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The path to medical school begins long before application season—almost from students’ first steps on campus at Whitman College. 

“The pre-health advising has been really great,” says Marika Cartier ’26, a Biology major from Redmond, Washington. “Kimberly Mueller has been an amazing advisor to me. She’s helped me so much, walking me through the process over four years and preparing me to apply to medical school.” 

For students interested in pre-med and health professions, Mueller directs Whitman’s Office of Health Professions Advising and offers one-on-one support to help students prepare to apply to medical school, dental school, veterinary school and other health-focused postgraduate programs. Through a combination of courses, internships, volunteer opportunities, research partnerships, student clubs, and more, Whitman’s pre-med and pre-health advising is designed to turn students into competitive applicants and well-rounded health care professionals.

A Four-Year Roadmap

From their first year, pre-health students are encouraged to think ahead in their professional journey, attending a Health Professions Orientation during Opening Week and connecting with the Office of Health Professions Advising to start mapping out a four-year plan. 

First-year students can kick off their career planning through a course (IDSC-100). As James Russo, Associate Professor of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Molecular Biology, explains, the course helps students “explore and understand the range of health care professions and discern which profession they may feel most called to pursue—based on what they see about their own strengths and what the demands, time trajectories and workforce projections are for the profession.” 

The course helps students design a four-year roadmap to success in their field, including a detailed course plan. 

“That has been so helpful to me,” Cartier says. “When I took the class, I said, ‘Wow, this is a lot of work.’ But four years later, I’m very thankful that I did it.” 

The course also covers core competencies, a set of nonacademic skills medical schools use to gauge an applicant’s potential for success in the field, including things like cultural awareness, empathy and community engagement. This early exposure helps students design a plan that will grow them into well-rounded, holistic applicants, with experiences that demonstrate those qualities before they apply. 

Finding Strength in Community

Through Whitman’s variety of health-related clubs, pre-med and pre-health students can find community, hands-on skill building, volunteer experience, networking opportunities and insight into future careers.  

Cartier is President of the , which acts as an unofficial peer support system for students following the pre-med track. 

“I’ve leaned into my friends in the club to see what classes to take or what to do during summer,” she says. “They pushed me to go do research and see if I like it. It’s been nice to be able to bounce ideas off each other and lean on those people.”

Because the pre-med track can be challenging, “We want to create a supportive community where we can go through this together,” Cartier says. 

The club also organizes events like a suture clinic with local doctors and networking dinners with alumni.

Another club, the (MAPS), was created to foster a sense of community among minority students interested in health care professions and to provide its members with the knowledge, skills and experiences needed to achieve their career aspirations. 

“When I first joined MAPS, that presence felt different than all the pre-health clubs here on campus,” says MAPS’ President Gimena Macias Gonzalez ’28. “It made me feel safe and reassured me that many minority students are just as passionate about pursuing medicine and that I wasn’t alone on this journey. MAPS wants to support students whenever they need it, no exceptions.”

The clubs’ events gravitate around learning and community building with guest speakers and topics suggested by the

Notable past events include a session where students made cell plushies to raise awareness about sickle cell disease and a suturing workshop using bananas for practice. 

“We wanted to offer these events so students can gain hands-on experience, learn about important health issues and feel more confident exploring their interests in medicine while receiving the support they need,” says Macias Gonzales. 

MAPS also takes its health advocacy off campus. Next semester, the club is planning a drug take-back initiative in partnership with , the , and Whitman Security to collect outdated and unused prescriptions from the community.

Student clubs are also a way to gain hands-on experience in health care settings. , for instance, works with Whitman Security to provide first aid during emergencies and hosts pop-up first aid trainings and health fairs throughout the year. 

And the provides volunteers for SOS Health Services, a free nonprofit health care clinic in nearby College Place. As a member of the club, Cartier was able to shadow the clinic’s physician, gaining firsthand insight into the intricacies of doctor-patient relationships and the daily realities of medical practice.

Building Hands-On Experience

Whitman pre-med and pre-health students also build their clinical experience through internship and volunteer experiences. 

During the school year, Cartier volunteers at in Walla Walla, where she has rounded through the emergency room, surgical unit and intensive care unit, checking on patients and providing comfort care. 

The rotations have helped solidify her interest in pediatrics. “I don't think I could do ER medicine, but I have a lot of respect for those who do,” she says.

The Whitman Internship Grant (WIG) supports 90-plus paid internships every year that help students secure hands-on experiences at top-tier organizations around the country and world.

The summer before her junior year, Cartier interned at , the research branch of the top children’s hospital in the Pacific Northwest, thanks to a WIG. She worked as a Research Assistant in the Majesky Lab at the Center for Developmental Biology and Regenerative Medicine, investigating the genetics of congenital heart diseases, where several lab techniques she learned at Whitman proved valuable.

With her second WIG, Cartier interned last summer at  in Issaquah, Washington. While shadowing pediatric health care professionals and rotating through different departments of the clinic, Cartier gained key insights into pediatrics and medicine. “I got to see the behind-the-scenes of a private practice, the business side, how the clinic interacts with the state health department, vaccines, community engagement,” she says. “All of the moving parts that you don’t really think of without that hands-on experience when you’re in the middle of all your pre-med preparations.”

Reflecting on both internships, Cartier says “I wouldn't have been able to do them without the grant, so I am very grateful for the WIG.”

In addition to WIG-funded internships, Whitman’s partnerships with prestigious institutions create even more opportunities for pre-health students. Each summer, one or two Whitman students are selected to spend 10 weeks at a Mayo Clinic laboratory through the Mayo Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF), where they help conduct research spanning neuroscience, immunology, biomedical engineering, virology and other fields. Fellows gain hands-on research experience alongside mentorship, weekly seminars, and a close community of fellow SURF students.

Whitman also partners with Fred Hutch Cancer Center in Seattle, sending two students each summer into its nine-week Summer Undergraduate Research Program (SURP). Past participants have contributed to research on HIV, universal influenza vaccines, cancer immunotherapy and disparities in cancer treatment.

楢pplication Boot Camp�

Rounding out the four-year plan for pre-med and pre-dental students is a second course, which Cartier describes as “an application boot camp.” Taught by Mueller, the course is usually taken during the same year students are applying to medical or dental school, and every assignment feeds directly into their application. 

By the time they finish, students have written and refined the core components of their application and learned about essential topics like financial aid, choosing a medical school and what to expect in residency. 

They are also connected to Whitman’s Health Professions Advisory Committee, a panel of faculty and staff, chaired by Mueller, who review students’ application materials and conduct mock medical and dental school interviews, giving students a rare chance to rehearse one of the most high-stakes conversations of their professional journey. 

The committee offers support beyond graduation as well, so that students, like Cartier, who plans to take a gap year to apply to medical school, can access their advice and feedback when the time is right.

As a Philosophy minor, Cartier appreciates Whitman’s liberal arts approach to pre-med. “Being here allowed me to explore both hard sciences and also dig into philosophy and humanities and see how they connect together.”

She’s glad she chose Whitman. “I wanted a smaller school. I wanted to be close to professors. I wanted to be able to know my peers, and I feel like Whitman was just exactly that,” she says.