Today I Filed the Paperwork to Found a University

Not metaphorically. This week I sat down and filed the Articles of Incorporation and registered agent papers within a certain state, for Landmark University of Health Sciences — a nonprofit dedicated to training the next generation of allied health professionals faster, more affordably, and without the debt load that keeps so many capable people out of this field.

I want to be honest about what this milestone is and isn't. It isn't accreditation. It isn't a campus, a faculty roster, or a first cohort of students. It's a filing — the legal starting gun for something much bigger. But after years of writing, researching, and arguing for a different model of health professions education, it's the first step that's actually on the record.

Why I'm doing this

I've spent my career moving between the clinic, the classroom, and the page — as a physical therapist, a health coach, an educator, and a writer. Across all of it, one problem keeps showing up: the pipeline into allied health careers is too narrow, too slow, and too expensive.

The data backs this up. My own research into student loan debt across health professions — what I've calledthe weight of the white coat— points to the same conclusion I keep reaching from the ground level as a clinician and educator: we are pricing capable people out of careers the healthcare system desperately needs them to fill. Every extra year of school and every extra dollar of debt is a filter, and it isn't filtering for competence — it's filtering for who can afford to wait.

I've also spent time making the case for apprenticeship-based models in health professions education — accelerated, hands-on, mentorship-driven pathways that get people into practice faster without cutting corners on rigor. Landmark University of Health Sciences is where that thinking stops being a white paper and starts being an institution.

What LUHS is meant to be

LUHS will be built around accelerated, hybrid, low-debt training for allied health professionals — a model designed around the six-pillar framework I've been developing and writing about for the past several years. The goal isn't to cut corners; it's to cut the waste: the redundant coursework, the debt financing, the multi-year timelines that don't actually make someone a better clinician, just a more indebted one.

This is a long build. There's a board to seat, accreditation to pursue, curriculum to finalize, a campus — physical or otherwise — to stand up. I don't have a finish line to point to yet. What I have is a filed incorporation, a clear mission, and a body of work behind it that I've been building toward this moment for a long time.

What's next

I'll be sharing this build in public as it happens — the milestones, the setbacks, the decisions. If you work in allied health education, workforce development, accreditation, or funding, and this mission resonates with you, I'd like to hear from you.

More to come.