Department of Nutrition and Dietetics • Birmingham, AL • Campus, Online and Hybrid • $976–$1,425/Credit
Samford University offers 5 nutrition credentials:
- B.S., Nutrition and Dietetics
- B.S., Culinary and Wellness Nutrition Management
- M.S., Nutrition
- M.S., Nutrition, Dietetics Concentration
- Post-Baccalaureate Certificate, Dietetic Internship
Program Tracks Overview
| Program | Est. Tuition | Est. Duration | Credit Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| B.S. Nutrition and Dietetics | $176.5K flat | 4 years (8 semesters) | 128 |
| B.S. Culinary and Wellness | $175.2K flat | 4 years (8 semesters) | 128 |
| M.S. Nutrition | $32.2K–$33.2K flat | 1–2 years (3–4 semesters) | 33–34 |
| M.S. Dietetics Concentration | $51.1K flat | 2 years (5 terms) | 48 |
| Dietetic Internship | $24.4K flat | 16 months (4 semesters) | 25 |
Samford is the unusual case of a school running both ACEND graduate architectures side by side. The Dietetics Concentration is an accredited Graduate Program in Nutrition and Dietetics, the newer model that folds supervised practice into the degree and removes the internship application entirely. The Dietetic Internship is the traditional route, taken alongside a separate master’s, with twenty seats a year. Which one you enter decides whether you face a match at all, and that is the real choice on this page.
Quick Facts
| Feature | Details |
|---|---|
| Program Types | Two bachelor’s degrees, two master’s routes, and a post-baccalaureate internship certificate |
| Format | Both B.S. Campus; M.S. Nutrition Online; Dietetics Concentration and internship Hybrid |
| Credit Hours | 128 (both B.S.), 33 to 34 (M.S.), 48 (Dietetics Concentration), 25 (internship) |
| ACEND Accreditation | Yes, three of them: the DPD, a Graduate Program in Nutrition and Dietetics, and a Dietetic Internship |
| RD/RDN Eligibility | Yes by two separate graduate routes. Neither bachelor’s confers it alone |
| Supervised Practice | Embedded in the Dietetics Concentration; 1,000 hours minimum in the internship |
| Specializations | Culinary medicine and wellness management; pediatric, geriatric and diabetes electives |
| Distinctive Coursework | Introduction to Culinary Medicine; Culinary Science; Dietary Supplements and Functional Foods |
| Research Requirement | No thesis. Capstone project in both master’s routes; research methods required in all |
| Entrance Exams | GRE, MCAT or DAT accepted for the M.S., waived for the current application cycle |
| Intake | Internship takes 20 interns a year. Dietetics Concentration runs fall and spring cycles |
| GPA Floor | 3.0 for both master’s routes; 2.5 for undergraduate transfer applicants |
| Tuition | $21,295 per semester at 12 to 18 undergraduate hours; $976 per graduate credit |
| Transfer Credit | None accepted toward the Dietetics Concentration, and no credit for prior experience |
| Institutional Accreditation | Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC) |
Bachelor of Science in Nutrition and Dietetics
The estimated tuition for the B.S. in Nutrition and Dietetics is approximately $176,500, being four years at the published $43,790 annual tuition and fees plus roughly $1,340 in department and course fees across the degree. The program requires 128 credits over four years and carries Samford’s ACEND-accredited Didactic Program in Dietetics.
The B.S. in Nutrition and Dietetics is the didactic half of the credential. It produces a verification statement and nothing more, which is the correct design but worth being clear about.
Nutrition and Dietetics Curriculum
The front three years carry the weight. Freshman and sophomore years run 36 credits each, junior year 32, and senior year only 24. That is an unusually front-loaded plan, and because Samford bills a flat rate from 12 through 18 hours, the heavy years are the efficient ones and senior year is where a student pays the most per credit.
The science and business spine is broader than most DPDs. Alongside anatomy, physiology, chemistry and biochemistry, the degree requires healthcare economics, statistics for health care professionals, and food service organization and management. Samford frames this as building business and leadership skills into a clinical degree, and the course list bears that out.
