chelsea
what are some good community colleges for going into a pediatrician career ??
#pediatrician #medicine #doctor #college #pediatrics
2 answers
Andrea H
Andrea’s Answer
Hi Chelsea. So exciting that you are interested in becoming a pediatrician. I think more important than the community college that you choose is your performance there! As a recruiter, I am very impressed with students who have worked hard in community college, gotten great grades, and then leveraged that to transfer to a 4 year university (and for you that would ultimately lead to med school!).
If you are comparing different community college options, I would ask them about their rates of completion (the number of students that graduate from their programs within a specified period of time) and ask them what types of things their students frequently go on to do after graduation, including further schooling. Additionally, since you'll need to take a lot of science classes to fulfill your pre-med requirements, I would make sure to check in with them about what science classes they offer. I know it seems far away, but I would take a look at a few med schools that you might be interested in down the line and look at their admissions pages on their websites. This page should list their required "pre-reqs", classes that you need to take in order to apply. I would bring this list to a meeting with the admission / enrollment counselor at the community colleges you're looking at and see what they have to offer within those requirements!
Great answer and tips, Andrea! I would agree on all of this.
Remember, ultimately the path to becoming a pediatrician (MD) would be to transition to and complete a 4-year undergraduate degree, then apply to and complete medical school (4 years) and then to apply for a pediatric residency (on-the-job training; 3 more years).
Marc Grella, MD, FAAP
Paula-Ann Granston
Paula-Ann’s Answer
I like to use this website called College Simply to look at the demographics and facts about colleges in my area. The website shows you enrollment numbers, acceptance rates, average SAT and ACT scores, average GPAs, net prices, and tuition costs of colleges.
I don't know if you want to stay in your area, but here is a comprehensive list of community colleges within 100 miles of Bloomington, California.
Here is the link to the website showing colleges in your area. If you are looking to venture out geographically, you can change the location.
https://www.collegesimply.com/colleges-near/california/bloomington/community-colleges/
The things I would pay attention to when picking a good community college to attend before transferring to a four-year university is retention rate and graduation rate. Graduation rate is the percentage of a school’s first-time, first-year students who complete their program within 150% of the published time for the program. Retention rate is the percentage of a school’s first-time, first-year students who continue at that school the next year. For example, a student who studies full-time in the fall semester and keeps on studying in the program in the next fall semester is counted in this rate.
I'd also like to mention that when you eventually matriculate into a four-year university, I would pay attention to the graduation rate, retention rate, and their medical school acceptance rate to ensure that students who graduate have a high chance of being accepted into medical school.