Struggling? Barely got accepted? Hoping to get lucky? Please reconsider

[Amicable Angora]

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So you got into pharmacy school, congratulations. Now pay close attention because I want to help you.

For the purposes of this article, it does not matter as much which school you got into. So for all intensive purposes, an acceptance to a top tier school or a 2nd tier school, etc. is the same for this article. However, ask yourself, "Did you struggle to get in?" In these times, there seems to be an increasing amount of applicants who apply (some of which get accepted), despite struggling and having less than ideal qualifications.

The following remarks are based upon observations I've made while helping people throughout the admissions process. Others are based upon my current experiences in pharmacy school. Let's elaborate by what I mean by struggling, struggling entails some combination (not all inclusive) of the following:

1. You had low grades (no a singular (or even two) C is not a low grade) at some point of your academic career.
2. You went through some horrible event that screwed up your academics.
3. You had breaks in your education (exception, a truly benign leave of absence) and had to be readmitted/restart your program/transfer multiple times or retake courses multiple times.
4. You have terrible letters of recommendation and/or a terrible relationship with your instructors/bosses 5. You had to work 5+ years as a pharmacy technician or other related job to compensate for deficits in your resume.
6. You are a returning student and older (this is subjective and can be as young as 25-26 or 33 for example).
7. You had to exploit backdoor methods to get in (connections, race/sex ratio)
8. Your PCAT was horrible (50% or worse) but your GPA is 3.5+

If this is you, yet you got accepted, I strongly suggest you follow this advice:

1. For those borderline applicants who got accepted to tier 1 or tier 2 schools and only struggled slightly, drop down from a higher tier school to a lower tier school that you can confirm is less rigorous.
2. Choose another career path. In case 1, this choice is a simple choice designed to protect you from failing out. There are a tremendous amount of cutthroat people in school (of any sort). Pharmacy school is harder than undergraduate (exception, see disclaimer at bottom), and will only get harder. It is better to err on the side of caution and study on your own level, rather than becoming the pawns of academic war where your failures set the curve (if any) and glorify gunners/over achievers. Case 2 is, unfortunately, sad and complicated. I feel that students on this forum have been mislead by the underdog success stories that pop up, especially as of late. For the stories that are true, I congratulate them and wish them luck. However, for every story that is true, there are 10 stories of untold failures following acceptance.

You need to know yourself. We Americas have a tendency to overestimate our abilities and underestimate adversity. I will do you a favor and ask you the hard questions then, so ask yourself:

1. Am I prepared to be the low tier student among sharks? (Social harassment, theft of scholarships, etc.)
2. Am I ready to sacrifice excessively to compensate for my weaknesses?
3. Am I prepared to fail out after being accepted?
4. Am I prepared to likely only have 1 career choice in pharmacy because of my low grades?
5. Am I ready to study like mad for an exam but only pull a C?
6. If you are older, do you really feel like being treated like a child and going through the harassment that you find in education?

Consider this carefully. Just because you get accepted to a school does not mean you really are ready or capable of handling the path. Or just because you get accepted and somehow are able to barely pass or cheat your way through shouldn't make you decide to do pharmacy or any career path you struggle this much in.

There are so many incompetent idiots among my class that it is astounding. I really do not want to work with these people in the future, it's really sad; one of the school admissions directors told me that my class has some of the most socially awkward and academically questionable students that he has ever seen. If I ever work on an admissions committee I will almost certainly auto reject a candidate with a high GPA who has a low PCAT. The PCAT is not a difficult exam if you take the time to prepare for it. I can only imagine a person with a 3.8 GPA and a 30 PCAT is an idiot with a joke BA/BS degree who sucked up to professors, possibly cheated, and exploited the joke of education today.

Please do not let this be you.

Closing disclaimer: If your major was something incredibly hard like any type of engineering, or biochemistry, physics, math, etc., feel free to pursue pharmacy even with lower than average grades. Unfortunately your major may have screwed your GPA, but realistically, difficulty wise, your 2.5 is superior to a 3.5 liberal arts major.

 

[oldstock]

Thanks for the advice. Very good advice with good dose of reality. However, I look at the picture with "Yes we can!" kindda attitude 🙂

The reality is that the admission standard has been going down because more and more schools keep opening up and ACPE / AACP allow this to be happening. Many "weak" candidates / applicants got accepted to pharmacy schools as the result.

