AACP

Pharmacy SuRGE

Pharmacy SuRGE (Scholarship, Research and Graduate Education)

Pharmacy SuRGE is an AACP initiative to bring together leaders from pharmacy schools to advance research, research training and graduate education. SuRGE meetings provide an opportunity to discuss and develop strategies for supporting research, identify opportunities for collaboration, and share experience in navigating the changing research regulation and funding landscape. SuRGE is envisioned as a starting point for activities that can be continued through AACP affiliate groups such as the Graduate Education Special Interest Group (SIG.)

Quarterly SuRGE meetings are held from 1–2:30 p.m. ET on the third Tuesday of March, June, September and December. Please contact Dorothy Farrell for more information.

The next Pharmacy SuRGE meeting will be held on Tuesday, March 17, 2026.

Agenda

Tuesday, March 17, 2026

Please note: All times listed below are in Eastern Time.

Cultivating Research Partnerships with Industry

1:00 p.m.–1:05 p.m.

Welcome and Update on AACP activities

Dorothy Farrell, Ph.D., Senior Director of Science Policy and Chief Science Officer, AACP

Overview of upcoming AACP programs and last call for comments on the SuRGE Community Statement padlet.

1:05 p.m.–1:15 p.m.

Setting the Stage

SuRGE Planning Group

1:15 p.m.–1:55 p.m.

Research Partnership with Industry

Ajay K. Banga, Ph.D., Chair and Professor, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Co-Director of the Center for Drug Delivery, T.P. Haines Endowed Chair in Transdermal Delivery Systems, Mercer University College of Pharmacy

Tim Tracy, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer, MoglingBio and Principal, Tracy Consultants

How can faculty and leaders engage partners in industry to support and advance research at pharmacy schools?

1:55 p.m.–2:30 p.m.

Discussion - Challenges and Opportunities for Research Partnerships

Moderator Mansoor M. Amiji, Ph.D., University Distinguished Professor, Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences & Professor of Chemical Engineering, Bouve College of Health Sciences at Northeastern University

The June 2026 SuRGE meeting will focus on graduate training and instilling competencies for successful careers outside of academia.

SuRGE Goals and Objectives

A Pharmacy SuRGE Community Taskforce has been established for 2025-2026 by Graduate Education SIG Chair Om Perumal. The taskforce will develop a community statement and articulate the goals and objectives for the SuRGE initiative and community.

The goals and objectives of the initial SuRGE meetings have been to

Devise a strategy for AACP to expand its support of college of pharmacy research and graduate programs.
Engage individuals with research and graduate education leadership responsibilities across the academy to expand this community within AACP.
Initiate the drafting of a Community Statement and a Pharmacy Research Statement.

Background Materials

The American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy (AACP) is the national association for pharmacy education in the United States, and our 143 institutional members are the colleges and schools of pharmacy accredited by or with candidate status from the American Council on Pharmaceutical Education (ACPE.) Our mission is to lead and partner with our members in advancing pharmacy education, research, scholarship, practice and service to improve societal health.

There are more than 6200 full and part-time faculty members in pharmacy schools in the United States, teaching in both professional and graduate programs. Enrollment in these programs includes more than 44,000 PharmD students, just over 3500 Ph.D. students, and nearly 1900 students enrolled in M.S. programs.

In 2022-23, programs in pharmacy schools conferred

12,639 Pharm.D. degrees
1,888 M.S. degrees
657 Ph.D. degrees

The most common Ph.D. degrees conferred by discipline were

223, Pharmaceutics
143, Medicinal Chemistry
129, Pharmacology
76, Social and Administrative Sciences
30, Pharmacy Practice

Other disciplines in which Ph.D. degrees were conferred include biological & medical informatics; biomolecular sciences; chemistry; drug discovery; immunology; industrial physical pharmacy; pharmacogenomics; pharmacotherapy; pharmacometrics and systems pharmacology; and translational science.

According to data collected through the AACP Funded Research Grant Data collection, in federal fiscal year 2023, 1772 investigators at pharmacy schools were principal or co-investigators on research grants or contracts originating outside their home school or college. These extramural grants totaled over $740 million dollars in NIH awards, $110 in other federal awards and $190 million in funding from non-federal sources.

Data on student enrollments and degrees conferred taken from AACP Office of Institutional Research and Effectiveness “First Professional and Graduate Enrollment Trends Interactive Dashboard” and “Fall 2023 Degrees Conferred - Profile of Pharmacy Students”

AACP Competency Framework for Graduate Education

Six Domains of Graduate Education in the Pharmaceutical Sciences, taken from Competency, Programming, and Emerging Innovation in Graduate Education within Schools of Pharmacy: The Report of the 2016-2017 Research and Graduate Affairs Committee

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