ABSTRACT
Federal, state, and private funding laid the foundation for both graduate pharmaceutical education and research in the Florida A&M University College of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences. Initial (1973) Minority Biomedical Research Support Program funding led to the 1976 establishment of the M.S. program in pharmacology/toxicology. The MBRS program’s maturation included the implementation of presubmission review procedures for grant proposals which yielded significant improvement in proposal competitiveness. From 1980 to 1984, the MBRS grant increased from six investigators to 12, and a 250% increase in funding. M.S. program success led to the Ph.D. program in pharmaceutical sciences (pharmacology/toxicology, medicinal chemistry, pharmaceutics, and pharmacy administration) in 1985. The 59 other pharmacy schools with graduate programs produced 13 African Americans with Ph.D. degrees from 1984–89. Florida A&M University graduated 5 in April 1991 to become America’s preeminent provider of such personnel. Three of the 5 were McKnight Fellows; all were supported by both MBRS and RCMI. Funds provided by the Centers for Disease Control/Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry cooperative agreement with the Association of Minority Health Professions Schools led to implementation of a Ph.D. track in environmental toxicology in 1990. Federal and corporate funding assists graduate student support, and helped establish an endowed chair. The College successfully competed for a Research Centers at Minority Institutions grant in 1985 which has sparked an increase in refereed publications from 19/year in 1983–87, to 36 in 1989, an 89% increase. Five proposals were submitted in 1983, compared to 30 funded grants in 1990. Grant support increased from $600,000 in 1983 to $3.7 million in 1990. The College is now 11th among pharmacy schools in NIH ($1.7 million) funding. The quality of library services and laboratory animal facilities has been enhanced.
