The Office for Diversity Affairs works to ensure diverse admissions to Vanderbilt School of Medicine. We also support VUSM student affinity groups with mentoring, funding, and other resources throughout the academic year. Take a look to see how we are helping medical students from all different backgrounds thrive.
For the past decade, ODA has been working collaboratively with the Admissions Committee and our faculty on the importance of diversity in our student body. A diverse student body contributes important prospective to clinical practice and research. Diversity allows us to achieve excellence by fulfilling our mission of creating leaders since diverse backgrounds lead to novel, “out-of-the-box” solutions.
To ensure that our selection process values diversity, we meet with incoming members of the Admissions Committee to discuss the importance of diversity. Our Admissions Committee (AC) is composed of faculty from diverse backgrounds and experiences. The ODA informs the AC on the candidate’s non-quantitative metrics and character for success in medical practice. Each year we also include non-voting medical students (including URM students) to the selection process to add greater perspective and to create a truly holistic process.
Currently, Vanderbilt has the third highest percent of under-represented minority matriculants when compared to the top 20 medical schools as ranked by U.S. News and World Report. See the table below.
