The UAB School of Medicine is committed to recruiting and supporting a more representative and inclusive student body to better serve the health care needs of our increasingly diverse society. This commitment is not merely about equity; it is about excellence. It represents the school’s core belief in the power of different perspectives and experiences to enrich the learning environment. Several recent scholarship gifts to the school are helping meet that commitment.
This past spring, the school’s Medical Alumni Association made a $100,000 gift to support scholarships for qualified in-state medical students from groupsconsidered underrepresented in medicine (URiM). According to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), underrepresented in medicine means “those racial and ethnic populations that are underrepresented in the medical profession relative to their numbers in the general population.” The MAA’s gift to current-use URiM scholarships is being matched by the School of Medicine Dean’s Office for $200,000 in total funding. The MAA has also launched an Underrepresented in Medicine Task Force focused on developing support for exceptional Alabama URiM students to attend and thrive at the School of Medicine.
According to MAA President John Wheat, M.D., and President-Elect V. Michael Bivins, M.D., “The MAA Board was excited by [School of Medicine Dean] Vickers’ report last year of the great health care need in the Black Belt and the School of Medicine’s desire to recruit more exceptional URiM students, especially those who relate to the Black Belt. After much deliberation, we determined that URiM students from Alabama would be a major asset in helping address these needs. We made recruitment and support for such students our priority and were gratified by the School of Medicine’s enthusiastic endorsement and decision to join us in this URiM initiative.” For more about the MAA’s URiM efforts, see page 30.
Gail Cassell, Ph.D., co-chair of the School of Medicine’s Board of Visitors, and her husband Ralph Cassell recently made a scholarship gift commitment that is also being matched by the Dean’s Office. The Wilkerson-Lacey Endowed Medical Scholarship will be awarded for the 2020/2021 academic year and is specifically designed to help the school recruit Alabama URiM students. The scholarship is a combination endowment and sponsored scholarship, so it benefits students both in the present and in the future, with the goal of providing at least half the cost of tuition and fees to at least one deserving recipient annually.
Co-chairing the school’s Board of Visitors isn’t Cassell’s only tie to UAB; she was a faculty member for a decade and also served as the Charles H. McCauley Professor and Chair of the UAB Department of Microbiology for 10 years. She is a senior lecturer in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and a senior scientist in the Division of Health Equity at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston. She retired from Eli Lilly and Co. as vice president for scientific affairs and Distinguished Lilly Research Scholar in Infectious Diseases.
The scholarship is named for two important figures from the Cassells’ life. “Lillian Wilkerson worked with my family for 17 years, and was instrumental in enabling my husband and I to have the careers we’ve had,” Cassell says. “We wanted very much to honor her for her loyalty, dedication, skill, and character. Her grandson, Ontario Lacey, is equally extraordinary, as he overcame many obstacles to successfully obtain his medical degree at the age of 40. He currently is completing his residency in the Navy as Lieutenant CG l Marine Expeditionary Force Information Group Surgeon.”
Cassell says she and her husband hope the scholarship will address some longstanding inequities in medicine. “Although improvements have occurred in the number of underrepresented minorities attending medical schools, substantial gaps have emerged and continue to increase. Notably, the number of African-American men attending medical schools is not increasing as fast as the number of African-American women. While no doubt many factors contribute to these gaps, financial constraints are a major factor. Our family is pleased to have the opportunity to honor Mrs. Lillian Wilkerson and Dr. Ontario Lacey. We hope our gift will make it possible for other equally exceptional and deserving young men to fulfill their dreams.”
The Capital City Medical Society Endowed Medical Scholarship was initially established in 2017. The purpose of the scholarship is to provide financial assistance to deserving medical students studying at UAB’s Montgomery Regional Medical Campus. The Capital City Medical Society (CCMS) serves as the collective voice of African-American physicians in Montgomery and in Alabama’s River Region. It is committed to improving the quality of health among minorities and medically underserved populations.
The initial fundraising effort was led by CCMS leaders and School of Medicine alumni William Abernathy Jr., M.D.; Joel McCloud Jr., M.D.; John Jernigan, M.D.; Vickers; and Montgomery Regional Campus Dean Emeritus Wick Many Jr., M.D., with the goal of meeting the $25,000 endowment minimum and eventually raising $100,000 for the scholarship. Vickers agreed to match scholarship contributions to help achieve this goal.
The CCMS held their first seated cocktail dinner to benefit the scholarship in September, 2018, followed by another in October 2019. With matching funds from the Dean’s Office, CCMS dinner benefit proceeds, and donations from many alumni and friends, this past fall the CCMS the CCMS has raised over two-thirds of their $100,000 endowment goal, with match monies enhancing student awards in the present.
“CCMS is dedicated to providing great patient care and enrichment for the community,” says LaToya Clark, M.D., an OBGYN physician with The Jackson Clinic in Montgomery and CCMS vice president and scholarship chair. “We are also committed to giving back and this scholarship not only allows us to help up-and-coming physicians, but to also encourage locally trained physicians to stay and work in this thriving community.”
“Diversity is vital to excellence, and it’s also vital to improving patient care,” says Vickers. “At the School of Medicine, we believe providing culturally competent health care is key to reducing, and ultimately eliminating, a range of health care disparities among African-Americans, Hispanics, and other medically underserved populations. To make a true, lasting impact on such disparities, we need those populations and communities represented in our classrooms, laboratories, clinics, and leadership roles. These scholarship gifts help our school meet that mission, and I am deeply grateful to the MAA and CCMS, as well as the Cassells, for their generous support.”
To make a gift to medical scholarships, contact Jessica Brooks Lane at 205-975-4452 or jblane@uab.edu. Gifts to the School of Medicine Minority Medical Scholarship are being matched by the dean’s office through September 2020. Give online at uab.edu/give/medminorityscholarship.