UTEP School of Pharmacy Newsletter

Celebrating Pharmacy Month and the Legacy of Barry Coleman

By Mario Vazquez

Throughout October, in celebration of Pharmacy Month, The University of Texas at El Paso’s School of Pharmacy holds events that unite its community through fun and informative activities and sessions. These events include a faculty/staff lunch, pharmacy olympics, a triathlon, pie a professor, and the masked singer, to name a few. Notable among the events is Barry Coleman Day, held on Oct. 19^th, which is best visualized by the showcase of brightly assorted bowties worn by students, faculty and staff – their way of honoring the man who dreamed of a future they now experience.

Barry Coleman, born in Chicago, came to El Paso by way of his Fort Bliss army assignment. A pharmacist by training who was known for his bowties, he opened the first location of Coleman Pharmacies at the intersection of Yandell and Campbell streets, just three blocks from the School of Pharmacy’s current location.

A staunch advocate for the pharmacy profession, Coleman began discussions with late UTEP President Diana Natalicio more than three decades ago about bringing a pharmacy program to the university – a goal born from his desire to address El Paso’s low ratio of population to pharmacist.

“He saw the potential that El Paso and UTEP had,” said Nina Bustamante, a third-year student in the Doctor of Pharmacy program who is related to the Coleman family. “He wasn’t from El Paso, but he loved this city and claimed it as his home. He wanted to provide a need that he believed our community deserved.”

Due in large part to Coleman’s efforts, UTEP began its pharmacy program in 1999 as a collaboration with The University of Texas at Austin. Coleman, however, envisioned a bigger future. He created an endowment at UTEP, rallied support locally and leveraged his connections at the state level to help the university make its case for the state funding needed to open a school of pharmacy. In July 2015, two months after Coleman’s passing, the School of Pharmacy was approved, and Coleman’s dream was realized.

In the short amount of time since the school officially opened in 2017, the Doctor of Pharmacy program is among the top five nationwide in producing Latino graduates, has more Latino faculty than any pharmacy school in the U.S., and is led by one of only two Latino deans among schools of pharmacy.

Decades after Coleman’s initial conversation with President Natalicio, students in the four-year Doctor of Pharmacy program mostly hail from El Paso, with many reporting that they plan to remain in the community. Each year’s crop of graduates also increases the number of Hispanics in the pharmacy profession, which according to the Center for Health Workforce Studies, stands at only 4.3%.

“Pharmacy Month and Barry Coleman Day are opportunities to celebrate our success in raising the bar with respect to how we’ve increased access to education in pharmacy and the pharmacy services provided to our community,” said School of Pharmacy Founding Dean José O. Rivera, Pharm.D. “But it’s also a time to remind our students, faculty and staff that there is more to accomplish and that we must each strive to be the next great agent of impact ... like Barry Coleman was for our program, for UTEP and for El Paso.”

List of Pharmacy Month activities:
Oct 16^th: Affirmation Board
Oct. 16^th: Faculty/Staff Daily Drawings
Oct. 17^th: Faculty/Staff lunch
Oct. 24^th: Triathlon Event
Oct. 25^th: Blossom to Remedy: Flower to Drug Challenge
Oct. 26^th: Pie a Professor
Oct. 30^th: The Masked Singer