh Manyam, PhD, explored the medical and public health applications of artificial intelligence.
Leading Rollins researchers also shared insights into current events and their impacts on diabetes, health equity, tuberculosis, and HIV/AIDS in a new op-ed section in the fall 2025 edition of Rollins Magazine. Plus, a national survey project in collaboration with Gallup shed light on Americans’ top public health priorities.
Our experts have fielded more than 470 media inquiries so far this year. Rollins thought leaders were frequently sought out by statewide, national, and international media outlets. Stephen Patrick, MD; Jodie Guest, PhD; Daniele Fallin, PhD; Patrick Sullivan, PhD; Dana Barr, PhD; and many others at Rollins have established themselves as trusted voices for public health.
Expanding Our Academic Programs
This year, Rollins expanded its degree options to meet changing needs in the public health workforce and give students more flexibility in how they complete their studies. The school added new, fully online programs, including two full-time Master of Public Health (MPH) programs in global health and behavioral, social, and health education sciences and two part-time MPH programs in epidemiology and global epidemiology.
Fall 2025 saw the first cohort of Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) students begin their journey at Rollins. And two new concentrations will be available starting fall 2026:
These concentrations will train the workforce in vital skills for public health’s changing policy and technology landscape.
The first cohort of Certificate in Science Communications students also started their studies this fall.
Rollins is meeting the need for public health professionals trained in data, technology, and informatics with new master’s degree programs. Three Master of Science in Public Health (MSPH) in Data Science programs will let students explore applications for data and analytics across public health disciplines. The part-time, hybrid Master of Health Administration (MHA) will train future health care leaders to use technological advances to deliver more equitable, efficient care. Both the MSPH in Data Science and MHA are now accepting applications for fall 2026 enrollment with a priority deadline of January 5.
The Department of Health Policy and Management is expanding their expertise and impact. The Health Policy and Management Scholars initiative brings former federal, state, and local public health leaders to the school as adjunct faculty members, creating new opportunities for learning and collaboration with students and faculty. The department also announced their first policy fellow in residence, Karen Hacker, MD, who will spend her one-year term working closely with the Rollins community as she examines trends in chronic disease and health care access.
These opportunities are now more accessible than ever to our exceptional Emory community. Starting in this year’s admissions cycle, Emory College undergraduate students now have a pathway to guaranteed admission to Rollins MPH and MSPH programs.
"As a top school of public health, we feel deeply the responsibility to keep pursuing our mission: educate our students and the public, conduct research that shapes our field, engage with and support communities, and work together to promote accurate information.”
Daniele Fallin, PhD, James W. Curran Dean of Public Health
Continued Excellence at the No. 2 School of Public Health
Rollins moved up to a No. 2 ranking among all accredited schools and programs of public health in the United States in U.S. News & World Report’s 2025-2026. Rollins has consistently ranked in the top 10 for 20 years.
In addition to its ranking as a school, Rollins also secured top spots for each of the programs individually ranked this year: environmental health science, social behavior, epidemiology, health policy and management, and biostatistics. These rankings reflect our tradition of excellence and commitment to research, teaching, and academic rigor.
Our faculty also demonstrated excellence this year, with many receiving major awards and recognition:
- Tené T. Lewis, PhD, was chosen as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
- Mohammed Ali, MD, was elected to the National Academy of Medicine.
- M. Daniele Fallin, PhD, received the Wade Hampton Frost Lectureship award at the American Public Health Association’s 2025 annual meeting.
- Moose Alperin, EdD, was elected president-elect of the American Public Health Association.
- Rameshbabu Manyam, PhD, won the 2025 Provost's Distinguished Teaching Award for Excellence in Graduate and Professional Education.
- Amita Manatunga, PhD, won Emory University’s 2025 Exemplary Teacher of the Year Award.
- Helena Pachón, PhD, was named an inaugural Excellence in Nutrition Fellow by the American Society for Nutrition.
We celebrated many of the exceptional students, staff, and faculty in our community at the 2025 Annual Rollins Awards Ceremony.
