Grant supports minority pharmacy program at Campbell University

     The Campbell University School of Pharmacy has announced the award of a $120,000 grant from the North Carolina GlaxoSmithKline Foundation to fund a program for minority pharmacy students. Now in its second year, the Pharmacy Readiness and Enrichment Program or (PREP) is designed to prepare motivated minority students for entrance into the School of Pharmacy and to make them aware of the many career opportunities available in the pharmaceutical industry.

     “Minorities are the most underrepresented population in the pharmacy field,” said Gabrielle Morgan, director of Student Services and Admissions in the School of Pharmacy. “As of 2005, only four percent of pharmacists in the state of North Carolina are members of a minority.”

     This is quite a disparity from the 25 percent nonwhite population of North Carolina, Morgan added. As of October 2005, 45 of the 100 counties in North Carolina were without a minority pharmacist representative. Research suggests that health care outcomes improve when health care providers are culturally competent and access to health care by minority populations is improved with a workforce that is culturally diverse, she explained.

    Campbell University’s PREP program is the only known minority recruitment program for pharmacy in the state that targets college-age students. A total of 70 students have participated in the program since it was established in 2005.

     The intense, one-week summer camp experience prepares qualified students (3.0 GPA) to take the Pharmacy College Admissions Test (PCAT) and gives them a closer look at the career opportunities available in the field. The course also prepares students for the admissions process through activities such as interview skills workshops. Students take a diagnostic exam at the beginning of the week and a final exam at the end of the week. Following the camp, students may continue their PCAT preparation through an online study guide program for up to nine months.

     Of the 35 participants at last year’s PREP camp, 63 percent applied to graduate and professional schools. A total of 47 percent of those students gained admission to the school to which they applied.

     “It really is a year-round endeavor,” said Morgan. “We conduct health fairs at partner schools to expose students to the program and provide them with an application to attend the week-long summer camp. The pharmacy school has partnered with Fayetteville State University, Central Carolina Community College, Shaw University, Winston-Salem State University and the University of North Carolina at Pembroke to reach qualified minority students.”

     “Diversity in health care can only be achieved through diversity in education,” said Dr. Ronald Maddox, dean of the School of Pharmacy. “It is our goal to increase our minority students and to graduate more minorities. Health care cannot often get to those culturally diverse areas unless someone with the same ethnic and cultural background can provide it. The School of Pharmacy’s mission has always been to serve the community as a whole, and that’s what we’re trying to do.”

     The North Carolina GlaxoSmithKline Foundation supports activities that help meet the educational and health needs of today’s society and future generations. Focused primarily in North Carolina the Foundation funds programs for the advancement of education, science and health.