[B]URLINGTON – Trustees at the University of Vermont recently approved the launch of a new 30-credit master’s in medical science, which was described as an “on-ramp to medical school.” They also approved an online health sciences undergraduate degree completion program.
The one-year master’s program will help students who want to attend medical school or other medical field graduate schools to raise their board scores and improve their chances of landing interviews and acceptances.
The university’s Curricular Affairs Committee previously approved the new program, which will have a “rigorous” biomedical science curriculum for students who “lack the appropriate background or credentials to be competitive applicants.” The program is for students without a science background and those whose undergraduate grades are too low to gain admittance to medical school.
Trustees were told that last year, because of a national shortage of physicians, applications to medical school reached an all-time high. The Association of American Medical Colleges reported 48,014 applicants, surpassing the previous record of 46,965 set in 1996.
The number of first-year medical students last year surpassed 20,000 for the first time and increased 2.8 percent over the previous year. Demand for physicians and for medical school seats is high and competition is fierce.
Admission into the program will require a B.S. or B.A. degree from an accredited institution, two semesters each of general biology, organic chemistry, and physics, MCAT or GRE scores from within the previous five years, and, for international students, TOEFL scores of at least 90.
Provost and Senior Vice President David Rosowsky said the program will be a “rigorous biomedical” master’s aimed at helping students who may lack credentials for medical school to be able to make that bridge successfully.
Twenty-five students will be enrolled in the program each year and will be taught by existing staff in the UVM Medical School. The program will involve only coursework, and will not have a thesis requirement.
Funding will come from tuition paid by the students in the program, according to the proposal.
Deb McAneny, the chair of the trustees said “it’s basically a post-grad year” to get students ready for medical school.
Another trustee said getting the students’ board scores up is a critical component of the new degree.
Online degree completion approved
Trustees also unanimously approved a new online Bachelor of Science in health sciences in the College of Nursing and Health Sciences.
To be considered for the program, students must have at least 30 credit hours, including at least one semester of biology with lab and chemistry with lab or college-level mathematics or statistics, and a minimum 3.0 grade point average.
The new health sciences program will be supported with existing staff, said Rosowsky.
No new base budgeting is requested for the program, which will be funded completely by tuition from students enrolled in the program.
“Could somebody take 20 years off and then finish, does it matter?” McAneny asked.
“Yes,” Rosowsky answered, “you can do it, we really are aimed at folks who have taken substantive time off.”
The program recently was approved by the Curricular Affairs Committee, and was proposed by the College of Nursing and Health Sciences, in collaboration with Continuing & Distance Education.
The new online program is needed, the proposal said, because Vermont “has a per capita rate of physician assistants, dentists, and pharmacists which is below the national average.”
The program is expected to enroll 25 to 30 students a year.
Both new programs are set to begin with the fall 2015 semester.