But, for the ones that got in regardless of their low stats, consider this is the chance of your life time to accomplish something good for yourself. Even if you are weak before, you can turn around and be stronger with winner attitude. You can if you put in the work.

It is all about the mind, discipline, persistence and hard work imho!

I am an older / non-trad student with decent stats who got 2 acceptance (1 top tier, 1 mid tier) for this application cycle (Class of 2018). And I have no illusion that pharmacy school is going to be easy now. Or job prospect and pharmacy residency in the future.

Here's what I am going to do for myself to prepare for the rigors of pharmacy study and challenges of the profession in general:

1. self-assess and reevaluate honestly and realistically my strengths and weaknesses in everything ranging from my own physical strength / endurance to academic performance vs the reality

2. devise a plan now to grow and expand my strengths and eliminate / improve on my weaknesses

3. take self-responsibility in every action of mine but dwell and be inspired on positive energy / people / stories

4. always be prepared and plan ahead with backup plans and ready to modify plans

5. continually and regularly working on my discipline / reward system / schedule and strictly follow them

6. plan and do everything early rather than late and seek help immediately when there is a 1st sign of trouble

7. start small, bit by bit, and successfully complete those small tasks everyday and build a momentum and roll forward

8. be on time / early, thorough and complete

9. be humble, kind, open-minded and helpful to others

10. build a support network and connections early with friends, professors, pharmacists, other health professionals and maintain those relationships well

Hard work and challenges ahead but I am going to be positive and hopeful !!


Congrats to everyone who got accepted to pharmacy schools this year and GL !! 🙂

So you got into pharmacy school, congratulations. Now pay close attention because I want to help you.

For the purposes of this article, it does not matter as much which school you got into. So for all intensive purposes, an acceptance to a top tier school or a 2nd tier school, etc. is the same for this article. However, ask yourself, "Did you struggle to get in?" In these times, there seems to be an increasing amount of applicants who apply (some of which get accepted), despite struggling and having less than ideal qualifications.

The following remarks are based upon observations I've made while helping people throughout the admissions process. Others are based upon my current experiences in pharmacy school. Let's elaborate by what I mean by struggling, struggling entails some combination (not all inclusive) of the following:

1. You had low grades (no a singular (or even two) C is not a low grade) at some point of your academic career.
2. You went through some horrible event that screwed up your academics.
3. You had breaks in your education (exception, a truly benign leave of absence) and had to be readmitted/restart your program/transfer multiple times or retake courses multiple times.
4. You have terrible letters of recommendation and/or a terrible relationship with your instructors/bosses 5. You had to work 5+ years as a pharmacy technician or other related job to compensate for deficits in your resume.
6. You are a returning student and older (this is subjective and can be as young as 25-26 or 33 for example).
7. You had to exploit backdoor methods to get in (connections, race/sex ratio)
8. Your PCAT was horrible (50% or worse) but your GPA is 3.5+

If this is you, yet you got accepted, I strongly suggest you follow this advice:

1. For those borderline applicants who got accepted to tier 1 or tier 2 schools and only struggled slightly, drop down from a higher tier school to a lower tier school that you can confirm is less rigorous.
2. Choose another career path. In case 1, this choice is a simple choice designed to protect you from failing out. There are a tremendous amount of cutthroat people in school (of any sort). Pharmacy school is harder than undergraduate (exception, see disclaimer at bottom), and will only get harder. It is better to err on the side of caution and study on your own level, rather than becoming the pawns of academic war where your failures set the curve (if any) and glorify gunners/over achievers. Case 2 is, unfortunately, sad and complicated. I feel that students on this forum have been mislead by the underdog success stories that pop up, especially as of late. For the stories that are true, I congratulate them and wish them luck. However, for every story that is true, there are 10 stories of untold failures following acceptance.

You need to know yourself. We Americas have a tendency to overestimate our abilities and underestimate adversity. I will do you a favor and ask you the hard questions then, so ask yourself:

1. Am I prepared to be the low tier student among sharks? (Social harassment, theft of scholarships, etc.)
2. Am I ready to sacrifice excessively to compensate for my weaknesses?
3. Am I prepared to fail out after being accepted?
4. Am I prepared to likely only have 1 career choice in pharmacy because of my low grades?
5. Am I ready to study like mad for an exam but only pull a C?
6. If you are older, do you really feel like being treated like a child and going through the harassment that you find in education?

