The Office of Health Sciences’ Multicultural and Community Affairs and Creighton University Medical Center’s School of Medicine have received a three-year $1.7 million grant as a Center of Excellence (COE) from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). Creighton is one of only 11 universities throughout the U.S. to receive a COE grant.

The COE program serves as a catalyst for institutions seeking to train students from minority groups in order to build a more diverse health care workforce. Creighton’s Office of Health Sciences’ Multicultural and Community Affairs will use COE funding to focus on boosting the academic performance of underrepresented minority medical students, encouraging medical school graduates to provide health care to underserved people, and raising the recruitment and retention rates of minority faculty in the School of Medicine.

“With the COE grant, we can continue our commitment to recruiting, educating, developing and challenging the potential of minority students and faculty, thus improving the quality of healthcare to the diverse U.S. population,” said Dr. Kosoko-Lasaki, M.D., M.S.P.H., associate vice president for Health Sciences’ Multicultural and Community Affairs. Dr. Kosoko-Lasaki led a collaborative effort among associate and assistant deans in the School of Medicine to obtain the grant.

Creighton is an independent, comprehensive university operated by the Jesuits. Creighton has been ranked at or near the top of Midwestern universities in the U.S. News & World Report magazine’s “America’s Best Colleges” edition for more than a decade.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
Betsy Reece (402) 280-2864
breece@creighton.edu