Jessie Said:

0-6 Pharmacy College Admissions and Pharmacy Life?

We Answered:

Hi,

I'm currently a 6th year student and will be graduating in May with my PharmD from Rutgers. With some bias, I would highly recommend it. The straight 6 program at Rutgers is a great way to go, but is extremely hard to get into and it's competitive admissions process is only increasing(I was on the admissions committee). All pharmacy schools will offer you relatively the same education, a lot of what you learn comes from how hard you work.(just like everything else, cliche, I know.) For admissions reasons, you might have to undergo interviews, so I would recommend a job at a local pharmacy when you are able, some might have age limitations. As to the second part of the question, a pharmacist with a doctorate in pharmacy has a vast amount of opportunities from working in a local pharmacy to a position in the pharmaceutical industry(especially in the northeast). A pharmacist in the local drug store (ie CVS) makes good pay and works to advise patients and make sure that the medication dispensed is correct. Also a lot of recommendations on what over the counter products to use. I plan on working in a hospital and will be doing a pharmacy residency next year so that I can be a clinical pharmacist in the hospital. I think I touched on all aspects of your question at least a little. If you have any other questions about this just type an answer that asks for some more specifics.

Randy Said:

Is it possible for me to be accepted into the 6 Year PharmD program in MCPHS?

We Answered:

Not sure why you are wasting your time on AP EnviSci when what you need is AP chem. Pharmacy is chemistry - in many countries pharmacists are actually called "chemists". If you want to get into a pharm program or succeed in a pharm program, you need to take as much chem as possible. At MCP or elsewhere you are going to take a year of general chem, biochem, and a year of organic chem, then almost all your pharm courses will be chem oriented. Those courses are hard in college and you need to get as big a headstart as you can. I would be WAY more worried about that than about your PSATs, which really don't count for anything. If you blow MCP (or Northeastern or URI or UConn) away with a high chem SAT score, then that would count more than anything else you could do. Being a pharm tech would probably be more helpful to your app than some of the other things you mention, but you may not be able to do that until you are 18.

Pharmacy is a great career. I hope you make it. You can get a lot of reliable info about pharm from the website of the AACP (Am Assoc Colleges of Pharm) - check it out.