AAMC Reporter: June 2006

New AAMC Campaign Aims to Attract More Minority Students to Medicine

Recent AAMC data have revealed a growing gap between the increasing number of minority biology majors and those who ultimately apply to medical school. To help close this gap and raise awareness of the critical need for more diversity in medicine, the association will launch a new marketing campaign to reach out to well-prepared minority students and encourage more of them to choose medicine as a career.

"With our nation's growing diversity and the increasing likelihood of a significant future physician shortage, it's essential that we intensify our efforts to educate more minority physicians," said AAMC President Jordan J. Cohen, M.D. "This campaign will add a career marketing component to our community's many ongoing efforts to create a more diverse physician workforce."

While biology is the leading undergraduate major of medical students, AAMC research shows that the share of black biology majors from the nation's largest doctoral institutions who applied to medical school has dropped from 83 percent to 44 percent over the past decade. Latino biology majors applying to medical school from the same institutions also declined, from 74 percent to 39 percent.

Three years after the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark affirmative action decision, efforts to bring more minority students into medicine have made limited progress. The most recent U.S. Census revealed that minority groups make up 25 percent of the nation's population. But in 2005, only 15 percent of medical school applicants were minorities. The number of medical school enrollees and graduates was even lower, at 14 and 12 percent, respectively.

The AAMC's Office of Communications and the Division of Diversity Policy and Programs are working together to develop the two-year marketing and outreach campaign, with support from the Divisions of Medical School Affairs and Medical School Services and Studies. The campaign, which will be launched this fall, has four primary objectives:

• Close the "applicant gap" among black, Hispanic/ Latino, and Native American biology majors
• Increase medical school application rates from students who participate in the Summer Medical and Dental Education Program (SMDEP)
• Test effective ways to market medicine as a career
• Provide AAMC members with new information about "untapped recruiting grounds" for minority students through the development of a new database that will produce reports about the number of undergraduate majors by race or ethnicity, as well as the "medical school applicant yield" for every undergraduate institution.

In 2003, opinion research conducted by the AAMC found that the cost of a medical education, the time it takes to become a doctor, and the demands of the physician lifestyle are the major barriers to the medical profession among minority students. In addition, students expressed concern about not being accepted to medical school and were uncertain that medicine was the right professional path for them. With these findings as a basis, the AAMC is conducting additional focus groups and opinion surveys around the country with underrepresented minority students and health advisers to guide the development of the campaign.

The campaign's centerpiece will be a new, highly interactive Web site that will provide minority students considering medicine with an opportunity to join an "e-community" of their peers nationwide, as well as access the "information and inspiration" they need about preparing for and applying to medical school.

"What we're trying to do on a national level," said Charles Terrell, Ed.D., vice president for the AAMC's Office of Diversity Policy and Programs, "is tailor these messages in a meaningful way and put that information in one place where students can reach it."

Through the e-community, students will be able to ask questions of experts in financial aid, medical school admissions, and other related topics in online discussion forums, as well as communicate with other aspiring medical students throughout the country. Other features under consideration include real-time instant polling on "hot topics," a blog chronicling the daily life of a first-year medical student, and podcasts on various topics. Visitors to the site will also be able to take a quiz about what kind of medical specialties might suit them and read inspirational, real-life stories from minority physicians and medical students.

The campaign will launch officially this fall when pilot marketing programs at four colleges and universities get underway. Each of the four schools identified for the pilot campaigns was selected for its potential to increase the number of minority applicants to medical school, its affiliation with or proximity to a medical school, and its strong undergraduate advisory program for health or science careers. At press time, four institutions have agreed to participate in the pilot program — the University of Arizona, the University of Pittsburgh, and Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, and a California state campus. The final pilot site is expected to be announced shortly.

Specific activities at the pilot institutions will be tailored to each school but will include a mix of on-campus activities, advertising in campus media, direct marketing, and volunteer and mentoring opportunities. Students at the pilot sites will also be encouraged to join the campaign's online community and take advantage of special opportunities at local medical schools to learn about medical careers firsthand. The campaign will also reach out to campus health advisers, as well as key undergraduate science professors. Lessons learned from the pilots will then be used to develop a marketing "template" for the campaign's national rollout in 2008.

For more information, please visit http://www.aamc.org/diversity/aspiringdocs.

— By Louise Arnheim

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