Fieldwork is small and early. NUTR 371 Directed Professional Practicum carries 80 hours of supervised fieldwork in the junior year, plus community work through the Samford Wellness Kitchen.
- NUTR 415 and NUTR 416, Advanced Nutrition I and II, macronutrients and micronutrients
- NUTR 401 Nutrition Care Process and NUTR 408 Clinical Nutrition I
- NUTR 412 Quantity Food Production and Management, four credits
- NUTR 414 Experimental Foods, four credits
- NUTR 312 Food, Culture and Society
- CHEM 345 Fundamentals of Biochemistry
- NUTR 498 Research Methods and NUTR 499 Senior Seminar
More curriculum details are available here.
You Should Know
- The 80 hours of fieldwork are not supervised practice in the ACEND sense and do not count toward the roughly 1,000 hours the credential requires. That comes later, in one of the two graduate routes.
- Transfer rules are tight. Courses replacing required nutrition courses must come from an ACEND-accredited program, science and nutrition courses carry recency requirements set out in the DPD Student Handbook, and no credit is awarded for prior work or volunteer experience.
- At 128 credits this sits eight credits above the common 120-credit bachelor’s, driven largely by Samford’s four-credit university core sequence.
- Samford publishes a 100 percent placement rate into supervised practice or graduate school, but the figure applies to graduates who apply, and the share who apply is not published. Ask the department for the underlying numbers.
Bachelor of Science in Culinary and Wellness Nutrition Management
The estimated tuition for the B.S. in Culinary and Wellness Nutrition Management is approximately $175,160, being four years at $43,790 in annual tuition and fees. The program requires 128 credits over four years and is explicitly a non-dietetics degree.
The Culinary and Wellness track shares a department and much of a first year with the dietetics degree, then diverges sharply toward food service management, culinary medicine and health promotion.
Culinary and Wellness Curriculum
Business is built in from the second year. Accounting concepts and foundations of leadership appear in the sophomore year, and the senior year adds food service organization and management. This is a management degree wearing a nutrition label, and it is honest about that.
Exercise science replaces clinical nutrition. Where the dietetics degree takes advanced nutrition, the nutrition care process and clinical nutrition, this one takes exercise physiology and sports nutrition in the senior year. The two degrees are close relatives with very different destinations.
There is real elective room, and a minor is required. The plan carries 24 credits of general electives plus humanities and social science electives, and Samford requires a minor or cognate alongside the major. That is more room to build a second specialism than most nutrition degrees allow.
- NUTR 305 Introduction to Culinary Medicine and Nutrition, four credits
- NUTR 414 Experimental Foods and NUTR 412 Quantity Food Production and Management
- KINE 473 Exercise Physiology and KINE 477 Sports Nutrition, four credits each
- NUTR 420 Nutrition Science Communication
- ACCT 211 Accounting Concepts and ECED 307 Foundations of Leadership
You Should Know
- This degree carries no ACEND accreditation and produces no verification statement. It does not lead to the RDN credential and does not qualify a graduate to enter a dietetic internship.
- It does not close the door on the master’s. The M.S. in Nutrition accepts a bachelor’s in any field, and the Dietetics Concentration does too provided the prerequisite list is complete.
- The required minor or cognate is not optional and needs planning with a School of Public Health advisor from early on, since the elective credits are what pay for it.
Master of Science in Nutrition
The estimated tuition for the M.S. in Nutrition is approximately $32,208 to $33,184 (33 to 34 credits at the $976 School of Public Health rate). The program requires 33 to 34 credits, runs online, and can be completed in about one year full time or two years part time.
The M.S. in Nutrition is the non-dietetics master’s. On its own it confers no RDN eligibility, but it is one of the two degrees the Dietetic Internship pairs with.
M.S. Curriculum
A core in public health nutrition, advanced nutrition and metabolism, clinical nutrition, seminar and research methods, then directed electives chosen for career direction, then a capstone project. The elective list is where the degree gets its character: culinary science, diabetes care, dietary supplements and functional foods, pediatric nutrition, nutrition in the older adult, and healthcare management.
