Master of Science in Health and Design

The Master of Science in Health and Design at the School of Architecture and Design at New York Tech is a transdisciplinary program for students, faculty, and experts to collaborate in research from biomaterials to inclusive design, on purpose driven projects that investigate the impact of design and the built environment on health in all its facets.

Design and health are deeply interconnected, requiring a transdisciplinary approach to address the well-being of communities, its individuals, and all living species. Integrating fields of design, engineering, health sciences, and medical and social sciences, we embrace system-based holistic and embodied perspectives that consider both environmental and human impacts.

Our pedagogical approach encourages students to explore the built environment, ecosystem health, and stakeholder interactions through data driven and qualitative inquiry. The mission is to integrate an inclusive design methodology with data-driven decision-making, merging digital tools and maker mindsets to inform resilient, health-focused solutions.

Together we practice modes that build a student's agency in creating healthy environments, which are becoming preventive and therapeutic. Research projects and products fold into student publishing papers and participating in conferences. The future for us is design-enabled health transformation via research using artificial intelligence into products across circular material systems, digital biofabrication, therapeutics, and medtech.

We want to empower people to improve their lived experiences through design.

Research Tracks

The program offers two research tracks: Biogenic Materials and Behavioral Health.

Behavioral Health

By engaging directly with our partners, communities, non-profits, and care professionals, students gain in person insights into daily user habits, their lived experiences, and expectations. Through investigating both environmental and lifestyle factors, we learn what truly influences health over time. We recognize the designed environment as a primary driver influencing behavioral health outcomes, shaping stress, cognition, social interaction, and increasing exposure to toxics or sensory affordances.

Students learn to analyze these dynamic exposure systems by mapping user behavior and health metrics, and conducting spatial and geographic data analysis. By deploying custom lab designed sensors, they monitor user-to-environment interactions. This reveals what potentially enhances or diminishes our well-being. Through deep qualitative and quantitative practices, including ethnographic studies and in-depth interviews, post occupancy evaluation, pre- and post-environmental feedback, and interactive testing, students build the skills to co-design inclusive solutions that respond to real-world needs and user desires.

Ultimately, this research track nurtures an ecosystem and human-centered approach. It refines methodologies that prioritize improved lived experiences, elevates design practice to the next level, and advances the core mission of enhancing health and well-being for all.

Biogenic Materials

While sustainability seeks to mitigate harm, the imperative is to transition toward a truly circular economy across building construction and products. This is why we prioritize a framework of regenerative design that seeks instead to heal ecosystems. It affords to unlearn and fundamentally rethink practices, led by an ecological mindset, emphasizing biogenic and renewable materials developed with digital fabrication techniques and AI driven material optimization.

The transformation begins with creating new hyper-local supply chains around precious waste, eliminating toxicity, and carbon footprints. Methods include conducting a local waste stream taxonomy, integrating indigenous knowledge systems, mapping resources, applying generative computational models, BIM and LCA analysis, and conducting hands-on material research and development. In a living building components lab, students explore the dynamic mechanical, thermal, and sensory properties of 3-D printed or grown biogenic materials. They simultaneously investigate design for disassembly, and modular, closed-loop building components.

Material pathways such as geopolymer concrete, 3-D printed earth structures with agro waste composites, and seaweed-based bioplastics are tested and applied under biophilic design principles to create healthy environments that positively impact human well-being. Prototyping and scaling—from furniture and wearables to large building size structures—demonstrate the potential of bio-based materials as catalysts for a new bio-economy.

Learning Outcomes

Students in the program will:

Understand, critically reflect upon, and overcome stuck tendencies, practices, and prejudices in how health and disease are framed, stated, researched, funded, and how it can be differently addressed through design thinking, emerging technologies and biomaterials.
Build connections and apply knowledge from a range of transdisciplinary sources towards an advanced design method in which health in its broadest sense acts as the organizing frame for research and regenerative practices.
Understand circular ecosystems, evaluate exposure, and materials' impact on health and the environment, and conceive products with intrinsically preferable attributes throughout their life cycles.
Understand the socio-technical models for healthcare redesign and how to evaluate their impact on patient experience and health outcomes by rethinking spaces, devices, and products.
Understand and leverage from an embodied perspective the advantages of digital technology, emerging materials, and data to pursue user-experience innovation in health and design fields.

The M.S. in Health and Design program contributes to the intellectual and professional strengths of New York Tech in its commitment to transdisciplinarity, social purpose, and a culture of technology as it relates to models of healthy living and the design of regenerative environments.

