Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine

Dean's Message
It is an honor for me to join the FAU community as the new dean of the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine. This is truly a transformative opportunity to work with all of you to build the future of this great institution.

Today, we are witnessing the fruition of the seeds that Charles E. Schmidt, Barbara and Dick Schmidt and the Schmidt Family Foundation planted nearly two decades ago with their historic gift of $15 million, which was matched by the state of Florida to build the 95,000 square-foot facility that houses our medical school and biomedical research laboratories.

In just a little more than a year, FAU has experienced phenomenal growth and achievement at the helm of our University's great leadership. I am deeply grateful to our founders and my predecessor for their vision and to our faculty and staff for their dedication and commitment. Their efforts combined with the untiring support we have received from our community and the state of Florida enabled us to welcome the inaugural class of our new medical school in August 2011.

FAU has an extraordinary combination of advantages to offer the 64 students who make up our charter class as well as prospective students: world-class faculty, a state-of-the-art facility and an innovative curriculum that gives them hands-on experience with patients very early in their training. They have top-quality mentoring from physician preceptors, and in the future they will benefit from residency experiences as well in conjunction with our partners in our Graduate Medical Education Consortium.

More than 400 outstanding community physicians across a broad range of specialties are also taking part in our program, and we have established affiliations with several leading hospitals in Broward and Palm Beach counties. This widespread support is a clear indication of the confidence that the South Florida medical community has in our program.

We are proud to be launching our school at a critical time in healthcare history as we work to address the dire shortage of physicians in Florida and nationwide. We all know that there is an urgent need for more doctors in our country to serve people of all ages, particularly the very large population of Baby Boomers who have now entered their retirement years.

We are committed to teach the next generation of physicians to not only be excellent doctors, but to be compassionate, selfless and effective communicators. While American healthcare will change, the basic fundamentals of why we became or want to become physicians will not change -- the patient is and always will be our primary focus. The physicians coming out of FAU's program will be well-prepared to make long-term contributions to the profession and to our communities.

Our young college is also making significant progress in scientific and medical research in the areas of neurological disorders, including Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease, cardiovascular disease, cancer, osteoarthritis, diseases of the eye such as age-related macular degeneration and HIV/AIDS. Furthermore, collaborative research initiatives with our partners at Scripps Florida, Max Planck Florida Institute, Torrey Pines Institute for Molecular Studies and others are providing a solid base for increased federal funding opportunities in basic, emerging and translational grant programs. Our unique dual M.D./Ph.D. with Scripps Florida and The Scripps Research Institute's Kellogg School of Science and Technology is preparing future physician-scientists for careers in academic medicine and clinical investigation.

The paramount strength of our educational programs and research is our innovative faculty who are continuously looking for ways to enhance the educational experience and develop and test novel approaches for treating various diseases and conditions that afflict us globally.

We believe that you will find the school to be an extraordinarily welcoming place where great things are accomplished. I am proud to be serving as dean during this exciting period of progress and growth and I invite you to join me as we invent the future of the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine.

College History
Florida Atlantic University's decision to seek accreditation from the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) for a new, independent medical school in the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine is the culmination of a goal that began over a decade ago. In the late 1990s, the Florida Board of Regents, the governing body for the Florida State University System at the time, established a regional campus of the University of Miami (UM) Miller School of Medicine, a private institution, on FAU's main campus in Boca Raton.

In 1998, the Florida Legislature approved the first in a series of annual appropriations to FAU, which would total $4.4 million by fiscal year 2004-05, to build the core biomedical science program at FAU required to support the UM-FAU regional medical campus. In 1998, FAU also received a transformational gift of $15 million from the Schmidt Family Foundation, which was matched by the state of Florida to construct a 95,000-square-foot facility designed specifically for the medical education program and for FAU's master's, doctoral and certificate programs in the biomedical sciences.

In 2004, the first class of 16 students was admitted to the two-year UM regional medical campus program at FAU. In 2005, the Florida Board of Governors, which replaced the Board of Regents, authorized the expansion of the UM-FAU regional medical campus from a two-year to a four-year program, enabling UM students to complete their entire undergraduate medical education program at FAU. In 2007, the first class of 32 students began the four-year FAU regional medical campus program and the final class completed the two-year regional medical campus program. In 2008 and 2009, respectively, 48 students were admitted to the FAU regional medical campus program, resulting in a total student body of 128 students in academic year 2009-10.

In 2009, leadership from FAU and Scripps Florida began informal discussions about the feasibility of forming a partnership between FAU and Scripps. The FAU Board of Trustees determined that pursuing Florida Board of Governors' and state legislative authorization for FAU to award the M.D. degree and formalizing the FAU-Scripps partnership offered significant advantages for students, the Florida physician workforce, the Florida biotechnology research sector and FAU's biomedical science research enterprise. As a result of this partnership, FAU and Scripps agreed to offer a joint M.D./Ph.D. degree, with the M.D. degree conferred by FAU and the Ph.D. degree conferred by the Scripps Research Institute's Kellogg School of Science and Technology, pending state authorization and LCME accreditation.

On April 7, 2010, the Florida Board of Governors made a landmark decision and authorized FAU to award the M.D. degree. Legislation authorizing FAU's medical education program was passed by the Florida Legislature on April 22, 2010 and signed into law by the Governor on May 15, 2010, thereby making it an independent medical school becoming only the 134th allopathic (M.D.) medical school in North America. FAU's medical school benefitted from the strong support from the state of Florida Board of Governors and the Florida Legislature, and is fully funded for its total enrollment of 256 students.

On June 23, 2010, the FAU Board of Trustees officially renamed the Charles E. Schmidt College of Biomedical Science to the Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine.

In early February 2011, FAU Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine received preliminary accreditation from the LCME, the accrediting authority for all medical education programs leading to a medical degree in U.S. and Canadian medical schools. The LCME is a joint committee of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) and the American Medical Association (AMA).

FAU new medical school will recruit and educate a diverse student population who will live, work and serve in our communities. The new medical school will help to advance South Florida's health care communities by providing quality, affordable medical education and access to first-rate medical care among our underserved populations.

Office of Medical Student Financial Aid
Welcome to the Florida Atlantic University College of Medicine Office of Medical Student Financial Aid. The goal of the Office of Medical Student Financial Aid is to provide all necessary assistance and services to assure that students meet their financial obligations so that they may achieve their educational goals in the Florida Atlantic University College of Medicine. Counseling services provided include but are not limited to: applying for financial aid and the financial aid process, budgeting and money management techniques, debt management, and any personal financial concerns a student may have.

This website provides an overview of important information specific to financial aid in the FAU College of Medicine. Please feel free to contact the Office of Student Financial Aid with any questions or concerns you may have at mdfinancialaid@fau.edu.

Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine Degree Programs :

Medicine

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Florida Atlantic University, founded in 1961, is currently serving more than 29,000 undergraduate and graduate students at sites throughout its six-county service region in southeast Florida. The University's student body, which ranks as the most ethnically and culturally diverse in Florida's State University System, includes many men and women of non-traditional age. Long known as an outstanding teaching institution, FAU is undergoing rapid development as a center of cutting-edge research, particularly in the biomedical arena. This process has been accelerated by the University's partnerships with four internationally known biomedical research organizations, the Scripps Research Institute, the Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute, the Torrey Pines Institute for Molecular Studies and the Max Planck Society. Additionally, FAU's Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine recently welcomed its inaugural class.