Questions about Harvard Extension

[Eskibot]

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I am currently a senior majoring in Civil Engineering. Let me give you guys a little bit of background information. Throughout high school and up until last semester of college, my only goal was to become a Combat Engineer Officer in the United States Marine Corps. I graduated from Officer Candidate School this past summer, but I declined my commission to become an officer. After going through training, I realized that the military lifestyle was not something I really wanted to do. Now I am thinking about taking other career paths because I do not want to limit myself on engineering just because that was my undergrad degree. With that said, I never had too many chances to volunteer at local hospitals or clinics. I worked my freshmen and sophomore summers, and then I was at Marine Corps Officer Candidates School for 10 weeks this past summer.



I am really interested in the medical field and have family that graduated from Harvard so I am considering applying to the premedical program.



I have a few question


1) I see on the "who is eligible" section, it states that applicants with an undergraduate GPA below a 3,0 will be accepted, what is the average GPA that students get accepted? I have a 3.3 right now but my school does the 10 point system, so an 89.5 is a B and is worth 3 points, not 3.7.

2) Should I take the GRE to be more competitive or does it not matter too much?

3) Will not having any prior medical related volunteer experiences hinder my chances of being accepted?

4) if you have been accepted to or graduated from the HES program, what advice(s) do you have for me?

Thank you so much for your time in advance.

 

[GreenDuck12]

1) I see on the "who is eligible" section, it states that applicants with an undergraduate GPA below a 3,0 will be accepted, what is the average GPA that students get accepted? I have a 3.3 right now but my school does the 10 point system, so an 89.5 is a B and is worth 3 points, not 3.7.

I believe in the application for the pre-health certificate program you will be asked to calculate your GPA based on the AAMC calculation. See how this may affect it. (For AAMC a B+ is worth 3.3)

2) Should I take the GRE to be more competitive or does it not matter too much?
I wouldn't go out of your way to take it. You are asked for your ACT/SAT scores.

3) Will not having any prior medical related volunteer experiences hinder my chances of being accepted?
This may be a cause for concern but I am not sure how much it would affect the outcome.

4) if you have been accepted to or graduated from the HES program, what advice(s) do you have for me?
If you apply and are not accepted, you can still enroll in the pre-med classes. You can also apply at a later date if you are interested in the pre-health certificate / committee letter.

On a general note I would not recommend jumping into classes/a pre-health program without getting some experience for what being a doctor is like. Take some time to volunteer/shadow/interview doctors to find out if this is really what you want to do. As Goro likes to say "Medical schools aren't going anywhere." Best of luck to you

 

[EngiNERD_Medicine]

Amen!

Also, you may send the program an email(email can be found on the program page).

Dr. William Fixsen is prompt with his replies, and gets straight to the point with a tailor made suggestion pertaining to your case. Though his email is shared on several pages in this website, I contacted them using the official email provided.

 

[ghostman]

3) Will not having any prior medical related volunteer experiences hinder my chances of being accepted?
This may be a cause for concern but I am not sure how much it would affect the outcome.

I actually didn't have medical experience when I applied to HCP, so I can't say it hindered me. But GreenDuck is right - it's better to get experience to make sure you REALLY want to do this.

I'm not sure about bloodbath, but HES is no walk in the park. If you know you're not good in science, don't expect this to pull up your GPA. I knew a few classmates who had to drop classes because they knew they couldn't pull off a good grade. But if you work hard, attend all the classes, do all the homework, it's possible to pull off a 4.0 GPA from HES. Being in HCP entitles you a committee letter if you maintain certain criteria, but that letter still costs $500.

 

[daivimarga]

I just found out about the sponsorship fee for the letter yesterday. It's odd to me that you have to pay for a LOR. what's that about?

Also I don't really understand why everyone has such divergent views of the program. I read in a forum that the average in Bio was like a 50%? Then others say it's not that bad.


They don't have linkages or stats on acceptance. I'm guessing if you have Harvard classes under your belt though, you'll be fine...

 

[GreenDuck12]

Sponsorship is different than a letter of recommendation. You can ask professors for LORs on an individual basis. Sponsorship involves a committee letter, which a composite recommendation of multiple faculty members that goes into greater detail about your performance in the program. My guess for the fee is that it is a more time intensive process that involves more work from admins (from what i have heard it takes about a full day to write a committee letter for a student). For some it is worth the extra fee and for others its not.

HES is also not a formal post bac program. They accept any student that is willing to pay for the course. The post-bac programs that have linkages (Goucher and Bryn Mawr, for example) accept a small number of students. It is also important to keep in mind that maintaining a linkage agreement does not guarantee than any students from a given program will get admitted through that route. Usually the number of students who get in through linkages, as a whole, is quite small.

I just found out about the sponsorship fee for the letter yesterday. It's odd to me that you have to pay for a LOR. what's that about?

Also I don't really understand why everyone has such divergent views of the program. I read in a forum that the average in Bio was like a 50%? Then others say it's not that bad.


They don't have linkages or stats on acceptance. I'm guessing if you have Harvard classes under your belt though, you'll be fine...

 

[daivimarga]

Ah thanks @GreenDuck12 that makes sense!


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

 

[drtobeintx]

Here's what I know about HES and why I decided against it. I've already taken my pre reqs for med school as a non trad applicant. However, my GPA in under grad as a business major was low. And my mcat under the new scale was a 478.

I didn't prep at all for the mcat. However my pre req GPA was good. So I thought if I enrolled in at HES and did the post bacc, that would make up for the MCAT and UGPA. Wrong!

In my case my efforts should be placed on the mcat and not hes and their sponsorship.

 

[Seattle Mariners Fan]

With respect, I do not think there is any making up for a 478 MCAT.