The Columbia University Roy and Diana Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons (VP&S) is the medical school of Columbia University, located at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan. Founded in 1767 by Samuel Bard as the medical department of King's College (now Columbia University), VP&S was the first medical school in the Thirteen Colonies to award the Doctor of Medicine (MD) degree. Beginning in 1993, VP&S was also the first U.S. medical school to hold a white coat ceremony. Following a gift of $250 million from Roy and Diana Vagelos in 2017, the school became the first medical school in the nation to replace loans with scholarships for all students who qualify for financial aid when it did so in 2018. Columbia is affiliated with NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, the nation's 4th-ranked hospital according to U.S. News & World Report. Students additionally rotate through its affiliate hospitals: Harlem Hospital Center; Stamford Hospital in Stamford, CT; and Mary Imogene Bassett Hospital in Cooperstown, NY. History Colonial years In 1767, Dr. Samuel Bard, an alumnus of then-King's College and the University of Edinburgh Medical School, opened a medical school at Columbia. At the time, the medical program at King's College was the first to open in the Province of New York and only the second to be opened in the American Colonies. The school was modelled on the University of Edinburgh Medical School, which at the time was the world leader. Three years later, in 1770, King's College conferred its first medical degree to Robert Tucker, this would prove to be the first Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) awarded in the Thirteen Colonies. Prior to King's College of Medicine offering of the M.D. degree, other American and Canadian medical schools had been offering the M.B. degree. King's College continued to educate young doctors until 1776 when the school was forced to close due to the onset of the Revolutionary War and the occupation of New York by British soldiers. King's College remained closed until 1784 when the school was reopened as Columbia College and in December of that year, the faculty of the medical school were re-instated. In 1791, Bard, now a prominent colonial physician whom George Washington credited with saving his life, was named dean of the medical school. Merger with the College of Physicians and Surgeons In 1807, with a growing young nation in need of