Consider this carefully. Just because you get accepted to a school does not mean you really are ready or capable of handling the path. Or just because you get accepted and somehow are able to barely pass or cheat your way through shouldn't make you decide to do pharmacy or any career path you struggle this much in.

There are so many incompetent idiots among my class that it is astounding. I really do not want to work with these people in the future, it's really sad; one of the school admissions directors told me that my class has some of the most socially awkward and academically questionable students that he has ever seen. If I ever work on an admissions committee I will almost certainly auto reject a candidate with a high GPA who has a low PCAT. The PCAT is not a difficult exam if you take the time to prepare for it. I can only imagine a person with a 3.8 GPA and a 30 PCAT is an idiot with a joke BA/BS degree who sucked up to professors, possibly cheated, and exploited the joke of education today.

Please do not let this be you.

Closing disclaimer: If your major was something incredibly hard like any type of engineering, or biochemistry, physics, math, etc., feel free to pursue pharmacy even with lower than average grades. Unfortunately your major may have screwed your GPA, but realistically, difficulty wise, your 2.5 is superior to a 3.5 liberal arts major.

 

[oldstock]

The reality, now that you are accepted to pharmacy school, is that you will be among many smart and smarter and hard and harder working people who were top candidates of the pharmacy applicant pools. The curve and competition are different from pre-pharmacy / undegrad and surely higher and tougher than before. But, if you really want pharmacy as your life-long profession / career and put in the work, I believe you will make through pharmacy school and have a successful pharmacy career.

I just saw this article here on SDN,

This is No Lake Wobegon: When Medical School Means You’re No Longer Above Average
April 28, 2014
by Megan Riddle

http://www.studentdoctor.net/2014/0...l-school-means-youre-no-longer-above-average/

and this thread here,

Consistanly Below Average
Discussion in 'Allopathic' started by citr8, Sep 1, 2012.

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/consistanly-below-average.947191/


and this one here,

How Badly Do you Want Medical School: Non-Trad and Older
Discussion in 'Nontraditional Students' started by roadlesstravel, Mar 16, 2013.

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/thr...ant-medical-school-non-trad-and-older.991407/


some good insights there from the medical school's side 🙂

 

[pharmerjohn]

...We America[n]s have a tendency to overestimate our abilities and underestimate adversity...

Say hello to the age of swaggers, where confidence is high and skills are never required.

 

[Corytrade]

Say hello to the age of swaggers, where confidence is high and skills are never required.

Reminds me of those Nike T-shirts, "lazy but talented." That's okay, it makes it easier for the rest of the hard working people.

 

[Jessica Lee]

So you got into pharmacy school, congratulations. Now pay close attention because I want to help you.

For the purposes of this article, it does not matter as much which school you got into. So for all intensive purposes, an acceptance to a top tier school or a 2nd tier school, etc. is the same for this article. However, ask yourself, "Did you struggle to get in?" In these times, there seems to be an increasing amount of applicants who apply (some of which get accepted), despite struggling and having less than ideal qualifications.

The following remarks are based upon observations I've made while helping people throughout the admissions process. Others are based upon my current experiences in pharmacy school. Let's elaborate by what I mean by struggling, struggling entails some combination (not all inclusive) of the following:

1. You had low grades (no a singular (or even two) C is not a low grade) at some point of your academic career.
2. You went through some horrible event that screwed up your academics.
3. You had breaks in your education (exception, a truly benign leave of absence) and had to be readmitted/restart your program/transfer multiple times or retake courses multiple times.
4. You have terrible letters of recommendation and/or a terrible relationship with your instructors/bosses 5. You had to work 5+ years as a pharmacy technician or other related job to compensate for deficits in your resume.
6. You are a returning student and older (this is subjective and can be as young as 25-26 or 33 for example).
7. You had to exploit backdoor methods to get in (connections, race/sex ratio)
8. Your PCAT was horrible (50% or worse) but your GPA is 3.5+

If this is you, yet you got accepted, I strongly suggest you follow this advice:

1. For those borderline applicants who got accepted to tier 1 or tier 2 schools and only struggled slightly, drop down from a higher tier school to a lower tier school that you can confirm is less rigorous.
2. Choose another career path. In case 1, this choice is a simple choice designed to protect you from failing out. There are a tremendous amount of cutthroat people in school (of any sort). Pharmacy school is harder than undergraduate (exception, see disclaimer at bottom), and will only get harder. It is better to err on the side of caution and study on your own level, rather than becoming the pawns of academic war where your failures set the curve (if any) and glorify gunners/over achievers. Case 2 is, unfortunately, sad and complicated. I feel that students on this forum have been mislead by the underdog success stories that pop up, especially as of late. For the stories that are true, I congratulate them and wish them luck. However, for every story that is true, there are 10 stories of untold failures following acceptance.