- NUTR 600 Advanced Nutrition and Metabolism
- NUTR 601 Clinical Nutrition and NUTR 502 Public Health Nutrition
- NUTR 611 Research Methods and Applications
- NUTR 606 Dietary Supplements and Functional Foods
- NUTR 604 Diabetes Care, NUTR 612 Pediatric Nutrition, NUTR 613 Nutrition in the Older Adult
- NUTR 610 Capstone Project in Nutrition
M.S. Admissions
- Bachelor’s degree in any field, or current senior standing
- Minimum 3.0 cumulative GPA
- Prerequisites in mathematics, general chemistry, organic chemistry, biochemistry, anatomy, physiology and introductory nutrition, all completed within 10 years with a C or better
- Three letters of reference and a resume
- GRE, MCAT or DAT accepted, waived for the current cycle. Published minimums are GRE 153 verbal, 144 quantitative, 4.0 analytical; MCAT 492; DAT 14
- A $1,000 non-refundable enrollment fee, applied to first-semester tuition
You Should Know
- A PharmD joint degree option exists at 36 total credits, with 6 credits of pharmacy coursework counting toward the master’s.
- The 10-year prerequisite recency window is generous by dietetics standards but still rules out a science background older than a decade.
- No I-20 visa is issued for this program, so it is not available to students requiring a student visa.
Master of Science in Nutrition, Dietetics Concentration
The estimated tuition for the Dietetics Concentration is approximately $51,106 (48 credits at $976 plus roughly $4,258 in supplemental program fees). The program requires 48 credits across five terms over two years and is Samford’s ACEND-accredited Graduate Program in Nutrition and Dietetics.
The Dietetics Concentration is the newer of ACEND’s two graduate designs, and the important consequence is structural: supervised practice is inside the degree, so there is no separate internship to apply for and no match to lose.
Dietetics Concentration Supervised Practice
- Supervised experiential learning runs through NUTR 511, taken in three separate terms for 6 credits total
- Placements may be completed in Birmingham or at health systems nationwide
- All supervised experiential learning must occur within the United States, an ACEND requirement
- Competency demonstration follows the Future Education Model standards rather than an hours-only count
- Graduates are eligible to sit for the CDR examination on completing the program
The nationwide placement option is the practical advantage. A student can take online coursework from anywhere and arrange supervised practice near home rather than relocating to Birmingham for two years. The trade-off is that Samford does not publish an hour count for this route the way it does for the internship, because the model is built on competency demonstration instead. If you want to know how many hours you will actually work, ask before you commit, since it determines whether you can hold a job alongside the program.
The Fast-Track BS to MS Route
Current Samford Nutrition and Dietetics undergraduates can compress the bachelor’s and this master’s into five years rather than six. Years one to three cover undergraduate coursework, graduate courses begin in the senior year, and the student transitions fully to the master’s after graduating. Entry requires a 3.0 cumulative GPA maintained throughout, all convocation credits completed by the end of junior year, and an application form submitted during the junior year by 15 January. It is currently open only to Nutrition and Dietetics majors.
You Should Know
- ⚠ Samford publishes graduate tuition by program rather than as one university rate, and figures in circulation for this program use both $976 and $957 per credit. Across 48 credits that is a difference of about $900, and the supplemental program fees of roughly $4,258 sit on top of whichever applies. Confirm the current School of Public Health rate in writing before you budget.
- No transfer credit is accepted toward this concentration, and no credit is given for prior learning or experience. Everything is taken at Samford.
- Admission runs through DICAS and includes a 3 to 5 page personal statement, three references with at least one academic, and a Zoom interview with the selection committee. Background check, immunization records and health insurance follow admission.
- Introductory Nutrition must carry a B rather than a C. Applicants missing it can take NUTR 500 in the summer before the program starts.
- No I-20 visa is issued, and the program directs international applicants to ACEND’s own guidance.
Dietetic Internship Certificate
The estimated tuition for the Dietetic Internship is approximately $24,400 (25 credits at $976), and those 25 credits apply toward a master’s degree taken alongside it. The program requires 16 months across four semesters and provides a minimum of 1,000 hours of supervised practice.
The Dietetic Internship is Samford’s traditional-model route, and it is the credential the current listings for this school omit entirely.
