CONNOR HOFFMAN
Staff Writer
On Feb. 19, Fredonia and the University at Buffalo announced a new agreement between Fredonia and the UB School of Pharmacy. This agreement is meant to help quicken the process for Fredonia students to get a pharmacy degree at UB.
Normally, a Fredonia student going into pharmacy would be required to spend four years completing his or her undergraduate degree at Fredonia, and four years completing his or her doctorate degree of pharmacy at a different university. Now, with this plan, Fredonia students can start pharmacy classes at UB during their senior year, and this will cut down the number of years down from eight to seven. By cutting down the number of years from eight to seven, this program aims to save Fredonia students time and money.
According to Fredonia’s website, “Beginning in the 2015-2016 academic year Fredonia students will be able to apply to the UB pharmacy school during their junior year and, upon acceptance, have their first-year pharmacy courses count toward their undergraduate degree requirements at Fredonia.”
This agreement had been talked about for about six months before it saw completion. According to Dr. Ted Lee, the head of the biology department, this project was initiated by Kimberlie Ball, an admissions employee, and a colleague of hers from the UB Pharmacy Admissions Office.
Lee mentioned that under this agreement, students must complete their CCC requirements and pharmacy prerequisite courses by their junior year.
Lee also mentioned how this program doesn’t require a specific major, but that given the prerequisites for the UB pharmacy program, students would likely be biology, biochemistry or chemistry majors.
Lee was also influential in the creation of this program, seeing as he is the head of the Health Professions Advisory Committee, and was the one that worked with the UB Pharmacy Admissions Office to finalize the agreement. This committee is composed of various professors from the sciences.
Lee also will be advising students interested in the program.
According to Fredonia’s website,“The Health Professions Advising Committee at Fredonia works to advise and support students preparing for a career in medicine, dentistry, optometry and veterinary medicine.”
Also, this committee is the committee responsible for creating articulation agreements with other institutions. An articulation agreement is an agreement between colleges aiming to simplify and possibly save transferring students time.
Lee went on to explain just how the program works and what it hopes to achieve.
“The program provides a unique opportunity for motivated pre-pharmacy students to gain early admission into Buffalo’s program,” explained Lee.
“The first year of courses at UB Pharmacy will transfer to Fredonia as elective courses for their major and allow the student to complete the 120 hours needed to graduate from Fredonia,” said Lee.
Lee hopes that this will “allow [Fredonia] to recruit some additional students interested in pharmacy careers.”
The UB School of Pharmacy website states, “The University at Buffalo School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences is one of the oldest and most established pharmacy schools in the country. We are consistently ranked within the top 20 schools of pharmacy in the nation and this ranking emphasizes our teaching excellence along with our research and scholarly strengths.”
The UB pharmacy school is the only pharmacy school in the SUNY system. According to the UB website, it boasts a 99 percent graduation rate. The UB Pharmacy school website makes sure to mention that applicants in this program will receive no special treatment.
Lee mentioned how this is not the only agreement of this type that Fredonia has, but that it’s still special.
“The only other Pharmacy agreement we currently have is the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine Pharmacy School. The Buffalo program will likely be attractive to students due to the in-state SUNY tuition rate.”
Lee mentioned that, at the moment, there are not any plans similar to this in the making.
He added that there already has been interest shown in this program.
“A couple of our pre-pharmacy students are interested in this. A group from Fredonia will visit the UB School of Pharmacy in April,” said Lee. “I’m very excited about this opportunity for our students. It is very beneficial to our campus when we can develop opportunities for students to pursue post-graduate programs.”