You need to know yourself. We Americas have a tendency to overestimate our abilities and underestimate adversity. I will do you a favor and ask you the hard questions then, so ask yourself:

1. Am I prepared to be the low tier student among sharks? (Social harassment, theft of scholarships, etc.)
2. Am I ready to sacrifice excessively to compensate for my weaknesses?
3. Am I prepared to fail out after being accepted?
4. Am I prepared to likely only have 1 career choice in pharmacy because of my low grades?
5. Am I ready to study like mad for an exam but only pull a C?
6. If you are older, do you really feel like being treated like a child and going through the harassment that you find in education?

Consider this carefully. Just because you get accepted to a school does not mean you really are ready or capable of handling the path. Or just because you get accepted and somehow are able to barely pass or cheat your way through shouldn't make you decide to do pharmacy or any career path you struggle this much in.

There are so many incompetent idiots among my class that it is astounding. I really do not want to work with these people in the future, it's really sad; one of the school admissions directors told me that my class has some of the most socially awkward and academically questionable students that he has ever seen. If I ever work on an admissions committee I will almost certainly auto reject a candidate with a high GPA who has a low PCAT. The PCAT is not a difficult exam if you take the time to prepare for it. I can only imagine a person with a 3.8 GPA and a 30 PCAT is an idiot with a joke BA/BS degree who sucked up to professors, possibly cheated, and exploited the joke of education today.

Please do not let this be you.

Closing disclaimer: If your major was something incredibly hard like any type of engineering, or biochemistry, physics, math, etc., feel free to pursue pharmacy even with lower than average grades. Unfortunately your major may have screwed your GPA, but realistically, difficulty wise, your 2.5 is superior to a 3.5 liberal arts major.

Hello, just out of curiosity, what pharmacy school do you go to?

 

[oldstock]

Hello, just out of curiosity, what pharmacy school do you go to?

I'm curious too... something must have happened there 🙂

the more I ask myself, the more I see that the challenges in pharmacy school and job market are the same as with anything else in general. It is more about the person / characters imho. A lot of good points that the OP pointed out though, esp. about the PCAT 🙂

 

[jasscript]

I'm curious too... something must have happened there 🙂

the more I ask myself, the more I see that the challenges in pharmacy school and job market are the same as with anything else in general. It is more about the person / characters imho. A lot of good points that the OP pointed out though, esp. about the PCAT 🙂

I don't think it's something personal about the person that made him/her write this post.

It's the ridiculous amount of people that come on these forums with bad grades and bad circumstances that look at pharmacy as their second choice. Pre dental students, pre-med, pre-opt...etc that post below average grades and praise the fact that they got in...When they never wanted this career in the first place. It's taking away jobs from people that truly want to prosper in this profession. You also have to put blame on all the new pharmacy schools popping up and accepting students with low-par grades. What does that say about how rigorous their program is? What does that say about their intentions to the students? Is there nothing pharmacists across the nation can do to prevent the ACPE from accrediting these schools? Because their isn't a need for pharmacists that are only doing this as a back up plan or for the money.

 

[oldstock]

I don't think it's something personal about the person that made him/her write this post.

It's the ridiculous amount of people that come on these forums with bad grades and bad circumstances that look at pharmacy as their second choice. Pre dental students, pre-med, pre-opt...etc that post below average grades and praise the fact that they got in...When they never wanted this career in the first place. It's taking away jobs from people that truly want to prosper in this profession. You also have to put blame on all the new pharmacy schools popping up and accepting students with low-par grades. What does that say about how rigorous their program is? What does that say about their intentions to the students? Is there nothing pharmacists across the nation can do to prevent the ACPE from accrediting these schools? Because their isn't a need for pharmacists that are only doing this as a back up plan or for the money.

yeah the OP might be just concerned about the pharmacy profession as a whole...

Speaking about that, the real culprit is the ACPE and maybe AACP too imho. They are the accreditation bodies that grant accreditation and permission for pharmacy schools. They allow more new schools to open up. More schools/more supply of seats >> applicants = standards of mission will go down badly. No doubt that people with wrong motivation or subpar grade and PCAT will get in as the result.

