Pre-med in Tulane

<p>Any inputs from anyone doing pre-med in Tulane? My son has been accepted and intends to do Economics, Chemistry or Biology with a pre-med intent. How is the advising and suport for research? What are you hearing from the seniors about the acceptance rate to medical schools?</p>

<p>The school's claimed statistics are impressive. According to the February 7, 2008 live chat with President Cowen, "Students who work with Tulane's pre-medical advisors show incredibly high acceptance rates to medical schools: 88% of students with a 3.3 GPA and a 30+ on the MCAT and 100% for those with a 3.8 GPA and a 31+."</p>

<p>Tulane pre-med program is very good and has a high success rate. Also, if the student is interested in staying at Tulane for Med. school, he/she can apply to a program (I think at the beginning of sophomore year) that makes the admission process into Tulane Med school a lot easier ( no MCAT required!).</p>

<p>I'm also thinking about studying Pre-Med at Tulane, but I also heard about the extremely difficult MCAT. Tuitionsaver said that there is a program to attend Tulane's Med School w/o MCAT. Does anyone know more about this program? Thanks so much!</p>

<p>I believe what you are referring to is the Creative Premedical Scholars Program. Check this link for brief overview: <a href="http://www.tulane.edu/%7Epmswww/progreq.html#creativescholars%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.tulane.edu/~pmswww/progreq.html#creativescholars&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>My son is graduating this year, and has acceptances to several top medical schools. The supports are all there for anyone willing to work hard. The medical advisor is outstanding.</p>

<p>My son also did the creative med scholars program was accepted into Tulane med the summer before his jr. year. It is very strenuous, as you have to have all of your pre-med classes done (o-chem, etc,) but it can be done and he simply took his MCAT a bit early so all he info was fresh in his head.</p>

<p>Hi, I am also interested in premed at Tulane. But I’m also interested in loyola chicago. I was accepted into both schools. I know about the Tulane creative scholars program and have read about it. Apparently, you need a 3.6 gpa to stay in the program. I was wondering if it is hard to get that gpa?</p>

<p>Wow, you found a really old thread, lol. A 3.6 certainly isn’t trivial, especially since you have to go through the gauntlet of Freshman and Organic Chemistry, Physics, etc. It certainly can be done and is done quite often. It just depends on both your aptitude for these subjects and your ability to discipline yourself to do the work.</p>

<p>Haha yea. Do you happen to know how many kids enter the creative scholars program and how many do all the requirements and get above a 3.6 how many kids drop out of the program?</p>

<p>Well, I think what you are asking is how many apply and how many get accepted. I am not sure how many apply, it probably varies every year. I think I remember hearing they accept up to about 5 or 6 if that many have the qualifications. Since you don’t even apply until almost your junior year, I suspect few drop out. Some might fall out because they cannot complete the requirements set up at the time of acceptance to the program, but I suspect few drop out because they changed their minds. But this is not a program that you start as a freshman, if that is what you mean.</p>

<p>Med school is always competitive no matter what path you take to get there. Besides doing well in the science courses and getting at least a 3.6, you will be interviewed. And while 3.6 might be the minimum to even be considered, it might not be enough. It depends a lot on the competition that year.</p>

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<p>Many colleges with sky-high acceptance rates into med schools have a “committee letter” which can only be gained if the committee issuing it finds that the student is likely to get into a medical school. Is that how Tulane operates?</p>

<p>Catria, Tulane has exceptional pre-med advising and impressive pre-med students. I think this is the reason for the high acceptance rates. My son is right in the middle of applying and we have been amazed at the help and advice he has been given. </p>

<p>He told me that Tulane did provide a committee letter, but this was after multiple faculty interviews and meetings with his advisor. I have not heard of any of his friends at Tulane being dissuaded from applying to med school. I do know of pre-meds at other colleges being frustrated because of lack of support.</p>

<p>I am hopeful the 100% statistic is correct…</p>

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<p>Nope. </p>

<p>I’m a rising Junior – so I haven’t applied yet – but like all TU pre-meds, I’ve asked a lot of questions about absolutely everything (lol) and I’ve never heard of TU precluding anyone from applying. </p>

<p>In fact, they tell people to apply “broadly” if they feel that their application isn’t a shoe-in.</p>

<p>gowill - I feel pretty confident that 100% number is correct. A 3.8+ and 31+ is going to get you in somewhere good. Might not be Harvard or Johns Hopkins, but certainly a highly respected med school. For example, WUSTL med school has an average undergrad GPA of 3.8, but the average MCAT is about 36. Of course, they are ranked like 6th in the country. USC’s Keck, by comparison, has an average GPA of 3.6 and MCAT of 34. UNC: 3.6/32 Tufts: 3.5/30.7 and so on. So while I am sure there are other factors, a 3.8/31 will probably not get you into a top 20 school, but chances improve after that.</p>

<p>Thanks FC. My son is only applying to one school in the top 20, the rest have a range of rankings. We are going to hope for the best.</p>

<p>Since Tulane has an impressive record of getting its grads into med school, does that success in pre-med translate into dental school acceptances, too?</p>

<p>I’m not sure anyone tracks that since the numbers are probably small, but logic would say they should be highly correlated.</p>

<p>If ~10% of Tulane’s seniors apply to med school, and 73% of them actually are accepted by one, then Tulane is a school that produces lots of doctors in relation to the graduating class size…</p>

<p>Have to agree with that, Catria. I am surprised at how often I run into Drs. that did their undergrad at Tulane and went to med school elsewhere. Of course I am more attuned to picking up on the fact that they went to Tulane, but still it seems like an unusually significant number given the thousands of undergraduate schools in this country. Then again, it isn’t a random event scenario.</p>

<p>I understand that the 73% acceptance rate into med school is somewhat dated (2010) and that ~10% of Tulane grads matriculated in med school that year but is there any reason to see any of these two numbers change significantly from a year to another?</p>

<p>And do Tulane favor its own grads for med school admissions?</p>