My son has been accepted as a Chemistry major to both USC Honors College and UNC (non honors). He is very interested in a Pharmd program. We are residents of North Carolina so I understand that even with scholarships, UNC would most likely be less expensive than USC.
Finances aside, how do the two schools compare for getting a student into a Pharmacy program? I think at UNC, he would be just one of the throngs of people whereas in the HC at USC, he would get much more individual attention and have more success. Bottom line: my guess is that UNC is considered a better school, however, I also believe that my son would receive much better grades at USC. Can anybody provide some insight? Thanks in advance.
Sorry I can’t help you with details about these two schools, but if it was me I would visit both schools, talk to the pharmacy department and ask your questions.
When I looked at different pharmacy schools I researched how long a scholarship was good for and when the professional phase of the program starts. Some schools consider the first four years undergrad and just the last two grad, some two and four. Also look at the tuition and housing costs for every year instate versus OOS.
And find out if there are scholarships available for the grad part of the program.
Without scholarships I’m coming up with total P1-P4 tuition for USC (OOS) $139,000 and UNC (IS) $89,000
To that you will have to add housing and food costs for all 6 years plus tuition for the 2 pre-pharmacy years which I assume will also be cheaper at UNC.
Just to address the finances for what it’s worth… we’re from NC as well and my D was accepted to UNC (non-honors) last year and USC Honors College (currently a freshman) and after the scholarship, it is actually less money for her attending USC than it would have been for UNC. That’s not what made her decision- it was more small fish in a big sea (UNC) vs more individualized attention, smaller class sizes, etc. (USC Honors College).
Don’t know much about pharmacy but I would look at a couple of things. Does son have lots of AP credit? USC is very generous and I know at least one friend of my D who finished undergrad early and used scholarship money for some graduate work. Now I don’t know what scholarships he was using, but worth asking about. There is an advisor for honors that deals with pharmacy who might could answer questions about how well honors requirements and pre-pharmacy mesh. @Mommdc all USC students who get in honors get some scholarship, very likely at least in-state tuiton rate which is around 14k(?) less per year than OOS.
My daughter is an OOS honors college sophomore at USC that will start her PharmD next year. She is a Cooper scholar and that scholarship is for 8 semesters so her first 2 years of pharmacy school will be billed at instate minus 4k. This was a bid deciding factor for her. It would have cost her thousands more for her to go to Ohio State (our instate U) because they did not give her as much scholarship money and they are a 4+4 program. She will have her PharmD in 6 years at South Carolina.
Is UNC a 4+2 program? If it is 4+4 then it will definitely be more expensive.