Brody to extend early assurance admission to two other universities

Dr. James G. Peden

GREENVILLE, N.C.  — The Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University will guarantee admission to a few top students at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke and N.C. A&T State University under a new agreement among the three schools.

ECU is expanding its “early assurance” medical school admission plan to the other universities in hopes it will further ECU’s mission of training doctors who will choose to practice in underserved areas.

For 10 years, ECU’s Brody School of Medicine has offered guaranteed admission to medical school to select high school seniors competing for the East Carolina Scholars program, the university’s top undergraduate scholarship. Each year, four are selected to receive early assurance, which means if they meet certain academic requirements they will be admitted to medical school after college graduation without having to compete with other applicants or take the Medical College Admission Test, a five-hour examination of writing, science and reasoning skills.

Since the program began, 15 early assurance scholars have graduated from medical school at ECU.

“It’s been an unqualified success,” said Dr. James Peden, associate dean of admissions at the Brody School of Medicine. “Generally speaking, the early assurance scholars have been among the best students in the school.”

Officials from ECU, UNC-P and N.C. A&T met last fall to explore an early assurance partnership and set criteria for the program. Each year, ECU will admit two early assurance students each from UNC-P and N.C. A&T. Those students must have a minimum grade-point average of 3.5 and be North Carolina residents. They will not have to take the MCAT so long as their SAT scores met a certain figure.

“I think it’s going to really benefit ECU and UNC-Pembroke and the students selected because of the alignment of the missions of ECU and UNC-Pembroke of service to eastern North Carolina,” said Dr. Kathleen Hilton, associate vice chancellor for academic planning at Pembroke. “It will help us recruit some additional outstanding students who are interested in the medical profession.”

UNC-P expects to offer the program to students entering school in fall 2011. N.C. A&T will offer it to students this fall or next fall.