ny mom

First, let me say WOW! We were blown away. Presentation was a little long, but our tour guide was great. My daughter was so impressed with everything-even the dorms that were heard were small are actually pretty standard. Now, to find out how to pay for it!!!

Re: Co-ops: It wasn't made clear, are they paid? If so, what is average pay?
Re: financial aid/scholarships/workstudy: On average, how much of a financial aid package is loans?
Re: Pre-med: I am assuming NU has a high percent placement rate into med schools, anyone have any first hand experience? How about pre-med co-ops?

Thanks

RatedPG

Co-ops are almost always paid although I have heard of some students taking unpaid coops in the last round, due to the economy. Average pay for coop really depends on the major/industry. Personal experience here, my oldest daughter in her first coop in engineering last January got $20/hour. Her second coop (currently applying for) range seems to be $16/hr and up. Second daugter is a Health Science major applying for first coop in Jan.. pay range is 12-15/hour.


I have no experience with financial aid/loans, only merit aid. Also no experience with pre med.

RedSox2007

I have a relative who is on his first coop at Northeastern as a pre-med major. He is working at Mass Eye and Ear at Mass General Hospital and gets 12/hr I think.

Emily2007

I'm a science major (although probably headed to PhD, not med school) and I think NU students do pretty well with getting into medical school, but really no better or worse than at most other schools.

In general, med school is about the applicant and not the school. The good students at NU get into medical school, the "bad" ones don't. That's the way it works everywhere. NU does its share of weeding out, as do most schools. Many freshman come in starry-eyed and idealistic until they get a 65% on that Bio II midterm (Potts-santone, why such a hard grader?) and then begin to drop like flies when Organic II rolls around. That's pre-med in general--it's meant to make you hate your life for 4 years, and just when you think it can't get worse, it's time for the MCAT. Maybe I'm just cynical--but most of my pre-med/science friends feel the same way, and at this point the only people left in my classes are the ones who really love science or are really dedicated and really qualified to actually get in to medical school. Most of the pre-meds I knew freshman year are long, long gone and have switched to other majors.

The people who stick with it are generally pretty successful... co-ops give you awesome application material, letters of rec, and connections. There are some smart kids here who have done great things on co-op. Brigham & Women's, which is essentially Harvard Medical School, takes a lot of co-ops, which looks pretty awesome on a resume. There are also all the volunteer opportunities, groups, etc., that come with going to a major university in a big city, and decent pre-med advising. A few of my friends are applying now or have been accepted now, and like I said before, the ones with good GPAs, co-ops, leadership, volunteering, and MCAT are getting interviews. The ones with weaker applications, or who stand out less, are not.

nubiochem14

Co-ops are typically paid but the pay range can vary greatly. I've heard of various paid co-ops at places funded by NPOs and they were barely making over $10/hour. As a member of the biochemistry club (aka BCC), however, I've heard of co-ops that pay $30/hour and even more in some rare cases. Your typical co-op for biochem/biotech is probably around $20/hour but for other majors it typically varies. Total I've heard of pay rates anywhere from $10/hour to $35/hour. Also note that some co-ops are not paid; some people have done co-ops with the Red Sox Foundation and those positions were not paid.

Right now Northeastern is giving me about $9K/sem combined through scholarships, grants and work-study but this is a very generous financial aid package from what I've heard so far. A lot of people whose parents did not have the money right off the bat to come to NU applied for a LOT of scholarships on their own and really went after that hard.

I actually have a work-study position with the pre-med advisor. It seems like every time I'm in her office during her office hours she's always advising someone about med school but honestly the program really weeds out people who won't make it in the long run. OrgChem gets the ones who somehow passed through the strainer at Calc and Differential Equations for Biology (Yes, DiffEqs) so the people who are left are really in things for the long term. As for placement I don't have any specific information but I know for a fact that we've put students at Emory University School of Medicine, Tufts Medical and a host of others.

As for pre-med co-ops I'm sure that there's got to be some positions available. If you go westbound on Huntington Ave you'll come across a major medical area of Boston so there are plenty of pre-med co-ops available but again the pay can be very crazy and the job description might not fit the classic definition of working at a hospital.