Categorized | Business, Education

College of Pharmacy gets support from Walgreens

Dr. John M. Pezzuto, dean of the UH-Hilo College of Pharmacy, accepts a $10,000 donation from Dana Psomas, left, Walgreens' Hawaii district manager, and Clark Fujihara, Walgreens district pharmacy supervisor, on Tuesday, Jan. 20, during a gathering of first-year pharmacy students on the campus. (Photo courtesy of Marc Burba)

Dr. John M. Pezzuto, dean of the UH-Hilo College of Pharmacy, accepts a $10,000 donation from Dana Psomas, left, Walgreens' Hawaii district manager, and Clark Fujihara, Walgreens district pharmacy supervisor, on Tuesday, Jan. 20, during a gathering of first-year pharmacy students on the campus. (Photo courtesy of Marc Burba)

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The University of Hawaii at Hilo College of Pharmacy has received a $10,000 check from retail pharmacy Walgreens to fund a diversity initiative at the university. Walgreens also presented a check for $20,000, the second donation toward a $50,000 pledge, to support the building fund for the newly established pharmacy college.

The check was presented in a ceremony attended by Walgreens officials, students and faculty at 5:30 p.m. Jan. 20 in the Forestry and Natural Resource building in Hilo. 

“This timely gift helps us to join the rest of the nation in recognizing the need for diversity programs,” College of Pharmacy Dean John Pezzuto said. “We’re very appreciative of the generous contribution from Walgreens and their commitment to support local students. We have made great strides in a relatively short time because everyone has shared the same vision to make this a center of excellence.”

The funds include a $2,000 scholarship fund to aid in programming for under-represented students. The gift is part of a Walgreens commitment to donate $1 million annually toward diversity initiatives at all of the more than 100 pharmacy schools across the country.

“Our future pharmacists of Hawaii will be uniquely positioned to positively influence the health and wellness of their local communities,” said Dr. Luoluo Hong, UH-Hilo vice chancellor for student affairs and acting athletic director. “A gift such as this helps our students more effectively serve the extremely diverse, multicultural communities in which they will be living and working.”

With this new initiative, Walgreens said it hopes more students will be encouraged to consider the contributions they could make as front-line health professionals in neighborhood drugstores.

“We’re glad to be partnering with UH-Hilo to develop this first home-grown, world-class College of Pharmacy for students here in Hawaii and throughout the Pacific,” said Clark Fujihara, Walgreens district pharmacy supervisor. “We’re always looking for great pharmacists and with the anticipated national shortage of pharmacists, it’s good to know there will be a new generation in the pipeline ready to serve our growing aging population and the complex pharmacy needs of the future.”

The College of Pharmacy was launched in 2007 and was awarded candidate accreditation status by the Accreditation Council of Pharmacy Education in July 2008. The college will be eligible for full accreditation when its first class of students graduate from the four-year program in 2011.

The donation to the building fund will help the college meet those accreditation requirements. Building has already begun on a four-acre parcel on South Aohoku Place near the Imiloa Astronomy Center. Plans call for up to four modular buildings that will be the home of future classrooms, offices, research and teaching laboratories for the College of Pharmacy.

For more information about the UH-Hilo College of Pharmacy, call 933-2909 or e-mail pharmacy@hawaii.edu.

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