UF music junior David Vega entered the university with the hopes of pursuing a career in the medical field to become the pediatrician he always wanted to be.
Even though he is a nonscience major, Vega, 21, has taken the necessary prerequisite courses at UF to prepare him for medical school. But other nonscience students may not have had the opportunity to take the required classes or may have changed their career choices entirely.
“It’s hard to know when you’re going to college what exactly you want to study and do for the rest of your life,” Vega said.
In response, UF is launching a new program called the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Pre-Health and Post-Baccalaureate Program, which allows graduates to take the prerequisite courses necessary to apply to health professional graduate programs such as medical or dental school.
“The college saw that that need was there, and so we wanted to create something that could help fulfill that need,” said Christine Richmond, an academic adviser for the college and one of the administrators for the program.
Students who have always wanted to attend UF for pre-health courses will have the opportunity to do so with the program, she said.
“A lot of students really want to stay here,” she said. “They want to either stay a Gator or they want to come here because we’re known for having a really rigorous pre-health curriculum.”
Students will have to complete a full-time, two-year program that including a Summer semester. It costs $525 per credit hour.
“A lot of them are going to be those same courses—so general chemistry, general biology—but it will be a smaller setting,” Richmond said.
The new program will also include cross-disciplinary laboratory courses, pre-health seminars to help with nonacademic preparation and content review for exams like the Medical College Admission Test or Dental Admission Test.
The priority application deadline is April 1, but students have until July 15 to apply for the program, which starts this Fall.
Students who are graduating at the end of the Spring and Summer semesters can still apply, Richmond said.
Interested students can attend walk-in advising hours to Farrior Hall for more information.
[A version of this story ran on page 1 on 2/26/2014 under the headline “UF plans post-bacc for pre-health grads"]
