FSU medical school again falls short

A national group that accredits such schools denies FSU's appeal of its earlier decision.

By WES ALLISON, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 9, 2002

Florida State University's second try to win accreditation for its medical school has failed, but it's getting closer.

The Liaison Committee on Medical Education, the national governing body for medical schools, on Monday told the FSU College of Medicine that its appeal for accreditation had been denied.

The school had appealed a February ruling denying accreditation because of six unmet standards. In Monday's letter, the appeals committee said FSU had met four of those standards -- though "concerns about these areas still exist" -- and had fallen short in two. The trouble areas are faculty staffing and curriculum development.

School officials said they were disappointed.

"It is important to note that neither of these two criticisms relates to the quality of the program we are offering, and we believe that there is substantial evidence to show that we are in compliance even with these two standards," FSU president Talbot "Sandy" D'Alemberte said in a statement.

The school presented its case to the appeals committee last weekend in Chicago. D'Alemberte said he planned to call a meeting of FSU's board of trustees to determine what to do next.

Presumably, the school will reapply as soon as it can, with hopes of winning accreditation late this year or in early 2003.

The accrediting committee is a joint operation of the American Medical Association and the American Association of Medical Colleges, and lack of accreditation can have serious consequences: Students must graduate from an accredited program to win acceptance into residency programs, and the lack of accreditation may hamper recruitment.

Some scholarships and grant funding also are available only to accredited programs.

The FSU medical school was created by the Legislature in 2000 and enrolled its first class of 30 students last May. The second class arrives in May. The school is based at FSU's main campus in Tallahassee.

FSU joins the University of South Florida in Tampa and the University of Florida in Gainesville as the state's only public medical schools. Unlike them, however, FSU has no main teaching hospital, and will instead depend on hospitals and physicians throughout the state to train its third- and fourth-year medical students.

This community-based model, as it's called, was designed after Michigan State University's medical school.

According to the letter, FSU depends too much on part-time faculty and lacks enough full-time professors in major disciplines. The school's curriculum committee also isn't adequately overseeing the development of the curriculum.

"Instead, the responsibility for the design and management of the curriculum is vested in individual faculty members who are personally responsible for the delivery of entire courses," the letter said.

The committee had denied FSU's original application for accreditation based largely on a visit to campus in December. School officials were taken aback and appealed.

The panel rarely overturns its decisions.

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