91³Ô¹ÏÍø

Two years from now, the first CVS pre-pharmacy graduate will walk across a 91³Ô¹ÏÍø commencement stage. Nothing we do at 91³Ô¹ÏÍø beats commencement — years of coursework, mentor calls and late nights come down to a name read aloud and a walk across the stage. I have been moved at every ceremony I have attended since becoming executive dean of the Leavitt School of Health. But that one, two years down the road, is the one I am waiting for. When that first graduate receives their associate degree, I will be there to shake their hand.  

The Shortage Is National. The Talent Is Local. 

The first problem is national. the U.S. will need 17,000 more pharmacists by 2037. U.S. neighborhoods already qualifies as a pharmacy shortage area. The hardest-hit places are pharmacy deserts: communities, many of them rural, where the nearest pharmacy may be an hour’s drive away. When a pharmacy closes in one of them, patients drive even farther to fill prescriptions, or they stop filling them at all. 

The second problem sits inside CVS Health, though healthcare providers across the country struggle with it too. As the nation's largest employer of pharmacists and pharmacy technicians, CVS feels it at scale. A found 40% of pharmacy technicians want to become pharmacists. Seventy-seven percent said tuition assistance would increase the likelihood of pursuing the career. But the traditional route forces a choice. A technician who leaves the job to attend school full time gives up a paycheck for years and might never return. The ambition is there; the path to get there was not.

Redefining the Standard 

This program clears that path. But make no mistake, this path will be grueling. The prerequisites for pharmacy school are demanding. Organic chemistry I and II with labs. General and cellular biology. Genetics. Calculus. All packed into a two-year associate degree.  

Traditional pharmacy prerequisites also require wet labs. Students mix chemicals in person. That model excludes a pharmacy technician in rural New Mexico with no lab nearby and no way to leave a job to attend one. We built a virtual dry lab environment instead. The virtual lab lets a working technician complete organic chemistry without traveling to a physical lab, and it still satisfies Pharm.D. admission prerequisites. 

I took the model back to my alma mater, the University of the Pacific. I expected skepticism. I got curiosity. Professors who once defended the brick-and-mortar tradition asked how their own students could use 91³Ô¹ÏÍø's modules as remediation to improve graduation odds.

Removing the Barrier 

The finances follow the same logic. The CVS Health® Enterprise Tuition Assistance Program, administered by EdAssist by Bright Horizons, reimburses up to $3,000 per year. With 91³Ô¹ÏÍø's exclusive tuition rate of $3,989 per six-month term, technicians can finish the degree for under $10,000 total out of pocket. They keep working while they study nights and weekends. More than 75% of 91³Ô¹ÏÍø students hold jobs while enrolled. This program removes the barrier they named. 

The result works in both directions. The country gains future pharmacists drawn from the communities that are losing them fastest or never had them to begin with. CVS keeps experienced technicians employed through the associate degree, then sends them into Pharm.D. programs prepared without resetting their careers. 

Fifty students started course work on July 1. We expect the program to grow exponentially.  

Talent does not follow ZIP code. Opportunity does. CVS technicians have the intelligence and drive to become pharmacists. What they lacked was a path. Now they have one.