UTHealth Houston School of Public Health celebrates new building milestone

At a topping out ceremony on Feb. 24, UTHealth Houston School of Public Health — ranked the 2024 Top Public Health school in Texas by U.S. News & World Report — celebrated the final beam being placed on its new 10-story, 350,000-square-foot facility, currently under construction in the Texas Medical Center’s Helix Park.  

The new facility, with an estimated cost of $299 million, is scheduled to open to students in the fall of 2026. It will have multipurpose spaces for students, distance-learning technology and capabilities to broadcast to UTHealth Houston School of Public Health campuses across Texas, an auditorium and teaching kitchen, state-of-the-art research laboratories, and classrooms that support the school’s wide range of disciplines.

“Everything in the building is consistent with the school’s mission,” said Eric Boerwinkle, PhD, dean of the School of Public Health, M. David Low Chair in Public Health, and Kozmetsky Family Chair in Human Genetics. “It is important to remind ourselves that the school is not a building, it’s really the people. It’s the people within the building and the functionality of this new space combined that will make this school even greater.”

The school’s mission is to change the culture of health through excellence in graduate education, research, and engagement. It has 180 faculty members, 500 staff, and 1,300 students as of spring 2025.

Jagat Narula, MD, PhD, executive vice president and chief academic officer at UTHealth Houston and K. Lance Gould Distinguished University Chair in Coronary Pathophysiology at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston, noted an increased need for resources and awareness surrounding public health, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It is estimated that state and local health departments will need to hire a minimum of 80,000 positions to adequately provide community health services in the coming years,” Narula said. “As one of the nation’s premiere health science universities, UTHealth Houston has the responsibility and privilege to lead the way in addressing these public health and related workflow challenges. Our faculty and staff will have a rich collaborative environment to learn and innovate in this facility.”

Founded in 1967, UTHealth Houston School of Public Health is the first public health school in Texas. Since forming, the school has opened locations in Austin, Brownsville, Dallas, El Paso, and San Antonio. Students can receive specialized training in areas such as biostatistics, epidemiology, environmental and occupational health sciences, health promotion and behavioral sciences, and management, policy, and community health.