After a $1 Billion Gift, Most Students at This Top University Can Go to Medical School for Free
Bloomberg Philanthropies is giving $1 billion to Johns Hopkins University so that most of its students can go to medical school for free. This is the latest donation from a well-known giver to help make medical school tuition-free across the country.
In a letter included in the yearly report of Bloomberg Philanthropies, billionaire Michael Bloomberg said that the donation would help with two problems: education and health which are getting worse.
The medical school said Monday that for most of the students, the gift will cover all of their costs, including fees and living costs. The gift will be given to students whose families make less than $300,000. Students from families that make less than $175,000 a year will not have to pay for their living costs.
That kind of gift has been given to other medical schools before. In February, students at New York’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine got free tuition thanks to a $1 billion gift from Dr. Ruth Gottesman, a former professor. On January 1, 2018, NYU School of Medicine became the first top 10 medical school in the country to let chosen students go to school for free.
It was in the letter that Bloomberg, who went to Johns Hopkins, said that life expectancy in the US is still lower than in other countries since the COVID-19 outbreak.
Bloomberg said that the pandemic hurt public schools as well, saying that “remote schooling was a disaster for students.”
The former mayor of New York City said that kids from low-income families don’t apply to medical school because it’s too expensive.
He also said that both sides should work together to solve this “health crisis.”
A poll from the Association of American Medical Colleges in October found that 70% of medical students who will finish in 2023 have some kind of student loan debt. The AAMC says that about half of medical school graduates owed more than $200,000 when they graduated.
“Many people who do graduate drop out because they can’t afford it.” Bloomberg also said that there are not enough basic care doctors in the US. “And when they graduate, they often choose to work in the most lucrative specialties to pay off their debts instead of in fields and communities that are most in need,”
Bloomberg gave $1.8 billion to Johns Hopkins University’s undergraduate financial help in 2018.