At the Rollins School of Public Health (RSPH), students learn to identify, analyze, and intervene in today's most pressing public health issues. The school's location in Atlanta, referred to as the "Public Health Capital of the World," also is home to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; CARE; the national home office of the American Cancer Society; The Carter Center; the Arthritis Foundation; and numerous state and regional health agencies. The School is also part of Emory University's Woodruff Health Sciences Center, providing access to the patient care, teaching, and health-related research programs of that organization. This setting is ideal for hands-on research, collaborations with the world's leading public health agencies, and interdisciplinary work with national and international organizations.

The program is community oriented, and many students bring actual problem-solving experience with them. Students join the RSPH community from all fifty states and from more than forty foreign countries to contribute to the school and apply knowledge to promote health and prevent disease in human populations.

The school comprises six academic departments: behavioral sciences and health education, biostatistics, environmental and occupational health, epidemiology, health policy and management, global health, and hosts over 20 interdisciplinary centers. More than 160 full-time, doctoral-level faculty members teach and conduct research in areas such as mathematical modeling of infectious disease transmission, exploring relationships between nutrition and chronic disease, and investigating cancer causation and control. Other research interests include identifying the social determinants of health-risk behaviors, AIDS, developing church-based health promotion programs to foster changes in nutrition and other health-related behaviors, detecting and preventing adverse outcomes in occupational settings, and evaluating the cost of health care and the allocation of health resources.