Currently a P3, selected for the 2 year scholarship
GPA: 3.7 from a top 10 school
My letters of rec were from my current hospital pharmacy manager, undergrad PI, and an undergrad professor. They were all very strong. I asked 5 people in total and my recruiter picked the strongest 3.
The weakest part of my app was that I only joined one student org and didn't participate much in it. I'm not passionate about any of the ones at my school and spent my time doing other things like working on my physical fitness by going to the gym 5-6 days per week for about 2 hours each time. I do this by reading slides on my phone in between sets if anyone was curious; it played a huge role in boosting my GPA.
Interview: This lasted for about 2.5 hours for me and went extremely well, the person gave me a perfect score and was able to write an incredible recommendation for me.
Work experience: 1 year at CVS, 2 years at a hospital where I currently work. Undergrad research for 2 years.
Also, one super important thing to note is that I applied last year as a P2 and was selected as first alternate then. My app was almost exactly the same this year, except I boosted my GPA from a 3.6 to a 3.7. It took a lot of effort and I made that a cornerstone of my application this year.
The Air Force is looking for candidates who are competitive enough to be selected for residency (that was my plan b if HPSP fell through) but want to serve in the military instead. They also filter out people who aren't super passionate about joining. Also, my goal is to spend the entirety of my career in the Air Force, and I made sure to let them know that.
I hope this helps, I'm thinking about making a different post about the process and the exact benefits (because pharmacy ones are hard to find online) after I sign the paperwork.