Of course, the new schools are all about the money as they are there to make money. It is not their faults to want to make money. But, what is the real intention/motivation of ACPE for allowing more and more new schools ?? Are they supposed to be the guardian of the profession by maintaining high standards of pharmacy admission and academics ?? They cannot do that when the supply/numbers of available school seats are equal or more than demand/numbers of applicants?? How many more pharmacists do we need in future ?? Is there any study and/or debate ?? I am not sure, but probably money talks there again as I have not seen any reasoning/logic/explanation from them of why they are allowing more new schools. It seems like they do not worry at all to let new schools to open left and right and let the free market to worry about the problems/consequences.

Pharmacists, pharmacy students, and their organizations/associations are their own best advocates for their own future. They can surely something regarding this situation now but obviously they are not involved enough.

So I guess it is time for us new blood to get involved. Either that or our pharmacy future will be the survival of the fittest !! 🙂

 

[Amicable Angora]

I don't think it's something personal about the person that made him/her write this post.

It's the ridiculous amount of people that come on these forums with bad grades and bad circumstances that look at pharmacy as their second choice. Pre dental students, pre-med, pre-opt...etc that post below average grades and praise the fact that they got in...When they never wanted this career in the first place. It's taking away jobs from people that truly want to prosper in this profession. You also have to put blame on all the new pharmacy schools popping up and accepting students with low-par grades. What does that say about how rigorous their program is? What does that say about their intentions to the students? Is there nothing pharmacists across the nation can do to prevent the ACPE from accrediting these schools? Because their isn't a need for pharmacists that are only doing this as a back up plan or for the money.

Quoted for the truth.

I am from a upper mid tier school.

And as oldstock said, this is my attempt to contribute to the pharmacy profession.

 

[KidPharmD]

yeah the OP might be just concerned about the pharmacy profession as a whole...

Speaking about that, the real culprit is the ACPE and maybe AACP too imho. They are the accreditation bodies that grant accreditation and permission for pharmacy schools. They allow more new schools to open up. More schools/more supply of seats >> applicants = standards of mission will go down badly. No doubt that people with wrong motivation or subpar grade and PCAT will get in as the result.

Of course, the new schools are all about the money as they are there to make money. It is not their faults to want to make money. But, what is the real intention/motivation of ACPE for allowing more and more new schools ?? Are they supposed to be the guardian of the profession by maintaining high standards of pharmacy admission and academics ?? They cannot do that when the supply/numbers of available school seats are equal or more than demand/numbers of applicants?? How many more pharmacists do we need in future ?? Is there any study and/or debate ?? I am not sure, but probably money talks there again as I have not seen any reasoning/logic/explanation from them of why they are allowing more new schools. It seems like they do not worry at all to let new schools to open left and right and let the free market to worry about the problems/consequences.

Pharmacists, pharmacy students, and their organizations/associations are their own best advocates for their own future. They can surely something regarding this situation now but obviously they are not involved enough.

So I guess it is time for us new blood to get involved. Either that or our pharmacy future will be the survival of the fittest !! 🙂

The AACP doesn't accredit colleges. It only serves as an organization representing ACPE accredited colleges. ACPE doesn't have anything in their mandate that allows them to restrict new programs from opening except strengthening the requirements. If the program meets accreditation requirements, then they get accreditation. ACPE can't say you aren't accredited because there are already too many schools. They could make the requirements really hard to meet, but current schools don't want that either.

The fault is in the Boards of these schools seeing a Pharm.D. program as a good way to make money, the pharmacists who agree to be faculty at these new schools, and the hiring managers (and corporations) that don't care what school you went to as long as you are licensed. So we get a bunch of high priced, easy to get into, high paying, schools that only teach to the NAPLEX.

 

[oldstock]

The AACP doesn't accredit colleges. It only serves as an organization representing ACPE accredited colleges. ACPE doesn't have anything in their mandate that allows them to restrict new programs from opening except strengthening the requirements. If the program meets accreditation requirements, then they get accreditation. ACPE can't say you aren't accredited because there are already too many schools. They could make the requirements really hard to meet, but current schools don't want that either.

The fault is in the Boards of these schools seeing a Pharm.D. program as a good way to make money, the pharmacists who agree to be faculty at these new schools, and the hiring managers (and corporations) that don't care what school you went to as long as you are licensed. So we get a bunch of high priced, easy to get into, high paying, schools that only teach to the NAPLEX.

thanks for that info KidPharmD 🙂


dang, looks like everyone gets candies except the students/pharmacists (sigh).

