OU-TU School of Community Medicine
Organization
Senate Bill 453 was passed in 1972 to create the Tulsa Medical College, a clinical branch of the OU College of Medicine. The first 17 medical students began classes in Tulsa in 1974. Governor Henry Bellmon signed legislation in 1989 to change the name of the Tulsa Medical College to the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine-Tulsa. Along with the College of Pharmacy and College of Education, the College of Medicine-Tulsa moved into the Schusterman Center in 2000. The College of Medicine-Tulsa changed its focus in 2008 after the George Kaiser Family Foundation made a $50 million gift to imporve the health of Oklahomas through community-based medicine. The College of Medicine-Tulsa became the first School of Community Medicine in the nation. Later that same year, the Physician Assistant program began through pernership with the University of Tulsa (TU). OU officially partnered with TU in 2009 to create a four-year medical school in Tulsa, to be called the OU-TU School of Community Medicine. The name was officially changed when the first class of four-year medical students began classes in 2015.