College of Medicine Mission and Vision

Mission. The mission of the Florida State University College of Medicine is to educate and develop exemplary physicians who practice patient-centered health care, discover and advance knowledge, and are responsive to community needs especially through service to elder, rural, minority, and underserved populations.

Vision. The FSU College of Medicine will lead the nation in preparing compassionate physicians to deliver the highest quality 21st Century patient-centered medicine to communities of greatest need, advancing the science of this care, and developing innovative educational programs in these communities.

History of Florida State University College of Medicine

The Florida State University College of Medicine, the first new medical school of the 21st Century, was established in June 2000 by the Florida Legislature, with the mission of serving the unique needs of Floridians. It welcomed its first students, the M.D. Class of 2005, in May 2001.

Specifically, the college was founded to train physicians with special emphasis on providing health care for medically underserved and rural populations, as well address the needs of the growing geriatric population in the state and nation. The traditions and successful policies and philosophy, including admissions criteria, of FSU’s Program in Medical Sciences (PIMS) influenced the implementation and development of the College of Medicine (see History of PIMS below).

Designed as a community-based medical school, College of Medicine students spend the first two years on the FSU campus in Tallahassee where they take foundational science courses and receive early clinical experiences in a Clinical Learning Center and in community settings. Early clinical experiences have been a curricular component of the program since the beginning, as has been a culture that values group study, teamwork, patient-centered medical care, and service to others. Students are assigned to one of six regional medical school campuses for their third- and fourth-year clinical training.

The College of Medicine’s first regional campuses opened in Orlando, Pensacola, and Tallahassee in 2003, followed by the addition of the Sarasota Regional Campus in July 2005. That same year, a Rural Medical Education Track opened in Marianna, offering a limited number of third-year students the option to spend an entire year completing rotations approximately an hour’s drive west of Tallahassee. In July 2006, a satellite site to the Tallahassee Regional Campus opened in Thomasville, Ga., 45 miles north of Tallahassee, where up to five students complete their third- and fourth-year of training, supplemented by training activities in Tallahassee. In July 2007, the college opened its last two regional campuses in Daytona Beach and Fort Pierce. In addition, the college opened the FSU-Isabel Collier Read Medical Campus in 2007, a rural clinical-training site in Immokalee, a migrant farming community on the edge of the Everglades. There, third- and fourth-year students from the six regional campuses have the option to take required or elective rotations in a setting with a strong tie to the college’s mission of working with the medically underserved. After receiving provisional accreditation in October 2002, the college received its first full accreditation from the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) in February 2005, becoming the first new allopathic medical school established and accredited in the United States in over 20 years.

Myra Hurt, Ph.D., the third and final director of the PIMS program (1992-2000), served as acting dean from the time of the college’s creation until July 2001, when Joseph E. Scherger, M.D., MPH, became the college’s founding dean. Dr. Scherger came to FSU from the University of California-Irvine, where he was associate dean for primary care and professor and chair of the department of family medicine. J. Ocie Harris, M.D., was named dean Jan. 28, 2003, replacing Dr. Scherger. He had been an associate dean at the FSU College of Medicine since November 2001 and in that capacity had overseen the development of the college’s three initial regional medical school campuses and the recruitment of clinical faculty. Dr. Harris came to FSU from the University of Florida College of Medicine, where he had a distinguished career spanning nearly 30 years and had most recently served as associate dean for community-based programs and director of the North Florida Area Health Education Centers Program. Dr. Harris served capably for five and a half years in developing and expanding the college’s distributed model. When he announced his intention to retire in 2007, a national search was conducted resulting in John P. Fogarty, M.D. being named dean in August 2008.

Dr. Fogarty spent the first 20 years of his career as an Army physician and academic leader and served the last five years of his military career as Chair of Family Medicine at the Uniformed Services University School of Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland. He joined the University of Vermont College of Medicine in 1995 as chair of family medicine and was appointed associate dean for primary care in 2006. He was then appointed interim dean of the college, and over a 15-month period, provided stable leadership during the search for a permanent dean.

Dr. Fogarty’s previous experience supervising a distributed model of medical education and serving as a department chair and interim dean, along with his background as a family physician, made him a great fit for the college’s mission and needs. He retired in 2023 as the college’s longest-serving dean after 14 years.

Florida State University Provost Jim Clark named Alma Littles, M.D. dean, effective July 1, 2024. Dr. Littles joined the College of Medicine shortly after its creation in 2000, initially serving as acting, and later, founding chair of its Department of Family Medicine and Rural Health. She was the college’s senior associate dean for medical education and academic affairs for nearly 20 years before adding interim dean duties to those responsibilities.

A graduate from the University of Florida College of Medicine, she completed her family medicine residency at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital. Dr. Littles returned to her hometown of Quincy, Fla., and practiced family medicine before returning to Tallahassee Memorial Hospital as its family medicine residency program director.

Originally housed in Duxbury Hall (administrative offices and student community room), Montgomery Gym (anatomy lab), several science buildings (classrooms) and portable buildings (administrative offices), the college moved into transitional facilities at the former FSU Developmental Research School on the northwest corner of the campus in three phases between December 2001 and April 2002. The college broke ground Feb. 4, 2003, on a new complex of buildings to house the first- and second-year educational program and the research facilities. Construction of the John D. Thrasher College of Medicine (education and administration) Building was completed in 2004, and the rest of the complex in 2005. The college occupied the new facilities in November 2004.