Internship Supervised Practice
- Minimum 1,000 hours of supervised practice over 16 months
- Twenty interns accepted each year, which Samford frames as a deliberate cohort size
- Rotations in Birmingham, or a distance track that can be applied for to complete rotations in your own city or state
- Taken jointly with the M.S. in Nutrition or an M.P.H., with the internship’s 25 credits applying toward that degree
- The master’s and the internship finish in the same four semesters
- A graduate degree must be completed simultaneously with, or before, the internship
- A $1,000 non-refundable fee secures admission and is applied to first-semester tuition
Because the internship credits count toward the degree, this route is not simply the FEM route plus an extra program. It is a different assembly of the same components, and it comes in materially cheaper on paper: roughly $32,000 for a 33-credit master’s that absorbs the internship credits, against roughly $51,000 for the 48-credit Dietetics Concentration. What the cheaper route costs you is certainty. Twenty seats a year means a competitive application, and an applicant who is not selected has no supervised practice at Samford at all, whereas the Dietetics Concentration admits you to the whole pathway at once.
You Should Know
- The 1,000-hour minimum matches the current national benchmark rather than exceeding it.
- The distance track is applied for, not assumed. Plan for Birmingham unless and until it is granted.
- Two of the three references should ideally come from a medical nutrition therapy instructor or a DPD director, which favours applicants with recent academic contact.
- Samford states that program outcomes data are available on request. Ask for them, particularly the exam pass rate for this route specifically.
Tuition
Samford’s published cost per credit hour for 2026-27 is $1,425 for undergraduates taking fewer than 12 or more than 18 hours, and $976 per credit for School of Public Health graduate courses. Undergraduates in the 12-to-18-hour band instead pay a flat $21,295 per semester, and Samford publishes direct tuition and fees of $43,790 a year. Two further undergraduate rates are worth knowing: summer and May term at $1,065 per credit, and Samford Online at $382.
As a private university, Samford charges every student the same regardless of home state. There is no in-state discount anywhere in these figures, which removes the residency variable that dominates cost at the state institutions.
| Enrollment | Charge | Effective per credit |
|---|---|---|
| Undergraduate, 12 hours | $21,295 | $1,775 derived |
| Undergraduate, 16 hours | $21,295 | $1,331 derived |
| Undergraduate, 18 hours | $21,295 | $1,183 derived |
| Graduate, per credit | $976 | $976 |
The spread across that band is the largest single lever an undergraduate has here. Moving from 12 hours to 18 cuts the effective cost by about $592 a credit, and both nutrition degrees run 128 credits, which averages 16 a term. Dropping below 12 or climbing above 18 returns you to $1,425 a credit.
Confirmed costs
- Either bachelor’s degree, tuition and mandatory fees over four years: 4 × $43,790 = $175,160. Tuition alone is 8 × $21,295 = $170,360, a blended $1,331 per credit at 16 hours a term (derived)
- B.S. Nutrition and Dietetics program fees, including food lab and research fees: about $1,340 across the degree, bringing it to roughly $176,500
- M.S. in Nutrition: 33 to 34 × $976 = $32,208 to $33,184. The PharmD joint option at 36 credits comes to $35,136 (derived)
- M.S. Dietetics Concentration: 48 × $976 = $46,848 plus about $4,258 in supplemental fees = $51,106 (derived)
- Dietetic Internship: 25 × $976 = $24,400, with those credits applying toward the accompanying master’s rather than adding to it
- A $1,000 non-refundable enrollment fee applies to the master’s and to the internship, applied to first-semester tuition
- Room and board, if applicable, runs $15,380 a year at double occupancy in Vail or Smith, bringing total cost of attendance to $59,170
- The full route from freshman year through the Dietetics Concentration comes to roughly $227,600 in tuition and named fees (derived)
Be aware that:
- Figures circulating for Samford’s bachelor’s degrees are frequently cost-of-attendance bundles rather than program costs. A widely repeated $218,472 total is about $43,000 above the four-year tuition and fees figure, because it folds in housing and meals and uses a stale year.
- The same applies to the Fast-Track route. A five-year all-in number that includes living costs is not comparable to a tuition figure from any other school.
