In a region shaped by ongoing crises and inequalities, the Diploma in Humanitarian Engineering and Public Health Innovations: a joint program between the Faculty of Health Sciences and the Maroun Semaan Faculty of Engineering and Architecture through the Humanitarian Engineering Initiative equips students and professionals with the tools to design innovative, sustainable solutions for humanitarian challenges.
The diploma introduces participants from diverse academic backgrounds to the field of humanitarian engineering, merging public health and engineering perspectives to tackle pressing public health issues and real-world challenges. It also sensitizes students to social injustice and inequity, with a focus on Lebanon and the wider Arab region.
Through the principles of multi-stakeholder engineering, the program emphasizes collaboration and contextual understanding, highlighting the importance of designing interventions that are culturally, socially, and politically sensitive, ensuring that innovation truly serves the communities it intends to support.
DIPLOMA DETAILS:
- Total of 15 credits
- Curriculum: 2 core courses, 3 elective courses in design, ethics and social entrepreneurship
- Application Open: September 15, 2025
- Deadline for Application for Fall 25-26: November 6, 2025
Competencies
Students who complete the diploma will be able to:
- Apply participatory needs assessment tools and analyze the different dimensions of a public health problem
- Apply formal design methods to develop practical, feasible, scalable, and sustainable humanitarian engineering and public health innovations and interventions
- Apply skills required to manage complex projects while working in multidisciplinary teams
- Demonstrate entrepreneurial skills to take a solution/intervention from prototype to product
- Articulate and adhere to ethical standards in the process followed and in the intervention designed
- Present and document a problem and its solution to a diverse target audience
Requirements for the Diploma
It is composed of 15 credits of course work according to the following requirements:
- HEHI 301, “Foundations of Humanitarian Engineering and Public Health Innovations"
- HEHI 302, “Capstone: Humanitarian Engineering and Public Health Innovations"
- One design course from the following list: AGSC 330, ARCH 344, CHEN 619, CHEN 798A , CIVE 552, CIVE 601, CIVE 628, CIVE 686, EECE 675 , ENMG 663, ENMG 698E, ENSC 633, ENST 300, FSEC 310, FSEC 315, LDEM 633, NFSC 306, PBHL 303, URDS 664, URPL 641
- One ethics course from the following list: MHRM 304 , PSYC 305
- One social entrepreneurship course from the following l ist: ENMG 654, ENTM 320, MFIN 359
HEHI 301 - “ Foundations of Humanitarian Engineering a nd Public Health Innovations"; 3 crs.
This is a multidisciplinary course that covers fundamentals of designing solutions for health challenges faced by disadvantaged populations. It introduces tools for identifying humanitarian and/or development needs and designing practical, scalable and sustainable solutions and interventions. The course is offered to students from all majors. Students will be exposed to health and health system challenges in addition to design fundamentals including participatory needs assessment, formal multidisciplinary design processes, and relevant technologies and tools with real world applications and case studies.
HEHI 302 - “Capstone: Humanitarian Engineering and Public Health Innovations Capstone"; 3 crs.
The capstone project course is an interdisciplinary service learning design course focused on development and humanitarian engineering solutions for health challenges. The capstone is divided into two sub-courses, HEHI 302A (1cr.) and HEHI 302B (2cr.), and must be registered in 2 consecutive semesters. In the capstone, students apply all tools learned in HEHI 301. Students work in multidisciplinary teams with disadvantaged communities, under joint supervision of at least two mentors from MSFEA, FHS, and other faculties.
Prerequisite: HEHI 301