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ALL ABOUT WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
Located in St. Louis, Missouri, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis was founded in 1891 and is known for its commitment to patient care, research, and education.
In 1962, the school joined with Barnes Jewish Hospital and St. Louis Children’s Hospital to form a coalition that continues to this day. The medical campus that is home to all three of these institutions—in addition to the Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center—covers 178 acres over 18 city blocks in the heart of St. Louis’s Central West End, directly adjacent to Forest Park. The institutions collectively generate an annual economic impact of nearly $6.3 billion and employ over 21,000 professionals, making them one of the largest employers in the St. Louis metropolitan area.
Barnes Jewish Hospital and St. Louis Children’s Hospital are Washington University’s primary teaching hospitals. Due to its prime location and relationship with neighboring medical institutions, Washington University School of Medicine offers one of the nation’s largest academic medical centers, including the six-story Farrell Learning and Teaching Center. The Center includes student carrels, state-of-the-art lecture halls and small group meeting rooms, a computer lab, simulated outpatient clinic rooms, and the Wood Simulation Center, where students have the opportunity to receive emergency and trauma care training with full-body, high-fidelity patient simulators. Clinical education takes place at individual patients’ bedsides, as well as in one-on-one or small group teaching settings.
Washington University School of Medicine is world-renowned for its achievements in the medical field. The school published the first evidence linking smoking and lung cancer, served as a major contributor of genome sequence data to the Human Genome Project, developed screening tests that are now used worldwide to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease, helped pioneer the use of insulin to treat diabetes, developed the first surgical prevention of cancer based on genetic testing, and demonstrated that severely malnourished children given antibiotics along with therapeutic peanut butter-based food are more likely to survive than those who receive therapeutic food only.
The faculty of Washington University’s School of Medicine has pioneered many advances in research and treatment. Of the current faculty, 13 are fellows of the National Academy of Sciences, 27 have been elected to the National Academy of Medicine, and 6 are investigators with NIH MERIT status. Collectively, they have received 101 individual and/or institutional career development awards from the National Institutes of Health and 58 career development awards from non-federal agencies. The school’s full-time clinical faculty (Washington University Physicians) is one of the five largest academic clinical practices in the country.
Washington University began admitting women in 1918, and today, women make up half of each incoming class for medical programs. The School of Medicine is committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion and actively works to create a welcoming environment for students of all backgrounds.
Overview
Average UGrad GPA ———- 3.83
Total Med School Enrollment ———- 474
Acceptance Rate ———- 9%
Introduction
There are several reasons why Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis (WUMS), often known just as WashU, is ranked among the Top 10 Medical Schools in the country byUS News and World Report. The school boasts stellar resources, exceptional faculty, vibrant student life, and a proven track record of placing graduates in prestigiousresidency programs nationwide.
For prospective students, these strengths make for a highly competitive admissions process. Similar to other schools of its caliber, WashU only accepts the most qualified candidates, so applicants need to keep the school’s unique identity in mind if they want to be successful.
Here, we’ll provide you with an overview of the WashU medical school admissions process and share proven strategies so you can outperform other applicants.
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Part 2: Washington University School of Medicine programs
Here is a list of WashU’s MD programs:
- Doctor of Medicine (MD)
- Medical Scientist Training Program (MD/PhD)
- Doctor of Medicine and Doctor of Philosophy in Biomedical Engineering (MD/PhD)
- Doctor of Medicine and Master of Science in Clinical Investigation (MD/MSCI)
- Doctor of Medicine and Master of Population Health Sciences (MD/MPHS)
- Doctor of Medicine and Master of Public Health (MD/MPH)
We’ll cover the basic MD admissions process here.
School of Medicine Tuition
For the 2019-2020 academic year, WashU’s tuition for first-year students was $66,913 and will remain constant for all four years of the program. The school estimates that additional expenses, such as med school materials, housing, food, and travel, bring up the total cost of enrollment to approximately $87,500.
In 2019, the school pledged $100 million to support a new scholarship program for eligible MD students that offers financial aid packages which are need-based, merit-based, or both.
In 2018, the average WashU graduate graduated with $125,457 in debt from the program—while still formidable, that’s considerably less than the medical-school national median of$200,000 for that same year.
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Part 3: How hard is it to get into Washington University School of Medicine?
WashU Medical School acceptance rate
For the 2019-2020 school year, the School of Medicine publicized the following numbers:
- 4,766 applications
- 47 applications per position
- 101 first-year students enrolled
WashU doesn’t publicize its formal acceptance or matriculation rates, but we know that a little over 2% of those who applied finally enrolled in the MD program. That makes for a highly competitive process, no matter which way you count it!
Washington University School of Medicine requirements
WashU admitted students perform at the highest level academically. Their average GPA and MCAT are as follows:
Average GPA: 3.85
Average MCAT: 519
In past years,the admissions office required that applicants took theMCAT within 3 years of applying. This would mean no later than 2017 for the 2020-2011 admissions cycle.
Before enrollment, the school requires applicants to complete at least 90 semester hours at an approved undergraduate institution. WUSM also requires that students complete one-year of study in each of the following courses prior to enrollment:
- Biology
- General or inorganic chemistry
- Organic Chemistry (one semester can be replaced by a semester of biochemistry; one course in biochemistry is encouraged)
- Physics
- Calculus through integral and differential equations (one semester can be replaced by a semester of calculus)
It is highly encouraged—though not required—that students take these required courses for a letter grade rather than a pass/fail grade at their main undergraduate college or university. As long as applicants have completed their pre-med requirements, they can major in whatever they wish; WashU matriculants have studied subjects ranging from engineering to the humanities in addition to science.
(Suggested reading:Medical School Requirements: The Definitive Guide)
Admissions Timeline
WashU provides a detailed timeline ofimportant dates, from the beginning of the admissions process to the first day of classes for accepted students. Our timeline below lists dates that are specific to the school’s admissions cycle:
- Early July: Encouraged time to submit yourAMCAS application
- October – February: WUSM admissions interviews
- November – April 15: Accepted students are notified
- December 1: Deadline to submit AMCAS application
- December 16: Deadline to submit transcripts to WUSM
- December 31: Deadline to submit supplemental application, recommendation letters, and MCAT scores to WUSM
We always recommend applying early so your application can be reviewed and processed as soon as possible, and so that you can take advantage of rolling admissions.
(Suggested reading:The Ideal Medical School Application Timeline (2020-2021))
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Part 4: Washington University School of Medicine secondary application essays
Following yourmedical school personal statement, which you’ll submit in your AMCAS application, you’ll be asked by WashU to write up tothree secondary essays: one is required and two are optional. Following the two optional essays, the school provides these words of advice:
These essays are an important opportunity to share more about yourself and make the case for why the WashU is the right school for you. WashU also suggests that these essays are the chance to address factors like adversity and diversity that may be a part of your personal story or educational history.
We recommend you complete all three essays so as not to waste a chance to better introduce yourself to the admissions committee.
Below are sample responses.
Question #1: Have you already completed your undergraduate education, have you had your college or graduate education interrupted, or do you plan not to be a full-time student during your application year? (YES/NO)
This is a simple yes/no question.
Describe in chronological order your activities during the times(s) when you were not enrolled as a full-time student. (2000 character limit)
This prompt asks for information that you most likely included in theAMCAS Work and Activities section. Still, you should take this essay just as seriously as any other part of your application.
WashU wants to know about your activities outside the context of school, so extracurriculars you completed as a full-time student can’t be included. This may cause anxiety for prospective students who are still in college and wondering, “Aside from summer internships, what other experiences do I have?”
Conversely, this question may prove difficult for older ornontraditional applicants who have lots of work experience in addition to the summer activities they completed as college students: “How can I accurately describe all my activities in less than 2000 characters?”
For these reasons, plan out your response and strategically prioritize your activities. For instance, the description of the mentorship program you did for 10 hours one summer shouldn’t be as long as the description of your full-time, postgraduate research job at a top university. Here are some additional tips:
- Focus on yourself. When describing different experiences, focus on your individual responsibilities and contributions. Shy away from discussing other people who were participants, colleagues, mentors, etc., who you worked with.
- Refrain from deep dives into how the experience(s) changed you. Although you might want to discuss how an activity influenced your life choices, the question is asking you to describe these activities.
- Be consistent. Keep in mind that your descriptions need to align with information that appears in other parts of your application.
Below is a sample description, or entry, detailing a student’s summer internship:
Assistant Research Technician; University of Los Angeles, Los Angeles Medical Centers; June- Aug, 2019. I worked in a laboratory on synthetic cell culture activities and assisted lead researchers with the day to day functioning of their research projects. I was primarily responsible for monitoring synthetic cell culture development, analyzing and documenting data for my supervisors, and preparing research findings for publication in academic journals. Additionally, I took on the added responsibility of creating a new internal database to track newly approved laboratory procedures for my department.
This entry is approximately 605 characters, which is over 30% of the allotted space you have to answer this question. Once you’ve decided on the number entries, make a clear cut decision about how long each needs to be. Remember, this is only one part of your application, and admissions committee members are aware of the space limitations. And never repeat anything from your W&A word-for-word!
Question #2: Describe a time or situation where you have been unsuccessful or failed. (optional) (3000 character limit)
The admissions committee knows that every applicant has failed or been unsuccessful at some point in their life. What WashU wants to know is how you dealt with this moment. For this reason, a helpful way to approach this question is by viewing it through the prism of having to answer atraditional adversity essay question. The admissions committee wants to know how you dealt with the challenges that arose from your failure and what coping strategies you adopted in its aftermath. Let’s review a sample response below:
When I was twenty years old, my grandmother died. The grief I felt following her fatal stroke was nothing in comparison to what my mom felt at the time. This fact puzzled me, since my mother had often profiled their mother-daughter relationship as strained and toxic, given my granny’s life-long bout with alcoholism. This took place in late November of my sophomore year, and at the time the idea of me flying back to Miami from Boston seemed out of the question. The funeral wasn’t as important as studying for exams in December, right? After they buried her, I received a telephone call. “I’m disappointed in you,” my mother said. I remained silent. “I needed you here today.” After that call, we didn’t speak again for six months. My parents are divorced; I spent winter break with my father’s new family in Tampa.
I’ve always prided myself on knowing how to read other people’s emotions, but when it came to this family tragedy—my granny was young, only sixty-three years old—I’d failed. I’d let down my mom and acted selfishly. I told myself that she secretly wanted me to stay at Tufts and study, and that a roundtrip ticket home was too expensive, even though my dad would have paid for it. Moreover, because of my own bad relationship with my mom in high school, there was a part of me that believed my absence at the funeral was payback for the times I’d felt mistreated by her. I’d always thought my mom favored my “prettier” sister and looked down at me for enjoying “silly things,” like fantasy novels, when she’d always been a social butterfly.
When summer break came, I decided to finally return home, and in less than 24 hours my mom and I took a walk. I listened to my mom express sorrow. Her life hadn’t worked out like she’d planned. She’d never remarried. She was still mourning her mother. She was frightened about her retirement plans, her pension and overall future. And soon, the things I wanted to say to her didn’t matter anymore. I simply had to listen. I tried to provide the emotional support that I hadn’t successfully given her before.
I thought that serving people would mean working as a neurologist or psychiatrist, researching the human brain and helping people with my findings. But this situation with my mother taught me that I couldn’t do this work effectively if I wasn’t truly attuned to the emotions of people around me. Sometimes it’s important to focus on slide decks, and other times it’s important to focus on the people you love. It took me committing myself to helping my mother plan her future to figure this out.
Although this response is personal, it discusses a family drama that is relatable to an average individual. And, similar to a traditional response to an adversity essay prompt, the applicant discusses how she was challenged, how she responded, and the lessons she learned in the process.
In this case, the applicant chooses to discuss an interpersonal failure rather than a career or professional shortcoming, but in the final paragraph she ties the lessons she learned back to her clinical interests in medicine. She also lets the reader know that she’s self aware and understands the importance of managing stress and creating work-life balance, which are skills she’ll need in medical school and in her future career as a physician.
Question #3: Is there anything else you would like to share with the Committee on Admissions? (optional) (3000 word limit)
Though it may seem daunting to generate a response without a specific question in mind, chances are you have responses tosecondary essays for other schools that could easily be tweaked and used here.
Some students use this space to explain why WashU is the right school for them or to explain how they think they’d contribute to the diversity of the student body or the medical profession. You probably already have basic versions of these—the diversity and “why us” questions—and so you can choose one of those essays, updating it to make it work for WashU.
Here’s a sample:
“You go to church? What type of gay are you?” These words were said by a guy I was dating over dinner at a Mexican restaurant. We soon broke ties after that comment, but the misconception has stuck with me. On Sunday mornings, when many gays are recovering from their debaucherous Saturday nights, I’m usually at the Church of Notre Dame in Morningside Heights, reflecting on my week and sometimes hearing the sounds of ambulances that serve a hospital next door. Because I want to work in the ER, I think it’s a sign when I hear that noise, because it feels like I’m being called to serve a higher purpose in more ways than one.
I’m fortunate to have been able to live both my religious life and sexuality identity. Sometimes I want to talk about Ariana Grande’s new single and sometimes I want to chat about spirituality, all in the same conversation. I grew up around socially liberal people, many of whom knew a lesbian pastor or a queer rabbi or cantor. But in other parts of the country, being gay is still considered a sin, and many LBGTQ+ people struggle to access medical care. Some are untrustworthy of both religious and medical institutions, often for similar reasons. As a medical student, I want to create bridges for members of this community to inform them about resources that can change their physical health and wellbeing.
As a junior in college, I was social secretary for my LGBTQ student group. In this role, I worked with religious groups on campus to do cross programming for our school’s Queer Awareness week. At Washington University in St. Louis, I’m eager to join LGBTQmed on campus and support the LGBTQ+ Health Provider Directory. I’m also interested in supporting Washington University’s Infectious Disease Clinic to work with St. Louis’ residents who are HIV positive. When I think about what diversity and inclusion mean to me, the goal isn’t simply to get different people together to understand each other’s differences. It’s about leveraging those differences to inspire positive changes in society. With rates of HIV transmissions still high in many parts of America, interventions are needed in rural and religious communities. I want to work in these places to increase awareness about the issue.
For many socially liberal people, religion can seem antiquated, dangerous, backward or even foreign. But the language of compassion and empathy that is often couched in religious practice has universal possibilities. To serve members of queer and Christian communities in need, I want to be a physician that never judges a book, or an LGBTQ+ individual, by their cover.
This applicant lets the admissions committee know why WashU is the right med school for him and how he intends to contribute to diversity efforts on campus. As a result, the response kills two birds with one stone.
It’s also important to note that the applicant has done his homework about LGBTQ+ resources on campus and discusses why his past life experiences will help him become an active member of this community. Furthermore, the applicant affirms that he’s politically conscious without politics becoming the primary subject of the response.
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