STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

nicole, you have residency in pa right now right? would you go to med school in pa, then? there are so many more med schools in pa than ohio, in fact, i think pa ranks as one of the highest percentages of med schools. so maybe don't change your residency yet, till you decide. i would actually take the mcat though, just because than you have that done. yeah, i know its money that you prolly don't have to spare, if you don't end up going to med school, but at least if you take the mcat than you know if you can even go or not. plus, 24 isn't that old, not at all. my grad school is about half full of kids who are going to med school after we finish in june 2007, which would put most of them as going into med school when they are 26 or so, so your age isn't a problem.

what do you see yourself doing as a career? do you want to work at cvs behind the counter or do you want to work in a hospital or what? don't do either pharm or med because it's something that you're interested in or it's something you want to learn about. i feel that because it's grad school, and it's prolly putting you into major debt either way, you need to be doing something that you want to do for the rest of your life. it's a career move you are making, essentially, and it better be something that you really really want to do daily for years and years to come. is there someway you can do some volunteer work in a hospital or with sick kids or something while still in pharm school, so you that way you can expose yourself to the medical environment? but in ending, i agree totally with honey, you're first start is actually to talk to somebody in your school about your doubts about pharm school. second, investigate med schools and specialities.

also...what is it that you are having doubts about? is it maybe just the specific school where you are now? and maybe a different pharm school would be better? what speciality would you want to do with med?

i responded to your first post, and now my answer sounds crazy but i can kind of help you with the mba thing since i just finished my apps. i think an mba is a really good degree (there's a bias in this answer) since it pretty much equips you to do anything. the great part about it is that most schools don't require you to major in any one thing, so you can learn about anything. in my research i've found that certain schools have reputations for certain things i.e. wharton and columbia are widely regarded as top-notch finance programs, while kellog (in chicago) is known for marketing. many schools also have joint degree programs, and iirc wharton has a really excellent healthcare program.

i would probably start by taking the mba electives and see how you like them . i say this b/c an mba is not cheap and most people take out loans, so it helps to make sure it's something you want to do. 

where to start depends on what you want. they're are tons of amazing resources, primarily school websites, business week, the vault, and us news & world reports. i guess the easiest place to start is with rankings and then narrow the choices down by what you actually want to do. i did this for my search and then focused on the criteria that were most important to me. if you want more specific info. pm me (i listed stylethread on my apps so i kind of don't want to get into too much detail here) 

as far as job prospects go, i think they're pretty good. my brother just sent me an email about this, so i'll dig it up and post the link. also i know detroit and mikacat have mbas so they can give you more advice on classes, etc.

eta: one more thing re rankings. take them with a grain of salt. ultimately a lot depends on what you want to do post-mba.  like if you want to stay in a certain geographic area, certain schools may not be in the top 10 according to a random survey but are really excellent schools.

-- Edited by honey at 11:43, 2006-01-22

-- Edited by honey at 11:53, 2006-01-22