The University is opening a satellite campus in 2021 as part of a collaboration with Inova Fairfax Hospital. The new campus is expected to host 30-50 faculty members in addition to research teams and medical students.
The strategic location of the satellite campus will place the University closer to the influence of Washington, D.C.
“The whole goal is to really position the University in close proximity to the nation’s capitol, where I think we can in our third century increase our participation in global education,” Dr. Richard Shannon, executive vice president for health affairs, said. “Charlottesville is an extraordinary place, but in a global world, access is somewhat limited, and we think establishing this satellite in the shadow of the nation’s capital will afford us national and global opportunities.”
The partnership with Inova will also include the creation of a research institute that will focus on innovations in genomics and support a partnership within the field of cancer research.
“Our goal on the research side is to collaborate on recruiting eminent researchers to Virginia to make discoveries the areas of genomics, functional biology, bioinformatics, biologically driven engineering, precision medicine that can be applied and commercialized to improve the human condition of those living in Virginia and beyond,” Eric Swensen, University Health System Public Information Officer, said in an email statement.
Eventually, the University hopes this collaboration will extend to medical students who are completing their residencies and give them opportunities to complete clerkship and post-clerkship training.
“Students can elect to go up to that site for their third and fourth year of medical school, and recognizing that about 25 percent of our medical school class comes from Northern Virginia, we think it will be particularly attractive to them,” Shannon said.
The University, the state and Inova are all set to contribute to the construction of the research institute and funding of faculty although the University has yet to determine how its share of contributions will be funded.
“We will need to submit an application to the Liaison Committee on Medical Education, which accredits all medical schools and regional campuses,” Swensen said.
The LCME process will not be completed until 2021, which is the year the completed medical school campus is set to open.
“Finding a location in the crowded areas of Northern Virginia and Washington D.C. is not easy, so when Inova bought this … parcel that used to be ExxonMobile headquarters, it afforded an opportunity to partner with them and get access to a terrific site,” Shannon said.
One of the additional goals of the University’s partnership with Inova is to allow the two institutions to advance medical research and contribute to medical education.
“The challenges in healthcare and biomedical research require partnerships to solve them. The challenge is so great that no one institution can do it alone, and this is U.Va’s attempt to partner with another first rate organization to try and better address the challenges in healthcare,” Shannon said.
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