Invest in our students
School of Medicine and Dentistry Scholarship Initiative
Invest in our students
“The journey through medical school was not easy, but the support of generous scholarship donors helped make it feasible. Now I’m the first physician in my family, a goal I have been chasing since childhood.”
— KORRY WIRTH ’21M (MD)
Wirth received the Thomas R. Noonan Scholarship and the Dr. William C. Manchester Memorial Scholarship while attending the School of Medicine and Dentistry. He is now a general surgery resident at Strong Memorial Hospital.
We’re setting the highest standards in medical education.
At the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry (SMD), we are committed to setting the highest standards in medical education, serving as a model for innovation and continuous improvement.
Rochester’s nationally recognized biopsychosocial model teaches physicians to understand the whole patient, considering the complex interactions of biological, psychological, and social factors. This approach has transformed medical education, research, and care. An SMD education also emphasizes community outreach and research, both locally and globally, in keeping with our University’s mission to make the world ever better.
Make a gift today in support of scholarships to help us recognize outstanding scholars, recruit diverse candidates, and compete with institutions across the country for the very best students.
Our students must reflect the communities we serve.
While the University of Rochester has always prepared well-rounded physicians, we acknowledge a new imperative to graduate physicians who are committed to transforming care for underserved populations. Diversity, equity, and inclusion are top priorities for SMD.
Our Equity and Anti-Racism Action Plan sets our course, which includes recruiting the most diverse students, faculty, and staff and providing the tools and support that encourage their success. Our students must reflect the communities we serve. We accomplish this by casting a wide net for the sharpest minds, then immersing them in an environment in which they learn to practice medicine with cultural humility. These students will go on to drive a national movement toward equitable, patient-centered health care.
As the cost of medical education continues to rise nationally, many of our peer institutions now offer scholarship programs that significantly reduce— and in some cases eliminate—student debt. To compete with these schools and ensure that the best and brightest students from a wide range of backgrounds can attend SMD, regardless of their financial circumstances, we must increase our available scholarship support.
Consider this:
- More than half of our medical students rely on scholarship support to afford pursuing their degree.
- The median debt per student in SMD’s class of 2021 was $195,785 while the average educational debt for a 2021 U.S. medical school graduate was $180,799. Scholarship support is essential to decrease student debt.*
- Debt can restrict career paths, force students to make decisions based on pay rather than their interests and passions, and leave lower-paying specialties scrambling for good candidates.
* Source: Melanie Hanson, December 2021, “Average Medical Student Debt”.
Building a diverse and well-rounded student body:
- Just five percent of each year’s applicants are accepted into SMD. We aim to maintain the selectivity that sets Rochester apart.
- One out of every four students in the class of 2025 is considered historically underrepresented in medicine.
- Recruiting a diverse student body exemplifies inclusion and helps educate well-rounded physicians who go on to provide equitable health care. Studies show that patients respond better to providers who can relate to their personal experiences.
- SMD is losing underrepresented students to peer institutions, due to our lack of full scholarships. In 2018, 59 percent of the underrepresented students who were accepted to SMD enrolled at another school, while 75 percent did so in 2021.
- Scholarships break the barrier for many students who otherwise could not consider attending our school. This support allows us to succeed in the rigorous competition for the most talented students—especially those who come from non-traditional backgrounds.
Fatima Bawany ’15, ’21M (MD) cares with compassion. When she was about 15 years old, her father, who grew up in Burma, asked her to visit a refugee center with him. One of the first people she met was an 11-year-old girl from Sudan. “Her stories inspired me to want to become a doctor and to help people like her someday.” Click here to learn more about Fatima.
Realizing a dream.
Bianca Audrey Duah’s family came from Ghana, West Africa. “When patients and their families talk about dealing with something really hard, I can relate to them,” she says, noting that she’s been the primary care provider in her family. “I owe so much to my medical school scholarship donors, who are making it possible for people like me to become physicians.”
Duah is the recipient of the Alice and Stewart Espey Scholarship Fund, the Dr. Robert P. Gulick ’57M (MD) Endowed Scholarship, and the Dr. Robert F. and Isobel P. Murray Scholarship.
Bianca Audrey Duah ’24M (MD)
Make a difference.
Retired cardiothoracic surgeon and academic medical leader, Stephen Plume ’69M (MD), ’75M (Res) established an endowed scholarship to benefit future generations of medical students. The impetus for his gift? To give back to a school that played a formative role in his life and his approach to medicine.
ENDOWED SCHOLARSHIP GIFTS are invested and managed by the University in perpetuity, ensuring that resources will always exist for the best students. A portion of the investment earnings is spent, while the original gift is preserved as principal. A gift of $100,000 or more can establish an endowed scholarship. A gift of $1,000,000 or more can endow a full scholarship for one student.
IMMEDIATE IMPACT SCHOLARSHIPS provide current-use funds that can be disbursed as soon as the following academic year. A pledge of $5,000 or more annually for five years helps cover tuition and cost of living expenses for deserving medical students.
For more information on supporting our students, please contact Melissa Head, executive director of URMC Academic Programs, at melissa.head@rochester.edu or (585) 273-2890.
For printer-friendly reading, please download our brochure.
“With your help, Rochester-trained physicians can close the nation’s health equity gap. Your gift in support of scholarships will help us recruit the most promising and diverse students, immerse them in the biopsychosocial model and principles of equitable health care, and then integrate them into a medical workforce that is more culturally humble and better prepared to raise the standard of care for everyone.”
— MARK B. TAUBMAN, MD
CEO, University of Rochester Medical Center and UR Medicine Dean, School of Medicine and Dentistry