Hello, and I was wondering if I could get some help in a situation I have found myself in. I have applied and been accepted into the Citadel Military College of South Carolina. I have always wanted a military education over normal college, but I have also wanted a career in the medical field. I talked with a woman who helps students with premed at the Citadel and she told me that I should apply for the HPSP. I also wanted to apply for ROTC because the Citadel is a very costly school. From my understanding, If I got the ROTC scholarship, I would serve my time after completing my education at the Citadel and would have to wait to go to medical school. I was wondering if there was a way to be able to wait until after medical school to serve my time for both ROTC and HPSP, or if there is another way of going about this. Perhaps join the reserves and help pay for the Citadel, then go to med school, and then go active duty as a surgeon or anesthesiologist? If you could get back to me with any information about this I would be deeply grateful.
All Branch Topic (ABT) Citadel ROTC + HPSP Problem
- Thread starter Lefty0011
- Start date
- Joined
- Apr 16, 2005
- Messages
- 1,824
- Reaction score
- 430
If you are talking about Navy ROTC then they currently are not taking ROTC the med school. I believe the other Services are. The general consensus is if you want to go to medical school don't do ROTC (or those other ideas you floated).
Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile app
Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile app
D
deleted480308
Doctors make enough money to pay off undergrad, don't do anything to hinder your odds at making it to medical school like rotc
- Joined
- Feb 27, 2008
- Messages
- 1,339
- Reaction score
- 179
Don't do ROTC if your goal is to go straight from undergraduate to medical school. If you do ROTC it should be with the intention and desire to serve as a line officer for at least your minimum commitment. Sometimes they let people go from ROTC to staff corps jobs but there are years where they let zero people do that. (and no amount of awesome on your part will make them open up a position that doesn't exist) If you do ROTC assume you will have to wait a few years to go to medical school.
The other thing to remember is that if you are signing up for ROTC with the intention of also letting the military pick up the tab for medical school that is a long commitment. 8-11 years may or may not seem like a long time but remember that is after 4 years of college 4 years of med school and 3-6 years of residency. So you would be tying yourself to the bureaucracy in some form for at least 19-25 years. You may love it and wind up in the military that long anyway but that is a long time in the future to make a decision about when you are 18.
The other thing to remember is that if you are signing up for ROTC with the intention of also letting the military pick up the tab for medical school that is a long commitment. 8-11 years may or may not seem like a long time but remember that is after 4 years of college 4 years of med school and 3-6 years of residency. So you would be tying yourself to the bureaucracy in some form for at least 19-25 years. You may love it and wind up in the military that long anyway but that is a long time in the future to make a decision about when you are 18.
- Joined
- Dec 15, 2005
- Messages
- 15,379
- Reaction score
- 21,538
Something glossed over in these threads is that most of the discussions include the assumption that the person is going to get into medical school. Most pre-med hopefuls don't. A small minority do.
So while I'm totally in agreement that ROTC is probably a net minus for people who go on to medical school ... I'd still hate to see someone who really wants to serve pass up on ROTC, or an academy, or another school like the Citadel that they really want to go to. Just on the chance that they'll actually get accepted to medical school. Because the harsh truth is that they probably won't get in anyway.
Every HS student who thinks premed is planning to be a 4.0 undergrad and rock the MCAT and then get in anywhere he wants (I was once that HS student too).
Just to throw some mud in the water and make your choice harder ...
So while I'm totally in agreement that ROTC is probably a net minus for people who go on to medical school ... I'd still hate to see someone who really wants to serve pass up on ROTC, or an academy, or another school like the Citadel that they really want to go to. Just on the chance that they'll actually get accepted to medical school. Because the harsh truth is that they probably won't get in anyway.
Every HS student who thinks premed is planning to be a 4.0 undergrad and rock the MCAT and then get in anywhere he wants (I was once that HS student too).
Just to throw some mud in the water and make your choice harder ...
- Joined
- Jul 24, 2000
- Messages
- 3,525
- Reaction score
- 323
I did ROTC+HPSP and was lucky enough to get in my first try and be allowed to go. thanks to ROTC I've been taking the APFT over 20 years now. if I did it over again I would do ROTC + my own dime or scholarships +HPSP. If I hadn't done a fellowship I could have been out summer of 2015 but I would have been miserable chugging away at primary care.
--your friendly neighborhood choose left, ok, choose right, ok, choose middle, squish like grape caveman
Last edited:
- Joined
- Feb 22, 2016
- Messages
- 374
- Reaction score
- 216
It's called Educational Delay. From Army ROTC in the last 10 years there have been between 20 and 45 Medical Corps Educational Delays granted each year though not all of them got into medical school. The 45 was an anomaly in 2010. Generally the number is closer to 20 for Army ROTC medical Ed Delay recipients. This is a small number compared to the number that start off as premed students. There is no guarantee for Ed Delay.
The Citadel and ROTC will interfere with your premedical education but it can be done. If Army is your preference, search in this Military Medicine Forum for 'Army ROTC' to understand the pro's/con's, paths, and pitfalls. Like others have said - you will owe a long time, might be diverted for years or forever, and there are numerous other paths to your goal. Getting into medical school is the hard part.
- Joined
- Nov 24, 2002
- Messages
- 23,746
- Reaction score
- 12,048
I graduated 1992 from VMI. During my cadetship, mandatory commissioning was abandoned, but, to receive a degree, the cadet had to have 8 semesters of ROTC. Non-contracted and non-scholarship students were referred to as "special students". Incidentally, whereas we were nearly universally offensive to each other (1300 18-21 year old guys are pretty abrasive), there was nothing implied about being a "special student". The point is, you MUST take ROTC classes there, but are NOT required to take a commission. However, as stated, if you are scholarship or contracted, then they got you.
