The Urban Health Program to encourage minority enrollment at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine.

Since 1969, the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine has worked to recruit, admit, and graduate a more diverse population of physicians. The state of Illinois ranks third in the nation in the number of African American residents, and fifth in the number of Latinos, and these groups together account for approximately 60% of Chicago's population. To attract applicants from these groups, the medical school created the Medical Opportunities Program and its successor, the Urban Health Program, to maximize this pool of applicants. Outreach activities at undergraduate colleges, in association with premedical organizations, identify underrepresented-minority (URM) students who should receive support in their applications. The organizations assist in monitoring the applications of URM candidates. Also, the medical college created academic and social support programs for its URM students: a prematriculation program, small-group review sessions for every major course in the first two years of the curriculum, help for second-year students preparing for the United States Medical Licensing Examination Step 1 and fourth-year students preparing for Step 2, and support for organizations for minority students. Over its 30 years, the program has had a substantial impact on the number of URM students entering the medical college, other medical schools, and other health professions. Over these years, the proportion of URM students in the medical college's overall enrollment rose from 10% to 23%. Also, a higher proportion of the college's URM graduates than its non-URM graduates practice in the Chicago area.

Increasing the graduation rates of minority medical students.

The University of Illinois College of Medicine has operated a program since 1969 to recruit minority students into the college and to increase the graduation rates of these students once they enroll. Known as the Medical Opportunities Program (MOP) until 1978, the program was expanded in 1978 and renamed the Urban Health Program (UHP). The authors of the present paper discuss the results of these programs, particularly the effect of granting minority students delays in completing graduation requirements. The MOP (1969 through 1978) increased graduation rates for minority students from 55 percent for those who graduated on time to 81 percent for both on-time and delayed graduates. Under the first seven years of the UHP (1979 through 1985), more minority students have been offered places, and more have enrolled than in the 10 years of the MOP. The retention rate under the UHP, if it holds, will be higher than that under the MOP. For the combined MOP-UHP period, the retention rate for minority students was 88 percent; 69.8 percent of the graduates were on time, and 30.2 were delayed.