Since I can't sleep tonight, perhaps I can clarify some things for you....
I am a first-year MSTP student traveling on the HST pathway. As Bailey has indicated, we are almost perfectly split between NP and HST curriculum this year. And, of that make-up, I know of students who applied to NP alone, HST alone and both programs. Personally, I applied to both programs because I didn't know what would be a better fit for me until I interviewed.
*As a sidenote, we all get along... as a reply to the speculation above in this thread that NP and HST may not get along. 🙂Although for the first two years we will be attending different pre-clinical courses, the clinical years of both the NP and HST curriculum are the same. Like other mudphud classes, though, we cook dinners for each other, meet at a pub after a hard day and even managed to go out dancing one Friday night. After our summer of bonding through the summer class and rotation, we are all focused on the fact that it may take a little more effort to stay in close contact across the different pathways during the stressful times of anatomy, but in my opinion, this just made us even the more committed to doing so.
As for the more fundamental differences between the programs....
The HST entering class is 30 students each year, and this curriculum strives to bridge biology and engineering approaches to medicine. My undergraduate education is in biomedical engineering, but my research interest is in genetics and development biology... for me, even as a 'biologist', I don't see the technical aspects of the curriculum as a negative. Remember, HST students take all of the basic science just like other med students. As for the opinion that this curriculum is 'less clinical', this is a misconception. Like New Pathway students, I will take a course with my first exposure to patients this semester... the HST program has passionate students interested in treating patients just like any other med school program...
As rumored, the class hours are long (much longer than that of NP), but the small class size is definitely a plus for me. I attended lectures while decided and was blown away by the close-knit family atmosphere that this small size induced. As a sidenote, HST runs on a semester schedule so you can sub/work in grad courses at Harvard or MIT (as time allows).
I am a less valuable source about the NP program... but the summary is as follows... short, big lectures in the mornings (120 med students + the dental students) and then the students break done into their tutorial groups... for some PBL style learning. NP is done in blocks.... aka, one course at a time for several weeks at a time... and is known for relying more on self-inspired and directed learning. NP students have more free time, and some MD-PhD students see this as a major benefit because they have more time in the first semesters to get into lab. As a sidenote, Harvard indicates that they are reworking the NP curriculum... so I do not know how much of this basic information will change over the coming years.
Hope this information helps... and best of luck to all of you in your applications.
