Purdue University, Butler University and U of Michigan for Pharmacy

Parents Forum
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<p>I also agree that for pharm, it’s less about the name of the school. That is why my S is at Ferris … no way could we justify paying extra at another pharm school. He got great merit aid, they are a strong pharm school, etc.</p>

<p>S liked Butler a lot. Our neighbor attends (education major); she loves it. We just couldn’t justify the cost differential.</p>

<p>A word about UM pharmacy … it’s more research-oriented than most programs. It’s extremely difficult to meet the early assurance terms, from what we heard.</p>

<p>S applied to Pitt but didn’t get into the early assurance program. From what we could determine, they fill up their E/A spots really quickly & even great applicants are shut out if they don’t get their apps done early enough. S got in for pre-pharm; he just didn’t get in the E/A pharm program. Not sure what that would have meant - he opted not to pursue it, since Pitt’s pharm merit aid isn’t great for OOS (from what we could glean from last year’s Pitt merit thread, we were not alone in feeling this way).</p>

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<p>I am a pharmacist in Southern California. I graduated from USC School of Pharmacy 21 years ago. When I started pharmacy school I had a bachelors in Biochemistry/Molecular Biology. I would say, at that time, about 50% already had a bachelors degree. I think it would be very hard for an 18 year old to know that they want to be a pharmacist. At least there is no way that I knew that is what I wanted to do when I was 18. In my experience, the men in pharmacy are not as happy as the women. For women, being a pharmacist allows a lot of flexibility and the ability to make a good salary and work part-time. It is definitely a female-dominated profession and although I find it very rewarding for men it often isn’t “enough”. Something to keep in mind is that, like most health-care professions, working weekends, evenings and nights is very common. Although that was appealing when I was young, once I had a family I really hated it. There are Monday thru Friday jobs (and I was lucky to find one) but generally they are the exception rather than the rule.</p>

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<p>Well, he only got $6,000 a year from Butler for a total of 24,000 although it says it can be spread out of 12 semesters. I was really hoping for more as other kids with similar stats were getting 15,000 a year. This will probably take Butler out of the running…</p>

<p>Tx5athome - your right… he has no idea if he wants to become a pharmacist at 17 years old… it was something that interested him and decide to apply to some “pharmacy colleges”. I appreciate your take on the profession at the moment.</p>

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<p>GoGiants, look carefully at the other programs (and rep) that URI has if your S is undecided. It’s great that he has that option, but would he be happy at URI if not for the pharmacy program? My D considered them, but didn’t apply, because the idea of being near the beach was appealing and they do have a good pharmacy school…but the more she looked at the other programs and student body, the less interested she became. YMMV</p>

<p>Btw, it is NOT as easy these days for new grad to find employment. The pharmacy shortage is non-existent in most urban areas…my friend’s kid graduated 3 years ago from a 0-6 program and had multiple offers and signing bonuses up to $20K. My godson is graduating this year from the same school, also great grades and internships, and is hoping to find one full-time offer, but not expecting signing bonuses. He said a number of his friends who graduated last year are working as floaters, at per diem rates, waiting for positions. He’s willing to work in more rural areas so may have better luck!</p>

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<p>Congrats to you and your son on these wonderful admissions</p>

<p>my mom&dad, myself, & 6 siblings are wolverines! You can’t go wrong at umich. Even if your son changes his mind and doesn’t want to study pharmacy, there are so many other terrific programs.</p>

<p>My dad graduated with pharmacy in '33. My niece got her degree, maybe '00 – she’s a hospital pharmicist.</p>

<p>Let’s see – one of the founders of google is a wolverine. Oh yeah, I got a umich computer science degree</p>

<p>Does your son like sports? football hockey basketball etc?</p>

<p>Purdue is a great school too, also computer science, also big-10 sports. People come from all over the world to study at these schools.</p>

<p>I don’t know anything about Butler</p>

<p>Have fun with your decision, please let us know what he chooses!</p>

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<p>Just a bit of a downer post… The job outlook for new pharmacy grads has really darkened in the past 4-ish years, as more and more schools have been opening and graduating more and more PharmDs (coupled with the overall economic downturn, of course). It’s not that awful, but there are some (many?) very saturated markets out there (many East Coast cities and California), and those interested in hospital pharmacy are now pretty much required to do a residency post-PharmD. Given those considerations, I would definitely factor level of debt into your S’s decision on where to go. I’d also recommend checking out the Pharmacy forums on Student Doctor Net, although they do lean to the “doom and gloom” side of things.</p>

<p>Just my $.02.</p>

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For some updated info: My daughter was admitted at Butler, Purdue and Manchester’s pre-pharm programs. She has straight A’s in high school, got her “pharmacy tech in training” license (Through the State of Indiana - which is only filing a single page paper and paying like $25 filing fee, and doing a criminal background check - which because she was under 18 was quite simple. By the way, pharm tech in training IS possible if you are under 18, as an exception.)and worked her senior year at a compounding pharmacy 6 hours a week in an internship - though at the date of her November apps, only had been there from August to November. She received $13,000/year in merit scholarship from BUTLER. Basically full ride to Purdue and Manchester. Her SAT 1920. Extracurriculars nothing extravagant. 2 varsity sports. A bit of charitable volunteerism. Spent 5 years in a not for profit grant writing program. Honestly, it was the pharm tech in training license and internship listed as her standout quality given on the “Congrats you’re in” letters.

She chose BUTLER for pre-pharm because of the fact that you have your seat to lose - rather than reapplying at Purdue and Manchester after 2 years. It simply seems obvious the “BUTLER PROMISE” promotes a better learning environment - after all, why would you ever help a classmate if you knew they were competing against you for the seat in the grad program? Furthermore, Butler is a medium sized school - Purdue has 50K students, and then Manchester, with their yet to be accredited pharm program has around 1200. Butler feels right.

Manchester is only about 40 minutes from me so that was really my “mommy inspired” first choice, but after visiting Butler, even I had to concede that it was a nice school and you can’t argue with the security of the Butler Promise. I asked Manchester if they would do a “Butler promise” - as that was a deciding factor for us. For some reason they can’t offer that right now. Oh well. I guess that makes my decision for me.

It appears at Manchester that if you don’t get in, they just have you continue another year at Manchester in pursuit of a chem degree or something. Uh…no. She’s getting on a 6year pharm track and not sitting around doing an extra year.

So yes, Butler is going to cost a fortune, $36,050 - but there is security and less stress…and in the end, potentially less time than elsewhere if they try to pull that “hang in there and take another year and reapply” thing - which honestly, would totally demoralize me.

Freshman dorms are not air conditioned. They say you have to “earn your air conditioning” at Butler. The library is dated looking. I hear the food is adequate, not great. However, the Hinkle Fieldhouse (where they filmed the movie Hoosiers with Gene Hackman) is awesome. The other buildings are more “east coast prep school looking” - and the campus felt safe.