Since its inception in 1977, the Medical School Option program at West Point, commonly known as the pre-med program, has sent approximately 20 cadets to medical school each year. The program has grown since its early days where cadets were pretty much on their own. Today, there is an established pre-med program similar to what you would see in any college across the country. Each cadet is assigned an advisor, and the advisor works with department academic counselors to assist cadets with course selection, prepare them for participation in the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) preparation program, and guide them through the primary and secondary phases of the application process. Beginning approximately fifteen years ago, 100% of cadets in the program were admitted to a medical school, with 80% accepted to various schools by winter leave. Of those cadets accepted to medical school, many choose to enter one of the Army’s branches after graduation, deferring their medical school start date for two years. There are also one or two cadets each year who defer medical school because they have won other scholarships.
Each semester the West Point Pre-Medical Society, an academic club that helps prepare cadets for medical school, sponsors doc of the month speakers, visiting lectures, tours, and community service projects. During April of each year, Society members take a trip to Washington D.C. to shadow Army physicians at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for a day and tour the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS).
Each cadet is expected to meet thresholds related to his or her grade point average for all science courses completed, as well as the all-important MCAT. Cadets apply for one of two scholarships: The Health Professions Scholarship Program, which is for civilian schools of medicine, and the USUHS scholarship, which is for the military’s medical school. Cadets are allowed to interview during their seventh semester, and those accepted by a school of medicine are allowed to attend these schools following graduation. Cadets attending medical school incur additional active duty service obligations.
Typically, a third of cadets attend the USUHS, and these numbers have increased to sixty percent with the Class of 2016. Other cadets attend civilian schools of medicine, and for the first time two cadets have been accepted to the prestigious Stanford School of Medicine, with one of those cadets deciding instead to attend Harvard. The Class of 2016 will see Cadets Zach Affrin, Aaron Alindogan, Christian Burgos-Sanchez, Shena Cousens, Anthony Cox, Marco Dela Cruz, Erik Hegeman, Nolan Jones, Rebecca Lee, Nicholas Moran, Carissa Pekny, Virginia Phillips, and Derek Smart attend the USUHS. Cadet Joe Broderick will attend Johns Hopkins after a year in China studying rural medicine, Cadet Briana Johnson will attend Stanford, Cadet Regina Parker will attend Harvard, and Cadet Cole Patrick will attend Oklahoma University School of Medicine.