Unit Synopsis
This unit explores how culture, social systems, community structures, and broader contextual factors shape health and wellbeing across diverse population groups. You will critically examine how these intersecting influences shape public health experiences and outcomes, with particular attention to Australia’s cross-cultural landscape. Emphasis is placed on culturally responsive, ethically informed, and context-sensitive public health practice. You will analyse complex community health issues and reflect on how culturally attuned, collaborative perspectives can inform more equitable and meaningful public health outcomes. By completing this unit, you will strengthen your capacity to work effectively with diverse communities, interpret health challenges through cultural and systemic lenses, and contribute to informed and culturally responsive public health practice across varied settings.
Details
| Level | Postgraduate |
|---|---|
| Unit Level | 9 |
| Credit Points | 6 |
| Student Contribution Band | SCA Band 4 |
| Fraction of Full-Time Student Load | 0.125 |
| Pre-requisites or Co-requisites |
There are no pre-requisites for the unit.
Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework). |
| Class Timetable | View Unit Timetable |
| Residential School | No Residential School |
Unit Availabilities from Term 1 - 2026
Term 1 - 2026 Profile
Attendance Requirements
All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).
Recommended Student Time Commitment
Each 6-credit Postgraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.
Assessment Tasks
| Assessment Task | Weighting |
|---|---|
| 1. Written Assessment | 60% |
| 2. Presentation | 40% |
This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of ‘pass’ in order to pass the unit. If any ‘pass/fail’ tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully (‘pass’ grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the ‘assessment task’ section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%).
Past Exams
All University policies are available on the Policy web site, however you may wish to directly view the following policies below.
This list is not an exhaustive list of all University policies. The full list of policies are available on the Policy web site .
Term 1 - 2025 : The overall satisfaction for students in the last offering of this course was 96.20% (`Agree` and `Strongly Agree` responses), based on a 35.91% response rate.
Feedback, Recommendations and Responses
Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.
Source: Self-reflection/Staff feedback
The 'reflective essay' in Assessment 2 needs to be replaced by a new task.
The 'reflective essay' in Assessment 2 will be replaced by a 'poster presentation' task.
The 'reflective essay' in Assessment 2 was replaced by a 'poster presentation' task.
Source: Student feedback and self-reflection
To adjust the due date of the first assessment to provide students with increased spacing between the two assessments, allowing for better workload management and reduced pressure.
To change the Assessment 1 due date from Week 9 to Week 7, allowing a better distribution.
In Progress
On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:
- Critically synthesise advanced public health evidence to explain how social, cultural, structural, and contextual factors shape health outcomes in diverse communities
- Evaluate advanced public health concepts, principles, and theories to interpret and justify responses to complex cross-cultural and community health issues
- Evaluate how social determinants, systems, and community health structures shape public health outcomes across varied populations and settings
- Design feasible, evidence-informed, and culturally responsive public health actions and strategies that address community needs within diverse practice contexts
- Formulate evidence-informed public health analyses and proposals using advanced reasoning suited to academic, professional, and community audiences.
| Assessment Tasks | Learning Outcomes | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | |
| 1 - Written Assessment | • | • | • | • | • |
| 2 - Presentation | • | • | • | • | • |
| Graduate Attributes | Learning Outcomes | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | |
| 1 - Knowledge | • | • | • | • | |
| 2 - Communication | • | • | |||
| 3 - Cognitive, technical and creative skills | • | • | • | • | • |
| 4 - Research | • | • | • | • | |
| 5 - Self-management | • | • | |||
| 6 - Ethical and Professional Responsibility | • | • | • | ||
| 7 - Leadership | • | • | |||
| 8 - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cultures | • | • | |||
| Assessment Tasks | Graduate Attributes | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 8 | |