---
title: "Health Education Specialist"
description: "Provide and manage health education programs that help individuals, families, and their communities maximize and maintain healthy lifestyles. Use data to…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/health-education-specialist"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Health Education Specialist

**Category:** Community and Social Service · **SOC code:** 21-1091 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 21-1091.00

Provide and manage health education programs that help individuals, families, and their communities maximize and maintain healthy lifestyles. Use data to identify community needs prior to planning, implementing, monitoring, and evaluating programs designed to encourage healthy lifestyles, policies, and environments. May link health systems, health providers, insurers, and patients to address individual and population health needs. May serve as resource to assist individuals, other health professionals, or the community, and may administer fiscal resources for health education programs.

Also advertised as: Certified Diabetes Educator; Clinical Instructor; Community Health Consultant; Education Coordinator; Health Education Coordinator; Health Education Specialist; Health Educator; Health Promotion Specialist.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $64,070 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $30.80/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $42,990 to $118,200, with the middle half between $50,620 and $87,130
- **Total US employment:** 65,690
- **Typical entry education:** Bachelor's
- **Preparation required:** Medium preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +5.6% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 6,900 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 42/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 65,690 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $42,990 |
| 25th | $50,620 |
| 50th (median) | $64,070 |
| 75th | $87,130 |
| 90th | $118,200 |
| Mean (average) | $73,280 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| MD | $104,470 | $99,534 | 2,220 |
| DC | $103,330 | $94,021 | 680 |
| GA | $99,400 | $103,227 | 3,210 |
| PA | $80,670 | $82,677 | 2,690 |
| MN | $78,400 | $79,496 | 1,250 |
| WA | $77,420 | $72,346 | 1,750 |
| IA | $75,750 | $86,313 | 540 |
| OR | $75,500 | $73,045 | 840 |
| RI | $75,360 | $73,680 | 150 |
| CO | $74,150 | $71,954 | 750 |
| WI | $74,040 | $78,686 | 900 |
| NJ | $73,740 | $67,773 | 1,420 |
| GU | $73,070 | No BEA price parity | 30 |
| AK | $71,940 | $70,282 | 310 |
| NH | $69,990 | $67,191 | 250 |

38 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 53 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/health-education-specialist/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/health-education-specialist.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 70,400 in the 2025–2035 base year to 74,400 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 3,900 jobs, or +5.6%. Faster than average: 5.6% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 6,900 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** Bachelor's degree (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Medium preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** None.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| Associate's Degree or other 2-year degree | 62.2% |
| Bachelor's Degree | 30.9% |
| Master's Degree | 3.4% |
| High School Diploma or the equivalent (such as a GED) | 2.6% |
| Doctoral Degree | 0.9% |

## What the work involves

- Document activities and record information, such as the numbers of applications completed, presentations conducted, and persons assisted.
- Develop and present health education and promotion programs, such as training workshops, conferences, and school or community presentations.
- Develop and maintain cooperative working relationships with agencies and organizations interested in public health care.
- Prepare and distribute health education materials, such as reports, bulletins, and visual aids, to address smoking, vaccines, and other public health concerns.
- Develop operational plans and policies necessary to achieve health education objectives and services.
- Collaborate with health specialists and civic groups to determine community health needs and the availability of services and to develop goals for meeting needs.
- Maintain databases, mailing lists, telephone networks, and other information to facilitate the functioning of health education programs.
- Design and administer training programs for new employees and continuing education for existing employees.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Active Listening — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Instructing — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Education and Training — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 4.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Administrative — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Psychology — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Public Safety and Security — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Expression — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Clarity — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Inductive Reasoning — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Social (S), Investigative (I), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| S — Social | 6.15 |
| I — Investigative | 5.29 |
| C — Conventional | 3.95 |
| E — Enterprising | 3.21 |
| A — Artistic | 2.54 |
| R — Realistic | 1.66 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ENFJ | 67.3 |
| INFJ | 62.9 |
| ESFJ | 60.6 |
| ENFP | 58.8 |
| ESFP | 55.4 |

Best-fitting types: ENFJ, INFJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Community Health Worker](https://nuecareer.com/careers/community-health-worker) — median $51,850
- [Nursing Instructor and Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/nursing-instructor-and-teacher-postsecondary) — median $80,250
- [Rehabilitation Counselor](https://nuecareer.com/careers/rehabilitation-counselor) — median $46,850
- [Health Informatics Specialist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/health-informatics-specialist) — median $105,850
- [Healthcare Social Worker](https://nuecareer.com/careers/healthcare-social-worker) — median $67,880
- [Health Specialties Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/health-specialties-teacher-postsecondary) — median $107,310
- [School Social Worker](https://nuecareer.com/careers/school-social-worker) — median $59,550
- [Dietitian](https://nuecareer.com/careers/dietitian) — median $76,400
- [Social and Human Service Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/social-and-human-service-assistant) — median $45,930
- [Social and Community Service Manager](https://nuecareer.com/careers/social-and-community-service-manager) — median $80,390

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2025–2035 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/health-education-specialist