8-Year Medical
Welcome
For over twenty-five years, Albany Medical College and Union College have offered a combined degree program integrating undergraduate and medical education. Graduates of this program are now teaching at medical schools, leading federal research agencies and practicing medicine throughout the world. The program described in this Website was recently expanded to eight years and includes an M.S. or M.B.A. degree from the Graduate College of Union University. This degree addresses the problems of twenty-first-century medicine and the educational needs of physicians who lead it. The medicine of the new millennium will require physicians to understand medicine, not only as the application of biomedical science to the art of healing, but, also as a socio-economic and cultural institution. It will require cosmopolitan leaders with a broad international perspective; physicians who are not only dedicated to caring for their patients, but who also are willing to confront the complex bioethical problems facing contemporary medicine. This educational program offers a combined bachelors, masters and doctoral degrees for students who anticipate assuming a leadership role in twenty-first century medicine.
* For more information, please visit the Leadership in Medicine web site
Application Process
The eight-year Leadership in Medicine-Health Management Program is sponsored by Union College, the Graduate College of Union University and Albany Medical College. Acceptance into the program requires high school applicants to apply to Union College and to Albany Medical College. The application process begins in the fall of the senior year and ends in the spring when admission decisions are sent.
Applicants submit a Union application to the admissions office (Grant Hall) by December 1. Union uses the Common Application. Students applying to Leadership in Medicine should indicate their interest in that program on the front of the Common Application. Union has a single page Addendum which must be submitted with the application. Applications forms may be downloaded or students may connect to an online application.
The applications are evaluated and the applications of the top candidates are forwarded to Albany Medical College for further review. These applicants complete the Albany Medical College application. Albany Medical College's admission committee selects applicants for interviews. These interviews are held in January, February and March. Students are interviewed at the Medical College and attend informational meetings at Union. Decisions are mailed to applicants in April.
There is an option for applicants to the Leadership in Medicine Program to be considered for the four-year program by completing an additional essay.
Admissions Criteria
The most important credential for admission to the Leadership in Medicine (LIM) Program at Union is academic excellence. In applying to the LIM Program, a student is committing to a career in medicine. The more you have learned about medicine, the better.
A successful applicant:
- has excellent grades in the most challenging courses available in high school.
- must have taken biology, chemistry, and physics.
- ranks near the top of his/her high school class (if the school uses class rank)
- has the option of submitting either the SAT I and two SAT IIs (a math and a science) OR the ACT.
- Ideally SAT I scores should be above 1950 and SAT II scores above 650. ACT scores at and above 30 are expected.
- has clinical or volunteer service in medicine.
Both need-based financial aid and merit based aid are available at Union. Please go to the financial aid website for more information.