OK neither ACPE nor pharmacy schools care. But any pharmacy organizations/associations out there representing pharmacists and pharmacy students should have said something about the current situation already. Looks like nobody cares enough to get together to raise a voice (sigh).

I see that survival of the fittest is what's in store for me in the future !! (sigh again).

 

[KidPharmD]

thanks for that info KidPharmD 🙂


dang, looks like everyone gets candies except the students/pharmacists (sigh).

OK neither ACPE nor pharmacy schools care. But any pharmacy organizations/associations out there representing pharmacists and pharmacy students should have said something about the current situation already. Looks like nobody cares enough to get together to raise a voice (sigh).

I see that survival of the fittest is what's in store for me in the future !! (sigh again).

You mean like THIS joint paper from APhA and ASHP published in 2010? Granted, this is a very PC position statement, but it does have some very serious concerns about the WAY all of these new schools are functioning since there is nothing they can do to keep them from opening. Until the government tries to regulate higher education even further, there is no entity in a free market society that can keep these programs from opening.

 

[oldstock]

You mean like THIS joint paper from APhA and ASHP published in 2010? Granted, this is a very PC position statement, but it does have some very serious concerns about the WAY all of these new schools are functioning since there is nothing they can do to keep them from opening.

thanks for the info again KidPharmD. I repost the link so people could see,

http://www.ashp.org/DocLibrary/News/Accelerating-Expansion-of-Pharmacy-Education.aspx

Until the government tries to regulate higher education even further, there is no entity in a free market society that can keep these programs from opening.

well, looks over to the medical side, it looks like the AMA is doing very good job there on the allopathic side. I have not done any research to see if the AMA really could claim the credit there though. It might be also that it is more difficult to open medical schools due to securing rotation spots and/or stricter laws regarding opening up new medical schools ?? Again, the DO side is expanding more than the allopathic side, I have no clue why. Maybe the old money talks there again. I am guessing here 🙂

again, pharmacists, pharmacy students, and their organizations must be more aggressive about this matter (e.g. lobbying, petitions, studies /debates, etc). I guess the current attitude is that everyone is just for themselves now. It is obvious that nobody cares enough to make any change.

Regardless, I am not going to wait for or trust the government to do anything as it barely can take care of itself. It will surely be a dog-eat-dog world by the time I get out of pharmacy school. Dang i really am scared now. I got 3 acceptance + 1 waitlist now and just had to decline 1 interview last week and probably I am going to decline the one for this week too. I am thinking more and more about the student loans I have to repay and the kind of money I can make from the jobs that are available to me when I graduate. What do I have to do now to prepare for this gruesome future ??

Care to give me some advice or tips ?? Thanks 🙂

 

[Amicable Angora]

Well aside from reconsidering your acceptances, I don't think there is much you can do about the tuition. From what I've seen, schools are generally very stingy when it comes to handing out scholarships.

 

[oldstock]

Well aside from reconsidering your acceptances, I don't think there is much you can do about the tuition. From what I've seen, schools are generally very stingy when it comes to handing out scholarships.

That is true. Luckily, for this year, one of the schools I got accepted just gave me a scholarship for the 1st year (~ 1/5 of the tuition). Still I will probably need to fight harder to get any scholarship for next year. At this point, student loan debt and job prospect are all I think about... (sigh)

 

[pharmerjohn]

At this point, student loan debt and job prospect are all I think about... (sigh)

With that and everything else already mentioned in this thread in mind, are you still against the idea of requiring a bachelor's degree to help tighten the pharmacy school admissions standard?

 

[oldstock]

With that and everything else already mentioned in this thread in mind, are you still against the idea of requiring a bachelor's degree to help tighten the pharmacy school admissions standard?

hey buddy 🙂

my opinion has not changed... I have heard a lot of stories about great and bad pharmacists with a BSPharm or PharmD and with/without a prior bachelor degree. Bachelor or not bachelor for pharmacy admission is not a problem imho. The standard of admission will tighten itself when there are less pharmacy schools compared to the number of applicants every year.