- Graduate rates are set by program at Samford, not university-wide, and the School of Public Health figure has moved recently. Treat $976 as current and verify.
- Freshmen are required to live on campus and hold a 19-meal plan regardless of credits earned, so the housing and meal line is not optional in year one.
- None of the figures above include books, the internship’s background check and immunization requirements, or travel to supervised practice sites.
This is the most expensive option in the state by a wide margin, and no amount of arithmetic changes that. What is worth noticing is that the graduate side is priced quite differently from the undergraduate side: a 33-credit online master’s at about $32,000, taken alongside an internship whose credits fold into it, is a very different proposition from a $176,000 bachelor’s. A student who does the didactic work elsewhere and comes to Samford only for the graduate stage pays a fraction of the total.
Check current rates on Samford’s graduate tuition and fees page before comparing.
Why Choose This Nutrition Program?
Strongest for someone who wants the dietitian credential without gambling on an internship match, and for career changers entering from an unrelated bachelor’s.
Two accredited graduate routes, and you can pick your risk. Almost no school offers both a Graduate Program in Nutrition and Dietetics and a separate Dietetic Internship. The Dietetics Concentration admits you to the entire pathway in one decision, with supervised practice embedded and no match to survive. The internship route is cheaper and pairs with a shorter master’s, but it runs on twenty seats a year. Being able to choose between certainty and cost, at the same institution, is genuinely unusual.
Supervised practice does not require moving to Birmingham. Both graduate routes offer nationwide placement, the Dietetics Concentration as standard and the internship through an applied-for distance track. Coursework in both is online. For someone with a job, a mortgage or a family, that combination is the difference between a possible degree and an impossible one.
The undergraduate side is unusually business-literate. Healthcare economics, accounting, leadership and food service management sit inside degrees that most schools fill entirely with science. For students aiming at food service directorships, wellness program management or private practice, that is a real head start rather than filler.
The honest drawbacks. Cost dominates everything else: roughly $176,000 for a bachelor’s before aid, at a school where 99 percent of students receive some. The Dietetics Concentration accepts no transfer credit and no credit for prior learning, so nothing you have already done will shorten it. Neither graduate program issues an I-20, closing both to students needing a visa. The internship’s twenty seats make it competitive in a way the marketing does not emphasise. And the 100 percent placement figure that appears everywhere applies only to graduates who chose to apply, which is a narrower claim than it first reads.
Accreditation
Samford University is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges. Institutional accreditation covers every degree at the university and governs credit transfer, recognition by other graduate schools, and eligibility for federal financial aid.
Programmatic accreditation is where Samford is unusual. The Accreditation Council for Education in Nutrition and Dietetics (ACEND) accredits three separate programs here: the Didactic Program in Dietetics inside the B.S. in Nutrition and Dietetics, the Graduate Program in Nutrition and Dietetics that is the M.S. Dietetics Concentration, and the Dietetic Internship certificate. Most universities hold one of these. Holding all three is what makes two independent graduate routes to the same credential possible.
The B.S. in Culinary and Wellness Nutrition Management and the general M.S. in Nutrition fall outside that scope. For a culinary and management degree that is entirely normal, and for the general master’s it is by design, since that degree exists to serve people who are not pursuing the dietitian credential or who are pairing it with the internship.
Graduates of the Didactic Program in Dietetics receive a verification statement and may apply to accredited supervised practice programs. On completing supervised practice together with a graduate degree, they are eligible for the Commission on Dietetic Registration examination, which has required a master’s degree at minimum since January 1, 2024. Graduates of the M.S. Dietetics Concentration are eligible for that examination on completing the program, with no further step. Graduates of the Dietetic Internship are eligible once the accompanying master’s degree is also complete. Graduates of the culinary degree or the general master’s alone are not eligible and would need a verification statement first. Alabama licenses dietitians, so the examination is a step toward practice rather than the end of it; confirm current requirements with the state board.
Related Programs
- Alabama Nutrition Programs & Online Degrees
- Auburn University - Auburn
- Jacksonville State University - Jacksonville
- Oakwood University - Huntsville
- Tuskegee University - Tuskegee
- University of Alabama - Tuscaloosa