Talk:Eastern Virginia Medical School

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EVMS is a private not public medical school. They get money from the state and offer lower tuition for in-state sudents, which must make up a certain percentage of the class, but EVMS is not public. The state does not appoint any members of the board of visitors.

[edit] Public / Private -- neither fits perfectly

Eastern Virginia Medical School is a public institution, but not a state agency.

It is a public institution in the sense that it operates under charter from the Commonwealth of Virginia, and its authorities are outlined by the state in that charter. It receive public support from the Commonwealth of Virginia, but it is not a full-fledged state agency like true public universities and colleges in Virginia. (Like a private institution, EVMS employees and faculty are not state employees, but like a public institution, the Virginia Freedom of Information Act applies to EVMS.) The Commonwealth provides capitated funding to support the in-state residents who attend medical school at EVMS, but the state does not appoint the EVMS Board and it is not responsible for overseeing the institution's overall operating budget (as it is for public colleges and universities like Old Dominion University).

In the past, EVMS was often referred to as the state's only private medical school, to distinguish the school from the two older state-run medical schools (the Virginia Commonwealth University's Medical College of Virginia and the University of Virginia). So institutions like the Association for American Medical Colleges categorize the school as "private" rather than "public," but neither adjective fits perfectly.

The recent debate in Virginia on the issue of "charter universities" basically revolves around the idea of allowing public universities and colleges to be structured similarly to the structure that currently is seen at EVMS: the schools get some state support but the schools would have more freedom in their operations (personnel, purchasing, etc.) than other state agencies.

[edit] If neither fits perfectly...

...then why not just explain that in the article instead of inaccurately calling it public?