Building Graduate Capabilities Through a Course-Wide Public Health and Health Promotion ECHA AI Curriculum Framework

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming public health and health promotion (PHHP) practice, creating a need for graduates who can use AI ethically, critically and effectively. Although AI is increasingly being incorporated into higher education, the focus has been on individual units or assessment tasks, with limited guidance available for embedding AI capabilities across entire courses. This study responded to this gap by developing a curriculum framework for integrating AI capability across postgraduate PHHP programmes.

An iterative co-design approach was undertaken within a large Australian university to develop an AI curriculum framework for the Master of Public Health and Master of Health Promotion programmes. The framework was informed by competency-based education and integrated curriculum design principles. It was also aligned with local institutional AI principles and mapped to international accrediting competencies.

The resulting 'ECHA' framework comprises four principles: Ethical and Responsible Use of AI; Critical Appraisal; Human-Centred Decision-Making and Professional Judgement; and Applied AI Literacy and Safe Practice in PHHP. Each principle is accompanied by discipline-specific learning outcomes, curriculum content and core graduate skills.

The new framework offers a practical, programme-wide model for integrating AI capability into postgraduate PHHP education. Embedding AI within existing professional competency frameworks supports coherent curriculum design while preserving the human-centred values underpinning professional practice. SO WHAT?: This paper provides a coordinated, competency-informed approach to course-wide AI curriculum design, intended to assist universities in preparing PHHP graduates to use AI ethically, critically and responsibly.