Pre-Medical

Enter the Vast Field of Medicine

Begin your career in an essential, effective, and rewarding field. When you pursue F&M’s pre-medical program — offered as a supplement to your chosen major — you’ll find all the guidance and support you need to build a sturdy foundation for a successful future in medicine.

About Health Professions Advising: Pre-Medical

The pre-med program is offered through F&M’s Health Professions Advising as a supplement to your chosen major. While you’ll declare this major at the end of your sophomore year, your pre-med experience will begin the moment you step on campus. As a pre-med student, you’ll enjoy individualized guidance on recommended courses to take, and specialized programming, resources, and more to help you develop the skills and experiences you’ll need to be a competitive applicant in medicine.

 

Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) Preparation

If you plan to attend medical school after graduating from F&M, you will need to take the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT). This exam tests biology, general chemistry, organic chemistry, physics, and verbal reasoning, as well as concepts from biochemistry, psychology, and sociology.

With the help of Health Professions Advising at OSPGD, you can prepare for this exam with customized study and preparation strategies. You can take an official practice test from the Association of American Medical Colleges, and if you’d like to take a commercial test preparation class, Kaplan MCAT® Prep and The Princeton Review MCAT offer a discount to F&M students and alumni. You can also receive guidance and tips compiled from F&M students and alumni who have scored in the 90th percentile or higher on the MCAT.

Clinical Opportunities

Immerse yourself in the day-to-day life of medicine prior to entering the field. Many pre-med students volunteer at local hospitals and clinics, including University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) Lancaster, Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health (LGH), and Lancaster Health Center. Some students volunteer for F&M EMS and Lancaster EMS after gaining EMT certification. If you have a specific area of interest, you’ll receive guidance and support to find clinical opportunities.

Health Professions Advising also coordinates the True Blue Network Mentorship Program. If you’re accepted to the True Blue Network Mentorship Program, you’ll be paired with an alumni or community physician who will serve as your mentor. This program instills a deep understanding of a life in medicine from both professional and personal perspectives. Often, students have the ability to shadow their mentor, further developing their understanding of patient care.

Research Opportunities

While most undergraduate institutions reserve research opportunities for their graduate programs, we want you to engage now — not later. At F&M, you’ll dive into practice and enjoy hands-on experience in and out of the classroom. We offer summer research opportunities for a limited number of pre-med students through a partnership with University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine. Pre-medical students can also apply for funding to support their off-campus research projects. Past students have completed summer research at:

  • Human Epilepsy Project at Yale University
  • Penn State College of Medicine Department of Pediatrics
  • University of Pittsburgh
  • Carnegie Mellon Institute
  • Hadassah Medical Center in Israel
  • Lankenau Institute for Medical Research
  • University of Pennsylvania Institute for Translational Medicine

Benjamin Rush Pre-Health Honor Society

Clubs and organizations offer a fun and exciting way to get involved while supplementing your academic experience. In your sophomore or junior year, you can apply to be a member of F&M’s Benjamin Rush Pre-Health Honor Society, an organization that hosts programs and events and creates a sense of community among pre-med students.

Success Beyond F&M

Graduates who follow the pre-med track are distinctly prepared for success in medicine. Many go on to medical school before beginning their career as a leader in the field. 

Graduate School

In recent years, qualified applicants (3.4 GPA, 3.3 science GPA and 76% or better MCAT score) have been accepted to medical school at a rate of 91%. The individualized learning and hands-on experience F&M provides gives them an advantage in getting admitted into some of the nation’s top programs, including:


  • Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine
  • Drexel University College of Medicine
  • Emory University School of Medicine
  • Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
  • Miller School of Medicine - University of Miami
  • Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine
  • Rutgers New Jersey Medical School
  • Sidney Kimmel Medical School - Thomas Jefferson University
  • University of Pennsylvania
  • Yale School of Medicine

Career Paths

Many F&M alumni have become leaders in medicine, including in private practice, clinics, and other settings. They hold positions such as:


  • Anesthesiologist
  • Cardiologist
  • Cardiothoracic Surgeon
  • Chief Medical Officer
  • Chiropractor
  • Dermatologist
  • Emergency Physician
  • Endocrinologist
  • Family Physician
  • Gastroenterologist
  • General Surgeon
  • Internal Medicine Physician
  • Medical Director
  • Pathologist
  • Physician
  • Radiologist
  • OB/GYN
  • Ophthalmologist
  • Optometrist
  • Orthopedic Surgeon
  • Osteopathic Physician

Alumni Spotlight

“Being submerged in this environment is really giving me that other component of a liberal arts education I came to F&M for.”

Curtis Mark ’23, a public health major and pre-med student, landed an internship with Dr. Michael Fishman '05, M.D., director of research at the Center for Interventional Pain and Spine (CIPS). Mark shadowed patient visits and surgeries, learned about patient charts and how to include notes, learned how to read medications, and got insight into CIPS studies on chronic pain. Mark even began his own research study on a topic he always found fascinating: phantom limb pain, which is when patients report feeling pain in a limb even after it has been removed. "All these things I've never experienced before I'm getting to learn about," Mark said. "Being submerged in this environment is really giving me that other component of a liberal arts education I came to F&M for."
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Alumni Spotlight

Developing Music Therapy for Premature Infants

In her sophomore year, when the pre-med student participated in a shadowing program at Lancaster General Hospital, she was inspired by her experience in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), which serves infants, known as "preemies," who are born before 37 weeks of gestation. "I was kind of surprised by the environment of the ward and how abrasive it seemed to little 4-pound babies fighting to survive outside of the nurturing womb they belonged in," Luckiewicz said. She started to research the subject with Associate Professor of Psychology Krista Casler, director of F&M's Child Development Laboratory. "I designed a music therapy project," she said. "A study conducted in 2013 used different sounds to benefit the baby in different ways, and then I started to research how a NICU worked and the babies' feeding schedule."
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Beyond Career Services

Health Professions Advising is offered through F&M’s Office of Student and Post-Graduate Development (OSPGD). Pronounced “os-puh-god,” OSPGD prepares F&M students and graduates for success in every aspect of life beyond college.

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