University of Utah Visit

Hey Everyone!

We had a great trip last week up to the University of Utah campus where we got to hear from many different current pharmacy students and get some great tips! Here are my notes from the meeting:

• P1 Students
• How to prepare for application
• Take the right classes and get the good grades!
• PCAT or Bachelor's Degree
• Leadership Experience
• Can be varied 
• Volunteer/Community Service
• Looking for who you've become and not just what you've done 
• Bring up these experiences during your interviews 
• Instructors care and want you to do well
• Interviews -- don't worry about getting the right answer, just relax and be yourself. Don't act prideful or like you think you are going to get it. Don't act like you already know about pharmacy 
• There is a website that gives samples questions that were used previously at the U
• Interviews
• Very important
• Be careful of the stories you tell 
• Be careful about talking about cultural differences
• Don't talk forever -- they will let you talk until you are done
• Be aware of current events in pharmacy 
• Their focus is to evaluate your critical thinking skills 
• It's fine to ask to repeat the question 
• Pause before you start answering, take a breath to think about your answer 
• Munger -- loves PharmD/PhD 
• difficult to find research opportunities, need to take initiative 
• Personal Statement
• 1st Year
• Busy, need to be organized, often do internship hours and need to know your schedule front to back 
• P2
• TTh -- busy days, three two hour classes, no class on Fridays unless test and other days are a lot light
• coursework is same load, project, presentations, 
• Spring P2 hardest semester
• P3
• TTh -- testing day no classes
• MW -- class all day (8-3)
• friday 2 hour class
• Still can work about 20 hours a week
• Lots of exams but not in class a lot 
• P4
• Summers all years are on rotation anyway
• For license, you need to have 600 paid/volunteer hours 
• Rotation 8 hrs a day/5 days a week, work after that
• physically exhausting because you need to be on your game all the time
• Once you get accepted, try to get an internship as soon as you can 
• Every year is going to graduate and leave positions
• Can get intern license in May 
• Admissions/Classes Questions
• denise.brenes@pharm.utah.edu
• madison.hatch@pharm.utah.edu
• jon.magness@pharm.utah.edu
• halee.namanny@pharm.utah.edu

Auburn University

Dr. Woosley came and visited us today from Auburn University (Alabama) and shared with us information about the Harrison School of Pharmacy! Here are some notes from the meeting:

• Unique characteristics of this school:
• Only two classrooms,
• Golf tournament with employers to raise money for scholarships
• Vaccinations for university
• Health fair and lots of service
• Field games day! Competition between the classes
• Legislative Day
• Rotation Experience
• Graduation -- family affair
• 30% students go into post-doc opportunities
• 24th Highest Ranked Pharmacy School
• Average GPA of 3.4 
• Not a grade-forgiving school
• Always find out school's GPA calculation policy!
• PCAT score is less important than GPA
• Biology and Chemistry sub-section scores are most important
• Shadowing is recommended
• Number of hours isn't important, just important that you know pharmacy is the profession you want to go into 
• Personal essay
• Want it in your own words, PharmCas has software that checks for plagiarism
• Interview -- extremely important
• 16 students invited at a time, interviewed for a day getting to know you and letting you know about the school
• Look for 7 domains of character
• Communication
• Leadership
• Problem Solving
• Professional
• Ethics
• Responsibility
• Analytical Skills
• Service Oriented
• Don't know your PCAT or GPA scores before 
• Will let you know within 24 hours if you've been accepted or not
• Rolling Admissions
• Take-away message: APPLY EARLY!
• Remember PharmCas is Eastern Standard Time
• 2nd Week of School -- you are assigned a patient 
• You interview them, find out disease states, find out drug therapy
• You will keep this patient for the remainder of the year
• The P2 on your team will be your mentor throughout the year
• Class size of only 15 -- 2 professors
• Pass/Fail -- intent is to learn how to talk to patients and how to solve problems on your own relating to pharmacy
• One 2-hour lab
• Teach on a disease-based concept
• Two years 
• Third Year -- Class size goes from 125 to 8
• Focus on problem based learning, disease centered, you will be given a patient-centered case with multiple problems 
• You will teach the class about your specific disease case
• Fourth Year -- Clinical rotations, 8 five-week rotations, one five-week off
• 6 are in an independent, chain, hospital, multiple clinical settings
• 2 electives: opportunities in Kenya, Arizona, cross-cultural, CDC in Atlanta, research

Check out pharmacy.auburn.edu for more information! 

Next Meeting Info -- USN School Rep!

Hey everyone! Here is the information about our upcoming meeting on NEXT WEDNESDAY, at 8:00 p.m. We will have a presentation from Dr. Michael DeYoung, the Associate Dean of Admissions and Student Affairs at USN-South Jordan! We will be meeting in Room 164 of the Tanner Building. Hope to see you there! 

Will They Count CHEM 105???

Oh transfer credits. What fun! I know a lot of us can get frustrated trying to figure out what class counts for which requirements, but do not give up! Many of the school's websites have "equivalence guides" where you can read up to see if your class will count. Below is the guide found on the University of Utah's Pharmacy School website (found at this link)

And if you still can't figure it out, most schools have an admissions advisor for their pharmacy school who can help you out if you just give them a call!

BYU COURSE	COURSE TITLE	CR	U OF U MAJOR REQUIREMENT SATISFIED	U OF U COURSE TITLE	CR
CHEM 105	Gen College Chemistry	4	CHEM 1210	General Chemistry I	4
CHEM 106	Gen College Chemistry	3	CHEM 1220	General Chemistry II	4
CHEM 107	General College Chemistry Lab	1	CHEM 1215 CHEM 1225	General Chemistry Lab I General Chemistry Lab II	1 1
CHEM 351	Organic Chemistry	3	CHEM 2310	Organic Chemistry I	4
CHEM 352	Organic Chemistry	3	CHEM 2320	Organic Chemistry II	4
CHEM 353	Organic Chemistry Lab	1-2	CHEM 2315 CHEM 2325	Organic Chemistry Lab I Organic Chemistry Lab II	1 1
ENGL 316	Technical Communication	3	WRTG 3015	Professional/Tech Writing	3
MMBIO 221 MMBIO 222	General Microbiology Gen Microbiology Lab	3 1	Course may satisfy requirement. See departmental advisor.
PDBIO 220	Human Anatomy (w/lab)	3	BIOL 2325	Human Anatomy	4
PDBIO 305	Essentials of Human Phys	4	BIOL 2420	Human Physiology	4
MATH 112	Calculus 1	4	MATH 1210	Calculus I	4
MATH 113	Calculus 2	4	MATH 1220	Calculus II	4
PHSCS 121* PHSCS 105	Principles of Physics 1 Intro Applied Physics	3 3	PHYS 2110 PHYS 2010	Gen Physics with Calculus I General Physics I	4 4
PHSCS 123* PHSCS 106	Principles of Physics 2 Intro Applied Physics	3 3	PHYS 2120 PHYS 2020	Gen Physics with Calculus II General Physics II	4 4
*Principles of Physics preferred; will accept Intro Applied Physics.