Even if a bachelor is required for admission now, the situation would not improve a bit if more and more pharmacy schools are opening up left and right every year. People with a bachelor degree and GPA like 2 ish and PCAT of 50 or less still get in. Imho, if you are mediocre, you are mediocre with or without a bachelor degree and that shows in your GPA and standardized test score. Imagine if we have like 300 pharmacy schools now (we might get there soon 🙂 ), people with GPA of 1ish and 20-30 on the PCAT will get in. Heck, why look at the PCAT at all ?? (CA schools already do not use PCAT) hey, what is that GPA ?? GPA 1's ?? no PCAT ?? no problem. Everyone gets in, provided they can pay.

The real problem is that more and more new schools are popping up to produce a growing surplus of pharmacy graduates and the ACPE is "helpless" to do anything to stop the flood of new pharmacy schools from opening but only there to accredit new pharmacy programs. And the problem is also that nobody cares enough to do jack about it. It seems everyone is for themselves now.

What you think you are going to do Pharmerjohn ?? BTW are you a pharmacy student and if so what year ?? 🙂

 

[pharmerjohn]

hey buddy 🙂

my opinion has not changed... I have heard a lot of stories about great and bad pharmacists with a BSPharm or PharmD and with/without a prior bachelor degree. Bachelor or not bachelor for pharmacy admission is not a problem imho. The standard of admission will tighten itself when there are less pharmacy schools compared to the number of applicants every year.

Even if a bachelor is required for admission now, the situation would not improve a bit if more and more pharmacy schools are opening up left and right every year. People with a bachelor degree and GPA like 2 ish and PCAT of 50 or less still get in. Imho, if you are mediocre, you are mediocre with or without a bachelor degree and that shows in your GPA and standardized test score. Imagine if we have like 300 pharmacy schools now (we might get there soon 🙂 ), people with GPA of 1ish and 20-30 on the PCAT will get in. Heck, why look at the PCAT at all ?? (CA schools already do not use PCAT) hey, what is that GPA ?? GPA 1's ?? no PCAT ?? no problem. Everyone gets in, provided they can pay.

The real problem is that more and more new schools are popping up to produce a growing surplus of pharmacy graduates and the ACPE is "helpless" to do anything to stop the flood of new pharmacy schools from opening but only there to accredit new pharmacy programs. And the problem is also that nobody cares enough to do jack about it. It seems everyone is for themselves now.

What you think you are going to do Pharmerjohn ?? BTW are you a pharmacy student and if so what year ?? 🙂

Hey there, oldstock. I figured you haven’t changed your mind, but I thought it’d be interesting to ask nonetheless. Let’s just agree to disagree on that idea.

I absolutely agree that the real problem is the sheer number of schools popping up everywhere, resulting in an inevitable surplus. It’s sad to think that no one is really doing anything about such a blatantly obvious problem. ACPE has the power to make the necessary changes that will positively affect the future outcome of the profession; however, it’s safe to say they’re more interested lining their pockets than protecting the future of pharmacy.

Like you, I’m an incoming P1, so there’s very little we can do besides staying optimistic and working hard. As you may have already noticed, there’s a lot of negativity on these forums. However, when putting things into perspective, there are far worse markets out there than pharmacy, yet people have endured and succeeded. It’s definitely going to be tough and there will be lots of challenges ahead, but not nearly as dire as some of the doom and gloomers seem to believe. My mantra is: I can’t change the directions of the wind, but I can sure as heck set the sails and give it my best. Good luck to us and the future of the profession.

 

[oldstock]

Hey there, oldstock. I figured you haven’t changed your mind, but I thought it’d be interesting to ask nonetheless. Let’s just agree to disagree on that idea.

I absolutely agree that the real problem is the sheer number of schools popping up everywhere, resulting in an inevitable surplus. It’s sad to think that no one is really doing anything about such a blatantly obvious problem. ACPE has the power to make the necessary changes that will positively affect the future outcome of the profession; however, it’s safe to say they’re more interested lining their pockets than protecting the future of pharmacy.

Like you, I’m an incoming P1, so there’s very little we can do besides staying optimistic and working hard. As you may have already noticed, there’s a lot of negativity on these forums. However, when putting things into perspective, there are far worse markets out there than pharmacy, yet people have endured and succeeded. It’s definitely going to be tough and there will be lots of challenges ahead, but not nearly as dire as some of the doom and gloomers seem to believe. My mantra is: I can’t change the directions of the wind, but I can sure as heck set the sails and give it my best. Good luck to us and the future of the profession.

Amen brother. 👍 👍 !!

 

[Amicable Angora]

BUMP for all the applicants for the upcoming school year!