The 2007 arrival of the M.D. Class of 2011 marked the first class to reach the maximum of 120 students. In 2010, as it celebrated the 10-year anniversary of its creation, the college reached its maximum expected enrollment of 480 students (120 per class).

The college was granted full accreditation from the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) on Feb. 4, 2005, and awarded maximum accreditation status on Oct. 19, 2011, covering an eight-year period. The LCME reaccredited the college in 2019 and will make its next reaccreditation site visit during the 2026-27 academic year.

Since the graduation of 27 from the inaugural M.D. Class of 2005, the College of Medicine has produced 1,953 physicians following the May 2024 milestone celebration of the 20^th graduating class.

And the growth has not been limited to medical students. In 2017 the college launched its School of Physician Assistant Practice to help address the shortage of health care providers in Florida. With the December 2023 graduation of its fifth class, more than 250 PA’s have joined the workforce following the completion of the intensive 27-month program.

Furthermore, the college’s Graduate Medical Education (GME) programs continue to grow in response to the need of health care providers in the state. Statistics show that 75% of physicians remain in the state where they’ve completed their residencies. With the addition of four new GME programs since 2022, the College of Medicine is now offering 14 programs made up of 253 residents, with future growth on the horizon.

As of 2024, nearly 3,500 physicians throughout the state serve as College of Medicine clinical faculty, providing training of both our students in years three and four.

Program in Medical Sciences

History of PIMS.

The history of medical education at FSU dates back to 1971, the year the Program in Medical Sciences (PIMS) was founded as an expansion program of the University of Florida College of Medicine. Funded by a National Institute of Health grant, PIMS was designed to address the need for physicians in the rural areas of Northwest Florida. In 1975 the state of Florida assumed the funding of the Program in FSU's budget. Through PIMS, students completed their first year of medical school at FSU and then transferred to UF to complete their medical education. PIMS had been providing the first year of medical education for 30 students a year since the 1970’s.
In the early years (1971-1992), only students from FSU, the University of West Florida, Florida A&M University, and some UF students referred by the UF College of Medicine were admitted to PIMS. Under the directorship of Dr. Hurt, PIMS became a participant in the AMCAS application process in 1992, and the applicant pool was opened to all legal residents of the state of Florida. However, the original recruiting mission of the program was retained. Housed first in the Thagard Health Center and then Montgomery Gym on the FSU campus, PIMS moved into new administrative offices and a new student resource center in Duxbury Hall in 1993.

From the first PIMS admission cycle, diversity in life experience was sought in applicants to the program. Application of "non-traditional" students, and students from rural and urban underserved areas was, and still is, encouraged. Older returning students, students from financial and/or educationally disadvantaged backgrounds, minority students, females, students from rural and urban areas, as well as diverse ethnic backgrounds were selected for admission to PIMS. Consequently, PIMS classes tended to have an older average age and be more diverse than classes at traditional medical schools.

To promote a liberal studies background and a humanistic medical education, PIMS was placed within FSU's College of Arts and Sciences. FAMU, Florida's historically black public university, and UWF became PIMS recruiting partners in 1971 and 1985, respectively. Paul Elliott, Ph.D., served as program director from 1971-1978; Robley Light, Ph.D., was interim director for about a year; Robert Reeves, Ph.D., was director from 1979-1992 and Hurt was named director in 1992.The PIMS program produced approximately 900 graduates.

Organizational Structure

Florida State University

FSU College of Medicine

Strategic Plan

Continuous Quality Improvement

Continuous Quality Improvement Policy

1. Purpose: This policy ensures that the College of Medicine (FSU COM) engages in a continuous quality improvement (CQI) process to sustain student success, medical education program improvement and accountability at its central and regional campuses. FSU COM will use its CQI process to monitor compliance with the measures and metrics of the COM Strategic Plan and ensure that the medical education program meets all Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME) accreditation elements, as noted in the following:

2. Element 1.1: Strategic Planning and Continuous Quality Improvement. “A medical school engages in ongoing planning and continuous quality improvement processes that establish short and long-term programmatic goals, result in the achievement of measurable outcomes used to improve programmatic quality, and ensure effective monitoring of the medical education program’s compliance with accreditation standards.”

3. Scope of Policy: This policy identifies the FSU COM continuous quality improvement (CQI) activities including:

a. Role of the CQI Committee: The CQI Committee is a standing committee of the FSU COM charged with the systematic evaluation of compliance with LCME accreditation elements. The CQI Committee utilizes the COM’s Strategic Plan to help guide its activities, ensuring compliance with the COM’s overall mission and vision.

b. Executive Committee responsibilities regarding CQI: The College Executive Committee advises the Dean on major operational and management issues and approves all major policies and procedures relating to the operation of the college. The committee assists with dissemination of information to the faculty, administration, and staff on medical school policies and practices, certifies graduation, provides reports to the semi-annual meetings of the faculty on all policy and procedural changes, and reviews and makes recommendations on reports from the CQI Committee and other issues that require a vote of the full faculty.

c. Office of CQI: The CQI Office is directed by the Associate Dean for CQI.

d. The Associate Dean for CQI: The Associate Dean for CQI reports to the Dean and is responsible for directing the Office of CQI and serves as Chair of the CQI Committee. The Associate Dean for CQI maintains an internal dashboard of CQI monitoring activities and reports at least quarterly on the activities of the CQI Committee to the Executive Committee.

Approved by COM Faculty, September 2020