Health Professions Advising Center

Applying to Professional Schools

Pre-medical and pre-dental students apply to professional school a year or more before entering.

HPAC offers special services to students preparing to apply to professional schools.

Health Professions Evaluation (HPE) and Clearinghouse Services

All UT Dallas applicants to professional schools receive:

  • General Admissions Orientation - Introduces UT Dallas's HPE and Clearinghouse services, the application timeline, and MANY tips ranging from requesting rec letters to selecting a school. At a GAO, students register to receive application support from HPAC.
  • Personal Statement Workshop - Doyen Rainey talks students through the goals and methods of effective personal statement writing, and offers tips from his years as an advisor, editor, and author. This interactive workshop relies on a prewrite which takes about 1 hour to complete.
  • Interview Skills Workshop - Dr. Kathleen Byrnes introduces students to multiple interview formats and how to prepare, and offers tips from her years as an advisor, counselor, and interviewer.
  • Application Seminar - Dr. Scott Wright introduces students to the TMDSAS, AMCAS, AACOMAS, and AADSAS applications, and offers tips based on his years as Dean of Admissions for UT Southwestern and head of the Health Professions Advising Center.
    Seminar dates     can be found on the HPAC News and Upcoming Events page.
    HPE forms can be found on the HPAC Forms and Handouts page.

Further application support is available to UT Dallas students who enroll in the "Health Professions Evaluation" class (Spring 2012):

  • Document revision by a pre-health advisor, along with detailed tips and instructions for completing complex applications,
  • Online tracking. of letters of evaluation and documents as they arrive at HPAC (uses eLearning)
  • Free distribution of recommendation letters through VirtualEvals or, as necessary, FedEx.

Qualifying medical and dental applicants also receive

  • Practice interviews with two UT Dallas faculty
  • Thorough evaluation by committee and a "committee letter" - recommended by nearly all professional schools