 

[Cauris]

Closing disclaimer: If your major was something incredibly hard like any type of engineering, or biochemistry, physics, math, etc., feel free to pursue pharmacy even with lower than average grades. Unfortunately your major may have screwed your GPA, but realistically, difficulty wise, your 2.5 is superior to a 3.5 liberal arts major.

damn... shots fired.

 

[Verduchi]

A Bachelors degree could of prevented the problem. I think these new schools that open up prey upon students who only have the minimum pre-req requirements.

I have seen first hand experienced Pharmacists with 20+ years experience having to take jobs in bad neighborhoods where clientele is >70% medicaid recipients because of the saturation.

 

[Amicable Angora]

A Bachelors degree could of prevented the problem. I think these new schools that open up prey upon students who only have the minimum pre-req requirements.

I have seen first hand experienced Pharmacists with 20+ years experience having to take jobs in bad neighborhoods where clientele is >70% medicaid recipients because of the saturation.

Where was this?

 

[Irelia]

Hey there, oldstock. I figured you haven’t changed your mind, but I thought it’d be interesting to ask nonetheless. Let’s just agree to disagree on that idea.

I absolutely agree that the real problem is the sheer number of schools popping up everywhere, resulting in an inevitable surplus. It’s sad to think that no one is really doing anything about such a blatantly obvious problem. ACPE has the power to make the necessary changes that will positively affect the future outcome of the profession; however, it’s safe to say they’re more interested lining their pockets than protecting the future of pharmacy.

Like you, I’m an incoming P1, so there’s very little we can do besides staying optimistic and working hard. As you may have already noticed, there’s a lot of negativity on these forums. However, when putting things into perspective, there are far worse markets out there than pharmacy, yet people have endured and succeeded. It’s definitely going to be tough and there will be lots of challenges ahead, but not nearly as dire as some of the doom and gloomers seem to believe. My mantra is: I can’t change the directions of the wind, but I can sure as heck set the sails and give it my best. Good luck to us and the future of the profession.

Absolutely agree with what you are saying. I am also an incoming P1 and read countless of articles/rants about how pharmacy is over-saturated and such and the truth is now one needs to do well in pharmacy school to find a decent/dream job. Maybe in the past even though you did not do so good in Pharmacy school you could probably find a job but now with so many schools opening, only people who works hard will naturally get better jobs. Even for medical school nowadays only top tier students can secure residency positions in specialties. Some people I feel like take it for granted that once you get into pharmacy school you have a secure future. This may be true for 10-20 years ago but definitely not true anymore. This is one of the facts that we just have to get adjusted to it for our generation, not just rant about it and discourage people from joining. (which sounds very selfish of them to me) Personally, I think we are still okay with job markets once we graduate but for the future students (lets say 5-10 years from now) I am not really sure.

 

[pharamacy_yo]

I don't think it's something personal about the person that made him/her write this post.

It's the ridiculous amount of people that come on these forums with bad grades and bad circumstances that look at pharmacy as their second choice. Pre dental students, pre-med, pre-opt...etc that post below average grades and praise the fact that they got in...When they never wanted this career in the first place. It's taking away jobs from people that truly want to prosper in this profession. You also have to put blame on all the new pharmacy schools popping up and accepting students with low-par grades. What does that say about how rigorous their program is? What does that say about their intentions to the students? Is there nothing pharmacists across the nation can do to prevent the ACPE from accrediting these schools? Because their isn't a need for pharmacists that are only doing this as a back up plan or for the money.

I want to go to pharmacy school, and I think I would be considered below average since I got multiple Cs and had to repeat classes during my undergraduate year. However, I want to still to work hard for pharmacy school. I have worked in a pharmacy for three years and I really enjoy it. I know my grades are low but I know that I went through a lot with family during my undergraduate career. It changed our entire life. By this post, it is suggesting to people like me that I shouldn't even bother trying to get into school because I will fail. I agree that because I have a less stronger background, it will be harder but I am all the more determined to be the best pharmacist that I can be. Please don't crush my dreams by saying I can't do pharmacy as my career path because I got a few Cs.

 

[DruggieDoRight]

I want to go to pharmacy school, and I ... Please don't crush my dreams by saying I can't do pharmacy as my career path because I got a few Cs.

If you think you can work hard and get the job go for it! However, just be prepared that if you slack off by getting bad grades, not getting into a good school, etc you may not find the job you want or like.

 

[Amicable Angora]

Bump for great justice.

 

[RxEvileye]

Guess I'll just drop out then.