Foreign Property News | Posted by Zarni Kyaw
The world’s richest woman, Alice Walton, has just opened a new medical school in Bentonville, Arkansas, with a bold promise: free tuition for its first five graduating classes. According to CBS News, the Alice L. Walton School of Medicine aims to transform how future doctors are trained by focusing on whole-person care, including mental health, lifestyle medicine, and emotional well-being.
The school accepted only 48 students out of more than 2,000 applicants, making it one of the most selective programs in the country. According to the school’s official site, the campus is designed to promote healing, featuring rooftop gardens, wellness studios, and spaces for reflection.
Walton, who was inspired by her own experience recovering from a serious car accident, believes medicine should treat more than just symptoms, it should care for the whole human being.
By offering free tuition and a radically holistic curriculum, Walton hopes to reshape the future of healthcare. Her initiative is not just a philanthropic gesture but a challenge to rethink how doctors are educated and how healing should happen.
The school is located in a 154,000-square-foot, four-story building designed specifically to support a whole-health philosophy. It accepted less than 3 percent of over 2,000 applicants and provides free tuition for its first five graduating classes.
A Rooftop That Becomes Park
Atop the building sits a 2-acre green roof, currently the largest in the region, that transforms the structure into a living landscape, a rooftop park complete with native trees, shrubs, and perennials such as redbuds, sumacs, and catalpas.
This intensive green roof rests on over 12 feet of Geofoam, bringing substantial earth and greenery into architectural form.
An Outdoor Classroom — Everywhere
The campus landscape, crafted by OSD (Office of Strategy + Design), includes healing gardens, meditation terraces, a woodland amphitheater with cascades, wetlands, outdoor classrooms, and even a teaching farm.
Together, these features grok the whole-person ethos by giving students and the community space to gather, reflect, and heal.
Over 550 trees and 140,000 native plantings were added across the site, reinforcing local ecology and offering sensory richness year-round.
Spaces That Blend Inside and Out
Internally, the four levels accommodate learning halls, small-group rooms, a library, clinical and anatomy labs, simulation spaces, student lounges, a theater, and wellness and recreation areas.
Key communal features include a public gallery, a café, terraces, and a lobby art gallery that connects directly to the natural surroundings, inviting public engagement both inside and beyond academic hours.
Ref: World’s Richest Woman Alice Walton Opens Medical School with Free Tuition
