By Audrey Post
FSU College of Medicine

They all matched, and almost half are staying in Florida for residency.

Those are the highlights of 2026 Match Day at the Florida State University College of Medicine, when fourth-year medical students learned where they’ll continue their training. Where they matched, and in what specialties, sets the trajectory of their medical careers.

Graduating medical students across the country receive their match information at the same time, noon Eastern time, on the third Friday in March each year. The National Resident Matching Program is the primary system matching applicants to residency programs with available positions at U.S. teaching hospitals, but some specialties and the military conduct their own.

Residency, the next step in medical education, culminates in board certification in their chosen specialty and a license to practice medicine.

Of the 121 M.D. Class of 2026 students who will graduate May 16, 120 participated in a matching program. The other graduate opted to spend the next year doing medical research and will participate in the match with next year’s graduating class.

Of the 115 students who participated in NRMP, 55 (47%) matched in Florida. 

“Having almost half of our class stay in Florida bodes well for the future as Florida faces a serious physician shortage,” College of Medicine Dean Alma B. Littles, M.D., said. “Research has shown that almost half of all physicians establish their practices within 50 miles of where they completed their residencies.”

Where they matched
Matches by specialty

A 2024 report by the Association of American Medical Colleges also showed that more than half – 58.6% – of all physicians who completed their Graduate Medical Education over the previous 10 years had stayed to practice medicine in the state where they did residency. 

Littles herself is evidence of the trend. The Gadsden County native completed a family medicine residency at what is now Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare in 1989 and opened her practice in her home county the same year.

A little over 31%, 39 students, matched in another state in the Southeast, either Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia or West Virginia. When combined, 94 of the 115, or almost 81%, are staying in the Southeast.

In addition, four students headed for military service – two in the Air Force and one each in the Army and Navy – matched with military hospitals, and one matched in urology through a specialty match administered by the American Urological Association. 

Almost one-quarter of the 120 students (23%) who participated in one of the match programs, 28 students, did so in internal medicine. Psychiatry was second with 15 (12%); pediatrics and surgery, both general and preliminary, each had 13 matches (11%), while family medicine had 12 matches (10%). Obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedic surgery, physical medicine and rehabilitation, and diagnostic radiology each had four matches (3%).

Transitional programs, otolaryngology, dermatology, child neurology, internal medicine/psychiatry, radiation oncology and urology all had one or two matches.

The number of students who matched in primary care specialties, excluding obstetrics and gynecology, was 54 (47%). If ob/gyn is included, the number rises to 59 (51%). Currently, the Association of American Colleges does not count ob/gyn as a primary care specialty, but many medical educators think it should be included.

Match Day is always a festive affair at Ruby Diamond Concert Hall, with the dean giving a brief welcome to the students, their families and friends, then calling on the graduating class members to “open your envelopes.”

The next few minutes were noisy pandemonium, with whooping, hollering, high-fiving and posing for happy snapshots while showing off their matches. Students then began taking to the stage with their regional campus classmates, sharing their results while beaming loved ones stood alongside. 

Class President Alycia “Aly” Savage then addressed the crowd. A 10-year veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps, she shared with her classmates a personal story of her disappointment on a previous “selection day” when she had completed flight training and learned what aircraft she would be piloting. She was assigned to her last choice.

“I did not want to fly the MV-22 Osprey. But the Osprey -- an aircraft that combines the vertical takeoff and landing of a helicopter with the speed and range of turboprop plane -- wanted me," she said. "More accurately, the Marine Corps needed Osprey pilots."

She felt crushed that day but looking back, she said she couldn't imagine her life any other way. "I became who I am because of a path I didn't choose." She encouraged her classmates to feel fully whatever emotion they felt when they opened their envelopes. "Celebrate. Cry. Laugh. Feel the relief, the excitement. If needed, feel disappointment, fear or uncertainty. And then, get to work," said Savage, who will be staying in Tallahassee for an FSU College of Medicine/TMH general surgery residency.

"We may not always control where we land, but we absolutely control how we lead, how we serve, and who we become once we get there. Class of 2026, I am so incredibly proud of you," she said. "I cannot wait to walk across this graduation stage with you." In her closing remarks, Littles reminded the students they were "almost to the mountaintop." "Eight weeks from tomorrow, we'll gather again in this same place and make it official," she said. "What a day it will be for all of us! See you then."

Photo captions:

Spotlight photo on Home page: 

Sarah Whitteker shows off her just-opened match letter to her family on March 20, 2026, in Ruby Diamond Concert Hall. She matched in Otolaryngology at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, Mississippi.

Photo at top right:

Kaleigh Wingate jumps for joy as she announces her match. "We're going Ivy, baby. We're going to Dartmouth!" she shouted. She's the first M.D. graduate to match in Psychiatry at Dartmouth College/Hitchcock Medical Center in Hanover, New Hampshire, in the history of the FSU College of Medicine.

Joining her on stage, from left, are her sister, Kaitlyn Wingate; father, U.S. Army Col. Cedric Wingate; brother, Andrew Wingate; aunt, Sandy Gardner; aunt, Synora Ellis (behind Kaleigh, wearing red); grandmother, Margie Matthews (in wheelchair); mother, Kathleen Wingate (behind wheelchair); uncle, Wayne Ford, gazing at the PowerPoint of Kaleigh displayed behind the group; and close family friend Antonia Brown.

Photos by Colin Hackley for the FSU College of Medicine.

More photos below: