Bryn Mawr Postbaccalaureate Premedical Program - About The Program

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One of the nation’s oldest, strongest, and most respected postbac premedical programs
Medical school acceptance rate of more than 98 percent
Early acceptance to medical school through our extensive linkage program
Intensive, full-time preparation for medical school in one year
Intellectually charged and rewarding environment
Ideal size—small enough for individual attention, large enough for diverse perspectives
Wide range of medically related volunteer and job opportunities and programs

Richard (Dickie) Bower

“The Bryn Mawr postbac program has a personal touch—the program is just small enough that everyone knows everyone else, including the professors. It is a very challenging year, both academically and emotionally, as you wait for acceptance into medical school. But Bryn Mawr treats you as a person, not a number.”

DARTMOUTH MEDICAL SCHOOL, CLASS OF 2012
POSTBAC CLASS OF 2008
UNITED STATES NAVAL ACADEMY,
B.S. MATHEMATICS
1999

As a captain in the U.S. Marine Corps, Dickie served in Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East, most recently as company commander in Iraq. He enrolled at Dartmouth Medical School through Bryn Mawr’s consort program and was awarded a Naval scholarship under the Health Professions Scholarship Program. Upon graduation, he will return to active duty. While he was a student in Bryn Mawr’s postbac program, Dickie was a volunteer at the Jonathan Lax Treatment Center, Philadelphia, a primary-care HIV practice.

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Hollis (Tag) Hopkins

“I started medical school when I was 28, unlike a lot of students, who had just come from college or taken one year off at the most. The first year was quite daunting. But I was up to the pace in my study and time-management skills after my year at Bryn Mawr.”

UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO MEDICAL SCHOOL, CLASS OF 2011
POSTBAC CLASS OF 2006
NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY,
B.S., CIVIL ENGINEERING
2002

While enrolled full time at Northwestern, Tag also completed paramedic training and worked full time for an ambulance service in Chicago. After graduation, he continued working as a paramedic in Chicago and Boulder, Colorado. During the glide year between completing the postbac program and enrolling in medical school, Tag worked as a flight medic with Flight for Life Colorado, a helicopter service in Frisco, Colorado.

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Kathleen Degnan

“I loved going to school with people who were so passionate about their new career choice. The postbacs had a very strong sense of community. Everyone was friendly and willing to help one another. I could go to the library at night and sit down with any one of my classmates to talk about a concept or ask for their help. It was a great experience.”

UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA MEDICAL SCHOOL, CLASS OF 2012
POSTBAC CLASS OF 2007
NOTRE DAME,
B.B.A., FINANCE
2006

During college, Kathleen did a summer internship as a research assistant in molecular biology at the Coriell Institute for Medical Research, a nonprofit, basic biomedical research institution in Camden, New Jersey. During the glide year between completing the postbac program and enrolling in medical school, she worked as a research assistant for a study of secondary radiation effects in survivors of Hodgkin's lymphoma in the Department of Radiation Oncology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, which has provided glide-year opportunities for many students who have completed the Bryn Mawr postbac program.

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Ebony Dix

“I chose Bryn Mawr because of its solid reputation, excellent support system, and guidance in preparing students for the MCAT and the medical school application process. Bryn Mawr exceeded my expectations. The director, Jodi Domsky, and her staff got to know all of us on a one-to-one level. They really wanted us to succeed and fulfill our dream of becoming physicians. Any time I had an issue or problem, they would sit down with me and figure out a solution and a plan.”

ROBERT WOOD JOHNSON MEDICAL SCHOOL, CLASS OF 2012
POSTBAC CLASS OF 2006
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY,
B.A. MIDDLE EASTERN STUDIES/ECONOMICS
2003

After graduating from Columbia, Ebony worked in the financial industry and volunteered in a hospital emergency department. During the glide year between completing the postbac program and enrolling in medical school, she was a research assistant working on cancer and infertility research for a reproductive endocrinologist at Cooper Hospital in Camden, New Jersey.

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William P. Malachowski, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Chemistry

“Bryn Mawr postbacs are excellent students. They are very focused and motivated, with a real appreciation for the subject and a passion for learning. As an educator, I find them exciting and fun to teach.”

“Many postbacs have returned to school to study medicine after pursuing another career, and they love learning a subject that stimulates and challenges them with difficult, abstract concepts.”

“I often draw parallels between the analyses of organic chemical reactions, which have subtle differences indicating different outcomes, and the process by which a physician studies a patient’s symptoms, orders the proper tests, and analyzes the results to determine an accurate diagnosis from among several possible causes.”

Dr. Malachowski has taught Organic Chemistry to Bryn Mawr postbac students since 2000. His research into the development of new therapeutics for the treatment of diseases, including cancer and neurodegenerative conditions, has been funded by the National Cancer Institute and National Science Foundation. His work is published in the Journal of Medical Chemistry and other leading journals. Dr. Malachowski and his colleagues hold three patents on novel compounds and methods.

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