D'Youville Launches Innovative, Online Pharmacy Program

D’Youville Launches Innovative, Online Pharmacy Program

Buffalo, New York – February 10, 2021 – D’Youville continues its mission of providing groundbreaking healthcare education with its new three-year online pathway towards the Doctor of Pharmacy degree (Pharm.D) program, launching this fall. Applications will be accepted until June 1.

“The accelerated Pharm.D program will allow our students to earn their pharmacy degree in only three years instead of the traditional four. That shorter time in school means students get a jumpstart on their careers and an extra year of earning power, which when combined with potential scholarships could even compensate for most of their tuition costs,” says Canio Marasco, Pharm.D, dean of the D’Youville School of Pharmacy.

Students in the three-year online pathway will receive the same education as those in the standard four-year program. “We are accelerating the calendar, not the content,” Marasco says. “The online program will run in trimesters, with cycles of 14 weeks of online instruction, one week on campus for skills assessment, and one week of break or remediation before starting the next cycle.” After six cycles, students will spend their last year doing clinical rotations alongside professionals in a variety of settings. 

“The trimester cycles align with the preferences online students hold,” says Jeremiah Grabowski, D’Youville’s dean of online learning. “Online students seek programs that will save money and time, with a lower overall cost due to the quicker speed to completion.”

Although most students entering the Pharm.D program already have an undergraduate degree, it is not required. The current requirement is two years or 62 hours of undergraduate, prerequisite classes. “Our online pathway is set up in such a way that students just out of high school can conceivably receive their Pharm.D and be working as a pharmacist in only five years,” Marasco says, “if they complete two years of undergraduate work and take the three-year online option.”

Grabowski adds, “The three-year online pathway is also a good option for nontraditional students who need the increased flexibility that online classes can allow.”

Marasco says the impetus for the new program was borne out of the COVID-19 crisis. “When we shifted to all-online instruction in 2020 due to COVID, we discovered we could do the majority of program online, except for skills assessments,” Marasco says. “However, we are making every effort to fully integrate online students into the on-campus student experience. They will get to meet the faculty, take part in extracurricular activities, and receive hands-on clinical experience.”

The three-year online pathway towards the Doctor of Pharmacy degree (Pharm.D) will begin Fall 2021, pending approval by its programmatic accreditor, The Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE) and the New York State Department of Education (NYSED). The school has been informed by ACPE that the review will occur during Spring 2021 in collaboration with NYSED with final action by the ACPE Board at its June 16-18, 2021, meeting.

The School will inform all applicants, accepted students, and pertinent stakeholders of ACPE’s and NYSED’s action as soon as they are known. If ACPE and NYSED approve the online pathway, students admitted will matriculate into the online pathway as planned beginning August 23, 2021. If the pathway is not approved, admitted students will be offered a seat in the school’s campus-based pathway that begins August 9, 2021.

For more information about the three-year, online Pharm.D program, visit the online Pharm.D webpage or contact Kimberly Boulden, assistant director of online admissions, at bouldenk@dyc.edu, or Beverly Taggart, assistant director of pharmacy student services at taggartb@dyc.edu.

The D’Youville School of Pharmacy is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE). With a focus on creating healthcare leaders, D’Youville’s School of Pharmacy prepares graduates to improve communities through collaborative practice and research.