What Does a Health Promotion Director Do?
Campus health survey results, showing how students sleep, drink and cope with stress, set a health promotion director's priorities for the year. The post sits in a university health center or wellness office, and it involves supervising health educators and peer educators, managing budgets and grants and working with counseling, athletics and residence life. Leading workshops is a smaller part of the job.
Also known as: Assistant Director of Health Promotion
Health Promotion Director Duties and Responsibilities
The primary responsibilities of a health promotion director include:
- Set yearly prevention priorities from campus health survey data and student feedback.
- Supervise health educators, wellness coordinators and peer education programs.
- Manage the department budget, grants and any student health fee allocations.
- Build partnerships with counseling, athletics, residence life and student conduct offices.
- Oversee campaigns on alcohol, drugs, sexual health, sleep and mental well-being.
- Run campus health surveys such as the ACHA-NCHA and share results with leadership.
- Advise administrators on policies such as tobacco-free campus rules and alcohol at events.
- Evaluate program outcomes and write annual reports for the dean or vice president.
- Represent the office on campus committees and with local public health agencies.
- Hire, train and review staff, and plan their professional development.
Required Skills and Qualifications
To succeed as a health promotion director, you will need the following skills and qualifications:
- Program planning and evaluation at the campus level
- Budget and grant management
- Staff supervision and coaching
- Survey data analysis in Excel or SPSS
- CHES or MCHES certification
- Policy writing and presentations to senior leaders
- Collaboration across student affairs offices
- Sound judgment on sensitive topics such as sexual violence and substance use
Education and Training
Once you have spent several years as a health educator you will need to show you can manage staff and budgets before moving into an assistant director post. Many directors hold a master's degree, often an MPH. Reaching the top post without a master's might be possible, but candidates with an MPH or a master's in higher education will have the stronger application.
Salary and Job Outlook
Typical pay: varies widely for this role, and BLS does not publish pay for it separately. In the wider BLS group it belongs to (Medical and Health Services Managers), the middle half of earners made $94,700 to $166,100 a year, and the median was $123,860.
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, Medical and Health Services Managers.
BLS projects employment of medical and health services managers, the broad group that includes health promotion directors, to grow about 24 percent from 2025 to 2035. Much of that growth will be in hospitals, clinics and care homes, and campus wellness posts open less often. Across the group, BLS expects roughly 62,300 openings a year, and pay figures here also reflect those larger health care settings.
Outlook source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections, 2025 to 2035, Medical and health services managers.