Scholarships will cover at least half of the tuition for the first class of medical students who will train at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Kearney.
The scholarships, which are a part of the University of Nebraska Foundation’s Only in Nebraska campaign, will be privately funded and use no state money.
The first class of medical students at the Kearney campus will attend classes in the new $95 million Health Science Education Center II. As of now, the class will consist of 15 to 20 students drawn from the pool of UNMC applicants who indicate interest.
The Nebraska Rural Health Association reported that 66 of Nebraska’s 93 counties are medically underserved.
“The whole purpose of having the expansion program to Kearney is to get more students from greater Nebraska, to get educated in greater Nebraska, train in greater Nebraska and return to practice in greater Nebraska,” said Andrew Priest, executive director of medical education at the Kearney campus.
The curriculum for Kearney students will be the same as the curriculum at the Omaha campus, including lectures that will occur across both campuses. Aside from lectures, students will also participate in small-group discussions, with local physicians leading them.
Additionally, Kearney students will have the option to participate in an extracurricular community leadership program.
“If they move to a small town, they know how boards work. They know how nonprofits work. They know how community government works; all these things that will help them be successful, other than just being good doctors,” Priest said.
The UNMC College of Medicine hopes to offer similar scholarships to future classes of medical students at Kearney.
“We hope to be able to provide even more financial aid and to be able to extend these scholarships to future classes,” Dr. Bradley Britigan, dean of the College of Medicine, said in a news release. “However, additional philanthropic support will be needed to do so.”