Accelerated Master’s Degree Prepares Students for Growing Dietetics Field

Jobs for registered dietitians and nutritionists are expected to grow by 11 percent between 2020 and 2030. This translates to almost 6,000 new openings each year for professionals in the dietetics field.

Buffalo State College’s Health, Nutrition, and Dietetics (HND) Department now offers an accelerated pathway to help students qualify for those jobs—a master of science in dietetics that includes completion of the undergraduate dietitian education program (DEP) and one year of online graduate courses.

The new 4+1 program officially begins in fall 2022. Buffalo State sophomore DEP majors are eligible to apply now, and up to 16 students will be accepted each year, said Carol DeNysschen, chair and professor of HND.

“Our students now have the opportunity to seamlessly obtain a graduate degree,” DeNysschen said, “and it bolsters the department’s graduate offerings.”

It also comes at the perfect time. After January 1, 2024, the Commission on Dietetic Registration will require a master’s degree for individuals who want to take the credentialing exam to become a registered dietitian (RD). Currently, only a bachelor’s degree is required.

Registered dietitians work for hospitals, school districts, and long-term care facilities as well as in private practice, with a median pay of $63,090, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. They create customized nutritional programs based on the health needs of clients and counsel clients on how to improve their health through nutrition.

“The 4+1 program is a very economical way to earn a master’s degree,” said Tina Colaizzo-Anas, associate professor of HND and director of DEP.

To qualify, students must complete all the undergraduate DEP courses and roughly 1,000 hours of supervised clinical practice.

“Unfortunately, we can’t accept students from other colleges who haven’t gone through our undergraduate program, with its specific coursework and clinical hours,” DeNysschen said.

However, practicing RDs who want to earn a master’s degree do qualify for the program, and DeNysschen and Colaizzo-Anas said they expect to see interest from these professionals.

Planning for the 4+1 program began in 2014, when Buffalo State faculty members became aware of the upcoming change in requirements for the RD exam.

“At that time, we started surveying stakeholders—employers, students, dietitians in the field—asking them what kind of courses were important to them,” Colaizzo-Anas said. “We wanted to include courses that met the needs of our stakeholders and accreditation standards.”

Two courses that came from that survey are NSF 607: Experiential Learning in Weight Management and Diabetes Prevention and Treatment, and NSF 612: Nutrition Counseling.

“When practitioners focus on weight management to prevent diabetes, they’re also working to prevent other health disorders and diseases, such as high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke,” Colaizzo-Anas said. “And Nutrition Counseling is important because if you don’t have the ability to communicate nutrition information effectively to your clients to help support behavior changes, what do you have?”

The new master’s program comes at an auspicious time, as DEP is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.

“Buffalo State was one of the first six dietetics training programs in the country to offer internship-like training integrated with classroom instruction,” Colaizzo-Anas said. “We have a track record of success, including 100 percent placement of our undergraduates in the field or in graduate programs. With this new master’s degree, we’re building on our legacy of success in experiential learning, and this makes us unique among institutions of higher learning in Western New York.”