Overall my feelings toward the program are pretty positive. It has a great reputation, the Houston campus has the benefit of being located in the biggest Medical Center in the world, its affordable for both in and out of state students, and has high NBCOT pass rates...that's really all I'm concerned with at this point.I go to the Houston campus. My undergrad GPA was around a 3.5 but my prereqs were between 3.8-3.9. I did 50 hours of shadowing but only 20 were required--I needed more for other places and I'm sure it looked good having more, but I wouldn't go overboard with hundreds of hours. I was involved in a ton of extracurricular activities in undergrad and worked throughout undergrad and for 3 years after. My class had interviews but this fall's entering class didn't--there were 100 of us that interviewed and 42 got in. I'm not sure if they'll bring back interviews next year but I'm guessing it depends on how well things go with this upcoming class. The program is definitely challenging but also doable. As a whole the professors are decent--they are all very accomplished--but prefer to use a "flipped classroom" approach which means you spend a LOT of time studying, reading, and learning on your own. The general consensus of my class is that the first semester was the hardest, the second was the easiest, and this summer was pretty miserable (mainly because it was a full semester packed into 10 weeks). My classmates are amazing and after everything we've been through with this program we are pretty much a big family. FYI-we have 41 in our class now, but the one that dropped out took place within the first month of school because she was 9 months pregnant...she'll be starting the program again in Dallas this fall
I go to the Houston campus. My undergrad GPA was around a 3.5 but my prereqs were between 3.8-3.9. I did 50 hours of shadowing but only 20 were required--I needed more for other places and I'm sure it looked good having more, but I wouldn't go overboard with hundreds of hours. I was involved in a ton of extracurricular activities in undergrad and worked throughout undergrad and for 3 years after. My class had interviews but this fall's entering class didn't--there were 100 of us that interviewed and 42 got in. I'm not sure if they'll bring back interviews next year but I'm guessing it depends on how well things go with this upcoming class. The program is definitely challenging but also doable. As a whole the professors are decent--they are all very accomplished--but prefer to use a "flipped classroom" approach which means you spend a LOT of time studying, reading, and learning on your own. The general consensus of my class is that the first semester was the hardest, the second was the easiest, and this summer was pretty miserable (mainly because it was a full semester packed into 10 weeks). My classmates are amazing and after everything we've been through with this program we are pretty much a big family. FYI-we have 41 in our class now, but the one that dropped out took place within the first month of school because she was 9 months pregnant...she'll be starting the program again in Dallas this fall
