New Program Aids Aspiring Med School Students

Keck Graduate Institute is launching a new Postbaccalaureate Premedical Certificate (PPC) program in September for pre-med students who need to enhance their skills before they apply to medical school.

KGI's unique blend of bioscience and business is designed to give students the edge they need to rise above the stiff competition.

"In today's version of medicine, physicians need to be more than just effective at the bedside," said Daniel Chatham, KGI dean of admissions and financial aid.

Students in the one-year PPC program will take their core courses at KGI. They also have the option of enrolling in classes at the other Claremont Colleges to round out their resumes or raise their grade-point averages. KGI's courses are flexible and tailored to meet the individual student's background and qualifications.

Unlike similar programs across the country, applicants to the PPC program are required to have earned an undergraduate or graduate degree in science or engineering.

"We teach at a very high and competitive level; in order to keep up, students must have the basic building blocks already squared away," Chatham said.

Students who earn a Postbaccalaureate Premedical Certificate from KGI can either apply to medical school or exercise an option to enroll in KGI's flagship Master of Bioscience (MBS) program.

By strengthening their qualifications, graduates will improve their chances of going to the medical school of their choice. In today's market, the average applicant will apply to 13 medical schools but may be accepted at only one.

"It (competition) prevents them from choosing their medical school based on fit. Instead, they choose based on where they were lucky enough to get in," Chatham said.

KGI President Sheldon Schuster said the new program gives KGI the opportunity to help students fill gaps in their academic backgrounds and strengthen their candidacy to medical school.

"And, it gives them the opportunity to participate in a rigorous, scientifically difficult, challenging program and know they have the ability and capacity to succeed," Schuster said. "If they compete effectively with our MBS students, they should have no problem getting into medical school."

M. Ian Phillips, Norris Professor of Applied Life Sciences and faculty advisor for the PPC program, was instrumental in getting the program started.

He said KGI students who have gone to medical school after getting their MBS have found their KGI experience very useful.

"They leave here understanding how drugs apply to medicine and how new treatments apply to medicine, and ultimately they are able to understand how to run a business, if they go into private practice," Phillips said.

Charlton Smith (MBS '09), who just completed his first year of medical school at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland, wrote the proposal for the new program.

Smith said KGI is a good fit for the PPC program. "The skills you learn at KGI translate into skills you don't learn in undergrad or in medical school. It really complements one's career," he said. "And, if a student decides not be a physician or is unsuccessful in getting into medical school, there are really good jobs available to them."

He adds that KGI graduates are really unique applicants.

"You get a lot of people who have done very specialized research. At KGI, you get a chance to see more of the medical side and how discoveries directly apply to patients' care."

Suzanne Turner (MBS '03) will graduate in June from the University of Toronto in Canada and start her family medical residency in July. She found her KGI business background very helpful in terms of being a primary care physician and a health care advocate.

"As a family doctor, you're sort of a gatekeeper to the health care system," said Turner. "You make decisions about what kinds of tests are appropriate and who will get referred to a specialist. That's primarily an issue of resource allocation."

In her first year of medical school, Turner used the skills she learned in a KGI entrepreneurship course to raise an unprecedented amount of operating funds for a women's health conference.

"Using the business plan approach, I wrote a synopsis of what the conference was about, developed a budget and presented it to corporate entities and nonprofits," Turner said.

The effort raised five times more money than had been raised in recent years.