Alumni Lend a Hand

The story of one prospective applicant

A sought-after medical school candidate, Maria had been accepted to Harvard, UC Irvine, Johns Hopkins, and, of course, UCSF. As she explained it to Dr. Irby, our innovative curriculum, extraordinary research opportunities, and commitment to serving the community all drew her to UCSF. Yet, as she said with tears in her eyes, she felt she couldn’t afford to come to UCSF. Harvard and Johns Hopkins had both offered her a “full ride.” UCSF, on the other hand, was able only to promise her a $5,000 scholarship each year, barely a quarter of the cost of a medical education. Her choice? Attending another top medical school and graduating debt-free or coming to UCSF and graduating with over $200,000 in debt.

Yet Maria’s dilemma is fast becoming the norm. And what it means is that UCSF is at serious risk for losing the best and brightest students to other schools.

The numbers tell the story

Here are the facts: As a result of sharply reduced state support for UCSF, medical students have faced multiple fee increases over the past ten years, for a total increase of more than 300 percent. A student who entered medical school in 2001, for example, and graduated this spring, experienced a fee increase from $11,000 per year to $22,000 per year—resulting in double the amount of expected debt upon graduation. Living expenses in San Francisco add another hefty $20,000 a year.

UCSF alumni reach out

Yet in the face of dramatically declining state funding and sharply rising fees, UCSF alumni are stepping in to help close the gap. In a gesture of extraordinary generosity, Faustino “Tino” Bernadett ’80 reached out to his classmates, inviting them to join him in contributing to a student scholarship fund he has established in honor of his father, the son of Mexican immigrants who became a doctor himself. In a letter he sent to each of his classmates, he announced his $50,000 gift to launch the fund, as well as two $25,000 matching gifts, saying:

“Most of us have met and conquered our midlife crises. It is time to start giving back in a way that inspires and helps the next generation take steps into the ever increasingly complex medical world in which we live…. Remember, as I do, when we started at UCSF… We were determined to make a difference. We have made a difference in the generation we have served. We have spent countless hours with patients that needed us. We have been there at the beginning and at the end of life. We have invented medical devices to further the advance of medicine and developed and performed operations and procedures numbering in the thousands, if not tens of thousands… We have become leaders in our communities and in our country. Now it is our time to help the next generation do the same.”

Leopold Avallone ’65 has also stepped up to the challenge, contributing more than $126,000 to create a named fund— the Leopold T. and Michelle Avallone Fund—for student scholarships. Dr. Avallone reflected: “It came as a great surprise to me that UCSF receives so little funding from the state—less than 10 percent— and I suspect many of my classmates and fellow alums would be just as surprised.”

One of the very first students to receive a UC Regents Scholarship in the 1960s, he went on: “UCSF is such a great school, and it made such a difference in my life. I knew I wanted to do something to give back. But I didn’t want a lab or a piece of machinery named after me. I wanted to help students who really need the money and will be helped by it as I was.”

There is more good news as well. Alumni giving to the School of Medicine for scholarships has nearly doubled in the past year, increasing from $213,000 in 2003-2004 to $400,000 in 2004-2005.

The road ahead

“Still,” Dr. Irby remarks, “we have a long way to go before we have the resources to offer scholarship packages that match what our competitors provide.” Today, though 88 percent of UCSF medical students receive scholarship aid, the average scholarship is just $5,000 a year. “To enable students like Maria to come to UCSF,” Dr. Irby continues, “we must be able to cover a larger portion of a student’s medical school fees.”

If UCSF were to provide full scholarship support for all students with financial need, the total would come to more than $8 million per year. By contrast,UCSF can now only offer $2.2 million per year.

Alumni support matters. In the words of one grateful student, “the exceptional medical education I have been given at UCSF, and the dream of becoming a physician, would have been impossible without financial support. On the eve of the graduation of my class and the fulfillment of that lifelong goal, I wish to offer my most heartfelt thanks.”