In this light, the School of Architecture and Design strives to engage innovation via technology through the collaborative exchange between various professional and disciplinary domains of expertise across health and design fields. This program aims to provide career-oriented professional education to our students, creating opportunities for graduates in their professional destinations, facilitates career advancements for professionals, and contributes to the benefit of the larger world in a renovated approach to health and design.

Graduating students are applying for leadership positions in areas such as:

Design consulting firms as health design strategists
AEC and architecture firms as health and care specialists
Healthcare device manufacturers as product and project consultants
Large health care insurances and health data startups as health service design experts
Health institutions and municipal planning offices as health and design planners

International F-1 students who successfully complete this degree are eligible for an additional 24-month STEM OPT extension to work in the U.S. in an area directly related to their area of study immediately upon completing the customary 12-month post-completion Optional Practical Training (OPT).

The master's degree is a 30-credit program, offered at the Long Island and New York City campuses. The program does not lead to professional licensure. This is a post-professional Master of Science degree.

Students should submit all materials including design portfolio, research evidence, or prior practice experience, and one or two references as early as possible in order to ensure enough time for review and to obtain an I-20 (international students).

If an applicant does not meet the admissions criteria, it may be possible, at the discretion of the program director, to be admitted for a probationary period with an opportunity to demonstrate qualifications by achieving a graduate GPA of 3.0 or higher in the first three graduate degree courses. If the applicant's graduate academic record includes any failures in coursework, they may be dismissed from the program following a review by faculty committee including the director and two faculty members of the School of Architecture and Design appointed by the dean.

Admission Requirements

A degree from an accredited institution in the disciplinary arenas of design (architecture, interiors, furnishing, industrial, product, fashion, etc.) and engineering, healthcare and wellness, biology and chemical fields (with expertise in innovative technologies and bio-materials), or equivalent if applying with a foreign degree from another country
Minimum GPA of 3.0
No standardized tests (including GRE) are required, except TOEFL/IELTS/PTE for international students

If you have any questions about admissions or eligibility, please contact the Office of Graduate Admissions at nyitgrad@nyit.edu or 516.686.7520.

Application Materials

All applicants must provide the following information prior to submitting the required supplemental materials (curriculum vitae; personal essay; and digital portfolio, research evidence, or prior experience).

Completed application
$50 nonrefundable application fee
1–2 letters of recommendation from references who have direct knowledge of the applicant's professional potential and academic ability. References should send their letters of recommendation directly to the Office of Graduate Admissions at nyitgrad@nyit.edu.
Optional Interview: You are encouraged to meet with the program director, Christian Pongratz, professor of architecture, or their designee. Please email christian.pongratz@nyit.edu to schedule an appointment.
Copies of undergraduate transcripts for all schools attended. All final, official transcripts must be received prior to the start of your first semester.
Copy of college diploma or proof of degree
International student requirements: English proficiency (TOEFL/IELTS), I-20, and transcript evaluation.

Document Submission Form

Supplemental Application Materials

Curriculum Vitae: a minimum one-page resume with your portrait photo, name and last name, contact information, degrees, accomplishments, and depending on background also professional work, research, projects, publications, exhibitions, associations, skills, etc.
Personal Essay/Statement of Interest (500–1000 words): A written narrative providing evidence of personal interests in research, projects, or activities for social purpose, community engagement, and creating resiliency, individual health, aspects of healthcare, wellness and healthy lifestyle, medtech, biotech, behavioral data or biomaterials is considered a plus.
Design Portfolio, Research Report, or Prior Experience: along with evidence of disciplinary research or creative work. Evidence of research could include a project report, peer reviewed or graded paper, or thesis. Applicants wishing to submit a portfolio with creative work should follow these guidelines below:
- The portfolio should consist of your own work (format PDF/MP4; size limit 35 MB).
- The portfolio may include selected creative and/or textual work, assignment-based projects, self-directed work, or pieces of a collaborative nature, and could contain drawings, schemes, plans, video, photographs, diagrams, graphs, model images etc.
- Areas of interest may include design, healthcare, health technology, environmental sciences and technologies (including simulation, visualization, fabrication, robotics, etc.), engineering and bio-engineering, biotechnology, urban planning, interiors, industrial design, product, furniture design, or material design, etc.
- Please identify each piece of work with a date, title, medium, or methodology and a brief explanation of the work and its context, and organize these into a single, multipage PDF. For any team or collaborative projects, please identify all participants and highlight your own contributions.
- Name your PDF files in the following format:
  APPLY_MSHD_Portfolio_LastName_FirstName.pdf
- Maximum file size is 35 MB. Please be aware of this limitation when formatting files and resolution for your work. Files larger than 35 megabytes may be rejected by the New York Tech server. Links to applicant's materials available through the web, YouTube, Dropbox, or other sites can serve as support to the application.

Submit Supplemental Materials