Public Health Educator job description
1,038 verified openings in Behavioral & Mental Health
Grant applications are part of the job. Health education specialists build and run programs meant to help people keep healthy habits, and O*NET's task list includes preparing grant applications and grant-related work to fund those programs, next to press releases, media campaigns, and program websites. BLS reported 65,690 of these positions in May 2025 with a median of $64,070; earnings run from $42,990 at the tenth percentile up to $118,200 at the ninetieth.
Core Duties and Responsibilities
Most of the output is material other people use: reports, bulletins, and visual aids covering smoking, vaccines, and other public health concerns. Keeping working relationships with agencies and organizations matters as much, and so does maintaining the databases, mailing lists, and phone networks that let a program reach anyone at all. Specialists log what they did, how many presentations they ran and how many people they assisted, and they deliver workshops, conferences, and school or community presentations. Further up, the role runs health needs assessments and public health surveys, supervises technical staff, sets operational policy, and evaluates how the programs are performing.
Common Skills and Technologies
Writing rates as highly as speaking and active listening here, with learning strategies close behind, which fits an occupation built on teaching adults. The named software covers a lot of ground: MEDITECH on the clinical side, Microsoft Access and Excel for program data, Visio for process mapping, Adobe Photoshop and Facebook for outreach material, and the usual Office applications behind all of it.
Education, Training, and Career Path
O*NET's own survey returns an odd result here. An associate degree was the most common answer at about 62 percent, ahead of the bachelor's at 31 percent and the master's at 3 percent, with the last few points split between a high school diploma and a doctorate. The occupation is rated Job Zone Four, which assumes a bachelor's, so the survey is recording what respondents answered rather than what employers require. Several years of related experience or vocational training is expected whatever the degree. Certification appears in the reported titles, certified diabetes educator among them, next to health promotion specialist, health education coordinator, and public information officer.
Sources: O*NET 30.0, 21-1091.00 Health Education Specialists, https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/21-1091.00. BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, 21-1091, https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes211091.htm.