Vaccine and Infectious Disease Leadership
This year marked the five-year anniversary of the COVID-19 pandemic, and Rollins leaders reflected on the lessons we have learned in that time and how we can apply them to future infectious disease outbreaks. Bird flu and measles were two ongoing outbreaks at top of mind this year, and Rollins faculty were at the forefront of media and communications about both.
As some seek to cast doubt on the vaccines that protect us from these infectious diseases, the school’s faculty has stepped in to dispel misinformation. They weighed in on vaccination for HPV, hepatitis B, and routine childhood vaccines.
“Five years on from the onset of the pandemic it seems that many have forgotten the most consequential events: how devastating the first years were, how many lives were lost, but also how well the vaccines worked, and how many lives they saved."
Ben Lopman, PhD, Professor of Epidemiology
Championing Public Mental Health
Mental health was a focal point of Rollins research in 2025. Faculty studied mental health access and outcomes for children, adolescents, and adults across a variety of health contexts and insurance types. Researchers also delved into the impact politics can have on mental health and explored the role of art and youth mental health resilience in a newly launched podcast.
Rollins faculty will continue leading the charge in public mental health in 2026 through a mental health research accelerator, which brings together experts across the school to advance mental health scholarship.
Protecting Maternal and Child Health
Children’s health was in the spotlight this year as federal policy changes put their well-being in jeopardy. National polling from the Emory Center for Child Health Policy revealed that Americans largely don’t support policy changes that hurt kids’ health, like ceasing operation of the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System. The center also conducted polling in Georgia and learned about parents’ top public health concerns and strong support for childhood vaccines.
Another major maternal and child health focus was opioid use disorder—including how we treat it during pregnancy and how to identify newborns at risk for opioid withdrawal.
Rollins researchers also investigated how environmental exposures impact pregnancy and birth outcomes. This encompassed everything from air pollution to phthalates to heat.
“By bringing already individually successful people together into larger groups, we believe those collaborations will lead to initiatives with even greater impact. And as the research landscape shifts, these accelerators will have us poised to respond very quickly to emerging challenges and opportunities and to do so in a big way.”
Carmen Marsit, PhD, Executive Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs and Research Strategy
New Major Funding
Rollins received or had renewed several major grants and other funding opportunities throughout 2025 that bolster research and support student experience:
- Douglas Walker, PhD, and Daniele Fallin, PhD, are leading one of 13 projects selected for the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) $50 million Autism Data Science Initiative, looking at the impact of environmental exposures on autism.
- The Maternal and Child Health Center of Excellence, led by Sarah Blake, PhD, received a five-year grant renewal from the Health Resources and Services Administration.
- Rollins researchers studying water, sanitation, and hygiene received research funds in honor of the late Eugene Gangarosa, MD.
- Four researchers at Emory/Georgia Tuberculosis Research Advancement Center were awarded NIH grants to investigate tuberculosis in the U.S. and around the world.
- Funding from the O. Wayne Rollins Foundation will support student tuition scholarships and new research accelerators in key public health topics.
Leading in Communications
In 2025, Rollins continued our efforts to reach even broader audiences with clear, reliable science communications. The redesigned, modernized website, launched in June, is a pivotal tool in those efforts, offering a better user experience that makes the school’s research and programs more accessible than ever.
This summer also brought a change to the Rollins Public Health News newsletter as it transitioned to a weekly format. Every Wednesday, the newsletter breaks down the top public health headlines and delivers easy-to-digest, must-know information for over 14,000 subscribers.
The fall 2025 edition of Rollins Magazine brought deep dives into children’s and older adults’ unique health challenges, a look back on 50 years of public health research excellence at Rollins, and a snapshot of HIV in the southeastern U.S.
Health Wanted, a weekly radio show from Rollins and WABE, celebrated its one-year anniversary in August and moved into its second year of relatable scientific content. As of December, it is now available for distribution to public radio stations nationwide thanks to a partnership with PRX.
Follow Rollins on Instagram, LinkedIn, and Bluesky to stay up to date on all the latest research and happenings around the school.
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