The University of Maine System (UMS) will partner with the nation’s leading medical education consultant to study the feasibility of starting the state’s first public medical school. 

In response to a critical shortage of physicians in rural Maine and with the support of the Maine Hospital Association, the Maine Primary Care Association and Northern Light Health, in 2023 the Maine Legislature and Gov. Janet Mills provided funding for UMS to undertake a study to examine establishing an MD-granting institution in Penobscot County – likely affiliated with the University of Maine (UMaine).

Following a competitive request that generated multiple proposals, UMS has selected Tripp Umbach to assist with the study. The firm has worked with most U.S. medical schools over the past 30 years including in Maine, and conducted some 50 medical school feasibility studies, including in rural states such as Idaho and Montana. 

“As with Maine in general, our physician population is aging,” said Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center Director of Clinical Education Dr. James Jarvis, in a news release. “It has been difficult to keep pace with retirements and demographic shifts to fulfill the healthcare needs of northern Maine. This exciting first step, determining the feasibility of a new medical school in Penobscot County, may spark interest in current physicians to move here, while looking toward building a sustainable physician workforce for the future. Northern Light Health looks forward to expanding its tradition of training the next generation of physicians and building on our existing education and research partnerships with Maine’s public universities.” 

Tripp Umbach was chosen by UMS in part because of its extensive experience in innovative graduate medical education models, including multi-state medical education programs, health system-driven medical schools and state pathway programs with established out-of-state medical schools. 

As part of the study, UMS and Tripp Umbach will engage stakeholders throughout the state, including community and statewide healthcare organizations, state and federal healthcare and Veterans agencies, research institutions, other medical education providers, policymakers and associations, such as those representing hospitals, physicians and primary care providers. 

The study will consider whether a public medical school is necessary for Maine and what resources including funding, personnel, and research and clinical laboratories and equipment would be required if such an initiative is deemed essential. Any proposal to establish a medical school within the System would require a public review process and approval by the UMS Board of Trustees, as well as significant public and philanthropic support.

“We appreciate that Maine policymakers and healthcare leaders see our university as central to addressing the state’s healthcare workforce shortages, which are particularly acute in rural regions where we are so strongly rooted and include the need for more physicians,” said UMaine President Joan Ferrini-Mundy, who is also the System’s vice chancellor for research and innovation. “While we are realistic about the substantial resources required for starting and sustaining a public medical school, we look forward to working with Tripp Umbach and statewide stakeholders to understand the opportunities for our university, the broader System and our partners to build upon our strengths to further improve healthcare access and outcomes for Maine and beyond.”

The UMS Board of Trustees is authorized to operate a college of medicine and confer the degree of Doctor of Medicine, but the public system has never had the resources to do so and has focused on other education and research initiatives to improve Mainers’ health and well-being. 

Last year, Maine’s public universities produced 894 healthcare graduates and brought tens of millions of dollars in related research investment to the state, mostly through UMaine – the state’s only institution to have achieved the prestigious Carnegie R1 classification for very high research activity – and the University of Southern Maine’s Catherine Cutler Institute.

UMaine is also the degree-granting institution that anchors Maine’s Graduate School of Biomedical Science and Engineering, an innovative, multi-institutional education and research consortium that also includes The Jackson Laboratory, the MaineHealth Institute of Research, the MDI Biological Laboratory and the University of New England. In 2018, UMaine launched its Institute of Medicine to coordinate the institution’s accelerating activities and partnerships in health and life science education and cutting-edge research.

The feasibility study and its recommendations are due to the Maine Legislature in November 2025.