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NYU Med School to Offer Free Tuition; Cites Overwhelming Student Debt as Reason

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In a move that shocked denizens of the education sphere as well as academics of all stripes, the New York University School of Medicine, announced on Thursday that it will sponsor the tuition of all its students regardless of merit or financial need. In this landmark decision, NYU has become the first major American medical school to institute such a plan.

In December, Columbia University said that its medical school would offer full-tuition scholarships to certain students in need, along with grants to other students.

The announcement was made at the NYU annual White Coat Ceremony. This event includes new students being presented with white lab coats to mark the beginning of their medical education.

Kenneth G. Langone, the co-founder of the Home Depot chain of stores and chair of NYU Langone Health’s board of trustees said in a video to mark the occasion, “Thanks to the extraordinary generosity of our trustees, alumni, and friends, our hope—and expectation—is that by making medical school accessible to a broader range of applicants, we will be a catalyst for transforming medical education nationwide.”

He added that “I’m proud to announce that as of right now, every student that we admit to New York University School of Medicine comes tuition-free. And this includes the incoming class and the upperclassmen as well that are here right now — no more tuition.”

NYU has said that the program covers a yearly tuition of $55,018.

Prospective medical students will still need to come up with about $29,000 each year for room, board and other living expenses, according to a Wall Street Journal report. The scholarships will help 93 first-year students along with 350 already partially through the program, the WSJ reports. Several students enrolled in a joint MD/Ph.D. program are already offered free tuition under a separate program, according to an NPR report.

Langone, whose fortune stands at $3.5 billion, announced that together with his wife, Elaine, he has given $100 million to fund the tuition package. According to published reports, NYU has raised more than the $450 million of the $600 million that will be required to finance the tuition free program.

Apparently, the pressing issue of overwhelming student debt served as a catalyst for the NYU decision to make medical school education cost free. Such concerns as student debt, say NYU, have negatively impacted the future of the medical profession and they claim that the general healthcare system has been in decline because of it. In order to pursue high salaried professions in the medical world, graduates opt to go into specialty fields rather than such lower paying careers as internists, general practitioners, pediatrics and obstetrics and gynecology.
To illustrate such pay disparities among physicians, a survey indicated that pediatricians have the potential to earn an average of $221,900 a year, and internists can earn approximately $260,000. Medical students that plan to take the trajectory of entering a specialty can earn double or even triple the aforementioned salaries. The survey indicated that students that enter a specialty such as neurosurgery will earn an average of $622,755 per annum and orthopedic surgeons generally earn around $527,568 annually.

Langone added, “They (the medical students) walk out of here unencumbered, looking at a future where they can do what their passion tells them, which is to help people live better quality lives.”

Three out of four medical school graduates in 2017 graduated in debt, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. Of those in debt, the median amount was $192,000, the group says.

The group issued a report that has said that almost 90,000 students enrolled in U.S. medical schools for the 2017-2018 school year.

About 52 percent of them identified as white, 21 percent as Asian, 8 percent as multiple race/ethnicity, 7 percent as African-American, and 6 percent as Hispanic or Latino, and smaller percentages for other groups.

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