I was fortunate that I was there on an academic ride, and I didn't owe anyone anything. 25 and 30 years ago, there were guys that were Army that, on commissioning, were "120 day wonders", with 120 days active duty. Those days are long, long gone. If you get a scholarship, and take it, do it fully expecting to be an unrestricted line officer.
Now, as I recall, there was one guy a few years before me that went to Hopkins for med school, and is now a neurosurgeon, and a guy 2 years ahead of me that went to Duke Med, and is IM/Peds. My class has 3 doctors out of 200 that graduated my year.
The bottom line is that I am proof you can attend a senior military college and still go to med school. At the same time, it's definitely NOT the easiest way to do it.
I was fortunate that I was there on an academic ride, and I didn't owe anyone anything. 25 and 30 years ago, there were guys that were Army that, on commissioning, were "120 day wonders", with 120 days active duty. Those days are long, long gone. If you get a scholarship, and take it, do it fully expecting to be an unrestricted line officer.
Now, as I recall, there was one guy a few years before me that went to Hopkins for med school, and is now a neurosurgeon, and a guy 2 years ahead of me that went to Duke Med, and is IM/Peds. My class has 3 doctors out of 200 that graduated my year.
The bottom line is that I am proof you can attend a senior military college and still go to med school. At the same time, it's definitely NOT the easiest way to do it.
- Joined
- Feb 27, 2008
- Messages
- 1,339
- Reaction score
- 179
Hah yeah that's a good way to put it. I did ROTC to USUHS so I've been doing the PRT for 12 years with 12 more to go minimum.
Oh I totally agree. I forgot to include this verbiage in my response above but my usual advice on this topic is that you should only do ROTC to pay for undergrad with the intention of going to medical school if your answer to the question "What would you do if you couldn't go to medical school" is "be a line officer in the military" (for at least 4 years). Anyone doing ROTC that wouldn't otherwise have done ROTC if medical school wasn't on the table is potentially going to end up unhappy. ROTC is a great program though and I would certainly encourage it for anyone that wants to join the military as an officer. It's just that the earlier in your career you decide to join the military the more flexible you need to be about where that career will go. (which I was fine with but I don't imagine everyone out there would be)Something glossed over in these threads is that most of the discussions include the assumption that the person is going to get into medical school. Most pre-med hopefuls don't. A small minority do.
So while I'm totally in agreement that ROTC is probably a net minus for people who go on to medical school ... I'd still hate to see someone who really wants to serve pass up on ROTC, or an academy, or another school like the Citadel that they really want to go to. Just on the chance that they'll actually get accepted to medical school. Because the harsh truth is that they probably won't get in anyway.
Every HS student who thinks premed is planning to be a 4.0 undergrad and rock the MCAT and then get in anywhere he wants (I was once that HS student too).
Just to throw some mud in the water and make your choice harder ...
Last edited:
- Joined
- Feb 27, 2007
- Messages
- 5,710
- Reaction score
- 5,459
I can't fathom paying private school money to get yelled at and not be allowed to meet girls.
- Joined
- Jun 10, 2016
- Messages
- 1,107
- Reaction score
- 679
Perhaps reserved might have been a bad idea.. so I searched up ROTC.
Wanted to join ROTC for that Tuition coverage & military experience.
Guess I'll just leave.. (lol)
- Joined
- May 10, 2013
- Messages
- 964
- Reaction score
- 355
I became quite familiar with the Citadel as my stepson graduated from there. The first week there is worse than bootcamp (Navy not Marine Corps). The professors wear Army uniforms and are members of the unorganized state militia.
- Joined
- Jul 24, 2000
- Messages
- 3,525
- Reaction score
- 323
"unorganized state militia?" sounds like what i would call a "family reunion." only not many of them I'd consider to be professor material.
--your friendly neighborhood 2 generations removed from using outhouses caveman
- Joined
- May 26, 2007
- Messages
- 7,527
- Reaction score
- 4,514
The weirdest thing is that most of them don't actually join the military. I can see talking yourself into the idea that a 'real' military education is necessary for future officers, but who are these people who want to go through just the hazing and skip the rest?
- Joined
- May 31, 2015
- Messages
- 11
- Reaction score
- 7
Don't let the fact that it is a military school fool you. The school is located in quite possibly the best college town in the country near the college of Charleston that is 80% female. While during the week there certainly is a different experience, but on the weekends The Citadel turns into one of the great party colleges anywhere ... That place is wild.
"A drinking school with a military problem"
- Joined
- Dec 15, 2005
- Messages
- 15,379
- Reaction score
- 21,538
If the 80-20 female-male ratio at Charleston is a great reason to be at the Citadel ... why not just go to Charleston?
- Joined
- Jul 23, 2004
- Messages
- 11,775
- Reaction score
- 2,027
Trump sure comes to mind...
So advice please! trying to figure out the best path, been talking to recuritors but I don't fully trust them. I'm thinking ROTC to Ed dely to HPSP OR Reserves to ROTC to Ed dely then to HPSP . I know it will be alot of time in the military but I'm OK with that, if I can serve after I get my med degree..The recuritor said that if I'm in the reserves I'll be at the top of the list for ROTC scholarship along with my grades ect. But it seems like ROTC may interfere with me being able to go to med school right away if education delay is denied. Reasons that Ed delay would be denied? How early would you need to apply for the delay? And what's best Air Force or Navy? Ultimate goal is specialty in Pediatrics.
