A marketing plan for recruiting students into pharmacy school-based graduate programs. A report

American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, Winter 2000 by Holdford, David A, Stratton, Timothy P

These appeals are displayed in the following comparisons of an MBA, MHA, and combined PharmD/MS program in Pharmaceutical Outcomes Management & Research used in promotional literature at Virginia Commonwealth University (Table IV). The comparisons were developed to educate pharmacy students about differences among graduate programs. Similar descriptions could be developed for residencies, fellowships, and other post-graduate alternatives.

PROMOTIONAL STRATEGIES

AACP promotional strategies should be designed to assist and facilitate promotional strategies of individual member schools. AACP should consider working together with other national pharmacy organizations such as the American Pharmaceutical Association (APhA), the American Society of Health-systems Pharmacists (ASHP), and the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (IPSOR) to promote pharmacy school-based SAS graduate programs as a postgraduate educational option for pharmacy students and pharmacists. One example of such an effort might involve the development of a poster suitable for presentation in meeting expositions attended by many pharmacy students (e.g., APhA Annual Meeting, ASHP Midyear Clinical Meeting). An additional effort by AACP might involve alliances with the International Pharmacy Federation (FIP) to promote U.S. pharmacy school-based SAS graduate programs to foreign pharmacy graduates.

One important aim of any recruitment policy is to maximize the number of students who will be successful in graduate school. This requires that information about graduate school be presented in an exciting, informative manner that will encourage those students with the desire and capabilities to pursue this career option. It also implies that students be provided with sufficient information about what to expect from a pharmacy school-based SAS graduate program so that those who lack direction, motivation, and capability will be discouraged from entering graduate school prematurely. It is important that students be sufficiently informed about the differences between graduate school and undergraduate or professional programs that students can decide whether graduate education is appropriate for them.

AACP World Wide Web Home Page

AACP would benefit from having a subpage on its Internet site to promote pharmacy school-based SAS graduate education programs. The page must be easily accessible (i.e., clearly marked on the AACP home page and outside the firewall). Anyone who is interested in SAS graduate education should be able to easily access this information in an Internet search. The home page can direct browsers to descriptions of SAS graduate programs, how SAS degrees differ from other graduate degrees, and what types of jobs can be found after graduation.

The home page can have information individualized to different target segments. There can be a separate page for career changers, current pharmacy students, foreign students, non-pharmacist graduates, etc. Interested readers can hypertext to those pages from a central page. Information specific to the needs of each target segment can be included. For example, the page for current pharmacy students can provide information on how students can prepare themselves for graduate school, such as electives to take, skills to develop, and job training that might benefit them. Pages for other target segments may omit this information or provide it in a different manner.