医学院 z-bio 2025-07-25 2573

　　On July 14, 2025, Alice L. Walton School of Medicine (AWSOM) welcomed the first batch of 48 students in Bentonville, Arkansas, USA. They stood out from 2,000 applicants worldwide, with an acceptance rate of only 2.4%, becoming the first explorers of the new medical school founded by Walmart heiress and a rich woman with a net worth of $101 billion.

　　From car accident victims to medical reformers

　　Alice Walton's medical sentiment originated from a painful experience. A serious car accident in the 1980s made her go through more than ten years of fighting with sequelae and deeply felt the "flaws of the medical system." “Our healthcare system is broken and someone needs to push for change,” she said bluntly.

　　In 2019, Walton first founded the Heartland Whole Health Institute near the current location of the Medical School, focusing on disease prevention policy research. Two years later, the Alice L. Walton Medical College was established and a $450 million investment was invested to build the 154,000-square-foot school with more than 50 faculty members.

　　According to the plan, Alice L. Walton Medical College will provide medical programs with fully tuition-free for the first five students, with a fee of about $290,000 per person. The school is not only equipped with advanced facilities such as anatomy centers and clinical simulation centers, but also establishes cooperation with Washington Regional Medical Center, Arkansas Children's Northwest Hospital and other institutions to allow students to participate in "early clinical experiences" from the first academic year.

　　"There is a serious lack of medical services in our state and surrounding areas. We need to train and support doctors so that they can successfully respond to the health care challenges of the 21st century." She emphasized at the launch of the project that the new medical school will break the traditional medical education model.

　　Its "whole person health" course covers six major directions, including "health art", "evidence-based research", "clinical", "health system science", and "holistic health", and integrates the concepts of art, humanities and overall health into the curriculum system to cultivate compound medical talents with clinical skills and social care.

　　It is worth noting that Walton's Alice L. Walton Foundation has also reached a 30-year $700 million cooperation agreement with Cleveland Clinic and other institutions. In addition to funding the construction of medical schools, it will also build a specialty clinic center in Bentonville to promote the balance of regional medical resources.

　　Eastern Echo: Chinese Experiment of the Integration of Medicine and Industry

　　When Walton Medical College welcomed its first freshman, Fuyao University of Science and Technology on the other side of the Pacific also completed the first batch of 50 undergraduate students.

　　In 2021, Cao Dewang of Fuyao Group founded Fuyao University of Science and Technology through the Heren Charity Foundation. After being approved by the Ministry of Education in January 2025, the first 50 undergraduate students were assembled, and the admission scores were far higher than those in many 985 universities in Guangxi, Hunan and other provinces.

　　Although it has not recruited medical students for the first time, the planned "School of Life and Health Sciences" has established the goal of "integration of medicine and industry", focusing on cutting-edge fields such as medical artificial intelligence and high-end medical devices.

　　According to reports, Fuyao University of Science and Technology invested 800 million yuan in the first year, and the laboratory configuration standards are 40% higher than those of 985 universities. The 50 students are equipped with 15 academicians and 56 top scientists in the world, and the teacher-student ratio is only 6:1, far exceeding the average level of most universities in China.

　　In addition, the school also implemented the "8-year integrated training of undergraduate, master and doctoral students", breaking the "mass production" model of traditional education and focusing on the personalized development of students.

　　Although the success or failure of these grand experiments driven by private capital will take ten years or even longer to test, they have injected the vitality of change into the existing medical education landscape.