hello,
how long are old undergrad/bac classes good for as far as med schools are concerned? in 96 and 97 i did 2 writing intesive 200 lvl eng classes, and a 200 level writing intensive art class … are these classes still good for english requirements? after this i got a bfa in an art school… so i do have a degree… does this matter at all?
anyway whats the scoop on old classes for meeting requirements?
thanks
I would think they would be fine - but the best way to know for sure is to contact a medical school that you are interested in and see what they say.
I haven’t taken any English since probably 1990 - so I’m hoping that will not cause me any problems.
amy
Hi,
My english credits were done during my senior year in high school so that means my 1 year of english credits were from 1983 -1984. I also took 3 credits of sociology and 3 credits of psychology that same time period and all those were accepted as well.
There has never been any mention of the age of these credits.
Your credits are still quite recent. They aren’t even 10 years old yet. I wouldn’t worry about any of them. A friend of mine graduated from our university in 1995 so all her credits are older than yours and she has been accepted.
Yours are fine.
Good luck.
great info and suggestions 
thanks you two
on these non-science pre-reqs, I don’t think I’ve ever heard of someone being told they’d need to repeat a course. When I applied in 1999, my English credits were from 1972 and 73 and it wasn’t an issue. It’s always been my impression that courses such as English, and even statistics, are in a completely different category from, say, organic chemistry.
Mary
I took English, Calculus, Physics + Lab, General Chemistry + Lab, and one semester of Organic between 1992 and 1993. I only had to retake the science courses themselves because they wanted them to be within 7 years. I did not have to retake English or Calculus, and they even let me get away with not retaking the Labs.
Thanks for the handy feedback…
how did you find out about the 7 year limit on the science courses? Do med schools have non-trad section on their websites that I have just not been seeing? Or should we really just generally be calling each school to verify this info?
Thanks
I think it varies from school to school. One school I talked to said that they “preferred” to see the pre-reqs less than ten years old.
Amy
Quote:
Thanks for the handy feedback…
how did you find out about the 7 year limit on the science courses? Do med schools have non-trad section on their websites that I have just not been seeing? Or should we really just generally be calling each school to verify this info?
Thanks
You’ll have to check with each school. It varies quite a bit. I have seen it mentioned on some websites - generally when there is a specified limit. But don’t assume there’s no limit if you don’t see it mentioned!
The other thing is to just keep asking and networking here and on other bulletin boards. Often a school will have an unwritten “policy” about age of courses - as Amy says, they’ll say something like they “prefer” courses be less than X years old.
And my take on the “prefer” language: Any time a school states they “prefer” that you have done thus-and-such, treat it as a rule. What that translates into is, “If you are the daughter of one of our Deans and you did amazing bench research for your Ph.D., and as a result your o-chem is actually now ten years old, we will overlook it. But the rest of you schmucks had better have taken it in the past seven years.”
In other words, the “prefer” is generally a STRONG preference that implies exceptions are only made in extraordinary circumstances for extraordinarily qualified candidates.
Mary
thinking maybe I should’ve signed in as PostCallMary for the above post…
There is a book, a bit long in the tooth by now (data were collected in late 2001, published in 2002), the “Premedical Advisor’s Manual” available only to pre-med advisors and treated as a confidential book (e.g. students can’t browse it in a pre-med advising office) because of the contact phone numbers. This book has information for each med school (MD and DO) in much the same format (but more useful information for advisors) as the MSAR. Among the collected data are notes (sometimes in vague terms) about how long academic coursework is “good” for. (“Recent is recommended.” “Relevant coursework must be within the last four years,” etc.)
Unfortunately there is no standard and to be sure, you would want to call the admissions office of each school you are interested in.
Cheers,
Judy
(Back to work after 3 1/2 weeks of bicycle touring the Lewis & Clark trail…backpacking on a bike with nothing more pressing than pedaling from one campground to another…and eating, of course. 
Now, why are we all working??? )
Maybe pre-req course should come stamped with expiration dates like milk. "This course best used before …"
Anyway, my courses are 20 plus years old. I think I’ll update them