Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City will expand its scholarship program so medical students with the greatest financial need graduate with no more than $75,000 in debt, making it the latest institution to address the massive debt burden facing medical students, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The Enhanced Scholarship Initiative will target students with the greatest financial need and cover the entire cost of attendance, including such items as tuition, housing, food and books. Under the program, students will borrow no more than $18,750 per year to cover these costs.
Currently, tuition for an academic year at Icahn School of Medicine is $53,000. The median debt for medical students who graduated in 2018 was $192,000.
The aim of the plan, which will launch in the 2019-2020 school year, is to help diversify the class, encourage new applicants and reduce the stress that can come from debt, the medical school said.
The move follows other recent debt-relief efforts at New York City-based medical schools, including New York University, which announced it would cover tuition for all of its medical students, and Columbia University's Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, which announced a debt-relief program that eliminates loans for all students.