Emorygranger said:
thanks so much for the insight! With Goucher, what resources have been offered to you outside the classroom? For example, tutorials, clinical hands-on experience, advising? study groups? I guess what makes it so successful, aside from the students it attracts?!
Advising: we have two full-time advisors, strictly for the post-bacs. Considering there are only 25-30 people per class, you can imagine that it's very easy to get face time with them, and they know each of us personally. They walk you through the application process, help w/ writing the essay, prep you for your interviews, etc. They both really know the admissions process inside and out, and can help you tailor your app to the med schools you are interested in.
Tutoring: each class has a full-time TA who is a student from the previous year's class. This person's sole job is to help you with any coursework you are struggling with, as well as to give you advice and support from someone who's "been there before".
Clinical experience: there are no classes on Tuesdays. During the fall semester, you use this time to do volunteer or clinical work, which the advisors help you find. I had a really cool experience shadowing an oncologist, and got a great letter of rec out of it.
MCAT prep: included with the program.
Teaching: this is a small liberal arts college, and most of the profs are very, very, good. They are also very approachable and know you by name. This means that a) it's easy to go see them for help if you are having trouble with something, and b) they are able to write you a good letter of rec at the end of the year.
But in my opinion, the best part of the program is that the post-bac courses are 100% separate from the undergrad ones. This means that the professors know exactly why you're there, and they try to make sure to emphasize topics relevant to medicine and the mcat. They also don't grade on a curve, and truly want everyone to get an A. That's not to say that A's are just given out freely; you really need to be prepared to work hard if you come here. But there's absolutely no desire to weed anybody out. They want every single person who starts the program to do well and go on to get into (and suceed in) med school. This creates a totally different environment from the type one normally sees in pre-med courses. For one, it takes a little bit of the pressure off, because even though the courses are still hard, you know that nobody is going to create arbitrary barriers to your success. Secondly, it means that there is no reason to feel competitive with your classmates, and indeed, people in my class as a rule are very friendly with each other. Our class socializes together a lot, study groups are common, and nobody feels hesitation in asking a classmate for help with a subject.
All of this adds up to an important point I'd like to finish on: a lot of school's advertise the sucess rate of their program in placing graduates to med school. What many of them don't advertise is how many of the people who start their program fail to finish. At Goucher (and I've also heard this about Bryn Mawr), the attrition rate is very low; almost everybody who starts the program finishes it. So when they advertise 100% success in getting people into school, that's actually a pretty accurate depiction. At many programs where people are thrown into huge classes with undergrads and are graded on the curve, it's not uncommon for half the post-bac class to wash out. That doesn't mean you can't find success or hapiness in those programs, but it is something to think about when you are planning to invest this much time and money in your education.
Good luck to you.
If you only knew what schools my classmates have been getting into this cycle...
