Medical School Admissions Consulting Services

Claudia

A diplomat of the American Board of Preventive Medicine, member of the American College of Medical Genetics, and author of the textbook "Public Health Genomics: The Essentials", Claudia practices privately and teaches clinical medicine, pediatrics, child health, and genetics at UCLA Extension. She has also served on the faculty of the University of Southern California, Keck School of Medicine, instructing students at the undergraduate, graduate, and professional levels.

As a practicing physician, she offers her advisees valuable practical insights into the world of medicine. As an author, she enables students to bring out the best in their writing. Teaching and advising pre -health majors (medicine, public health, dentistry, pharmacy, and optometry), Claudia is particularly attuned to the goals and aspirations of students interested in the health professions.

Claudia received her BA, summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from Princeton University, MD from Mount Sinai School of Medicine, and MPH from Columbia University, concurrent with residency training in General Preventive Medicine and Public Health. She completed an NIH fellowship in Medical Genetics at UCLA, where she trained in clinical genetics (prenatal, pediatric, and adult) and researched the genetic epidemiology of chronic diseases.

At Kaplan, Claudia has enabled college students as well as non-traditional applicants to gain admission to their top choice schools. With experience as a Princeton Regional Alumni Interviewer, Claudia provides expert insights into the admissions process of highly selective schools, from what makes a powerful and polished personal statement to how to shine at your interview.

Heather, 2007 Medical Consultant of the Year

Heather is a board-certified physician who interviewed for medical school admissions while she was a medical school professor. She has expertise developing a unique personal statement that clearly underscores the applicant's strengths for admission. She can provide feedback about what a physician reader will think about a personal statement. She teaches her clients the difference between writing for the personal statement and writing for the secondary essays. Her experience as a biomedical writer strengthens her ability to help students write professionally and clearly. She's a member of the American Medical Writers Association. She has professional experience interviewing applicants for medical school and residency at the world's largest medical center. She has prepared applicants for many interview formats, including traditional, MMI, group, and panel.

She enjoys interacting with the full spectrum of applicants, from those who can compete for admission at top schools to those who need to reapply. One re-applicant who worked with her was awarded a scholarship. Nontraditional applicants often seek her advice, and she recently advised a 38-year-old applicant who gained admission to medical school.

Prior to her faculty appointment, she completed a residency in surgical pathology along with a fellowship at the top-ranked M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. She is very popular with students, and was voted the best lecturer in her department at the medical school.

Jack

After 36 years as a professor of Biology at York College of CUNY, Jack retired in January 2007. For about 33 of those years, he had been the chief pre-med advisor. In that capacity Professor Jack: advised students on their courses; worked with students on their applications; did interview preparation; coordinated a committee letter of recommendation and ran premed groups with guest speakers and other activities. He has also nominated over a dozen successful applicants for the prestigious Salk Scholarship given to CUNY students accepted to medical school who have shown exceptional promise in research. Currently Jack is Professor Emeritus and Adjunct Professor of Biology. Working as a Kaplan Admissions Consultant, he has perfected the "wisdom" he has accumulated over these many years. Since working as a Kaplan consultant Jack has had experience with a number of Canadian students applying to both US and Canadian schools and is familiar with the Canadian application process.

Jack has had a great deal of experience with a very diverse population of students and has seen them go on to the finest medical schools in the country including Harvard, Yale, Johns Hopkins, NYU, Albert Einstein and many others.

Janani

Janani was a non-traditional applicant to medical school. She completed her undergraduate training in economics, public policy and international studies at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX and the London School of Economics, where her education was fully funded by the merit-based President's Scholarship. She then worked in finance and investment banking before deciding to make the change to medicine.

Janani was accepted to several top-tier medical schools with over $200,000 in scholarship funding. She attended the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor, where she was named a Dean's Scholar and received a four-year, full-tuition merit scholarship. In 2008, she was accepted into her #1 residency program in internal medicine/preventive medicine in California. She was also accepted into her #1 fellowship choice, the Kennamer Program, through UCLA- Kaiser Los Angeles. Here, she works on implementing and evaluating health-promotion initiatives in underserved communities.

Janani served for multiple years as an involved member of the medical school admissions committee at University of Michigan Medical School. Based on her dedication to admissions work, she was selected to serve as an interviewer and voting member on the Executive Admissions Committee. Here, she gained firsthand insight into the winning components of medical school applications and interviews. Additionally, Janani has worked for over 12 years as a writing coach, helping students craft winning essays that express "their voice" with logical flow. She has mentored high school, college and medical students and residents in shaping their careers in medicine, serving as a speaker at various pre-medical forums and open houses.

Eric

Eric has been a Pre-Health Admissions Consultant with Kaplan since 2008. He is an MD and MPH graduate of the University of Michigan where he was also an undergraduate Goldwater Scholar and Phi Beta Kappa graduate with majors in Honors Chemistry, Biochemistry, and a minor in Physics. Eric applied widely to Medical Scientist Training Programs (MSTP) and traditional MD programs across the country. He interviewed around the country at programs including Harvard, Yale, UCSF, Washington University in St. Louis, the University of Michigan, the Tri-I MSTP program at Cornell/Rockefeller/Sloan-Kettering, Northwestern, and Johns Hopkins, among others. He had the difficult decision between many wonderful training programs, and was happy to remain at the University of Michigan. While there, Eric was a member of the Medical School Admissions Committee. Since then, Eric has helped numerous students gain acceptance to medical school and the programs of their choice across the United States and in Canada.

Houman

Houman, M.D., Ph.D. has been a senior medical school admissions consultant with Kaplan since 1999. He has co-authored two editions of the popular medical school admissions guidebook "Get Into Medical School: A Strategic Approach," has lectured to thousands of pre-medical students on college campuses throughout the country on medical school admissions, and has helped hundreds of medical school applicants achieve their dreams by improving their application essays and preparing for interviews. For several years, he served as a full voting member of a top-10 medical school in Los Angeles.

He is currently an Assistant Professor of Surgery and Ophthalmology at the University of Vermont College of Medicine. He graduated from Stanford University. He earned his M.D. from the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. and his Ph.D. in Biology from the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, CA. There, he was one of the first to discover and publish the important link between cancer and stem cells. He completed his internship in Internal Medicine at Stanford Hospital and his residency in Ophthalmology at the Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, MD. Following that, he completed a post-doctoral research fellowship in Chemical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a clinical fellowship in Cornea and Refractive (LASIK) surgery at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary. He is an inventor on a handful of patents or pending patents relating to cancer therapy, surgical devices for the eye, and eye drug delivery.

Kathy

Kathy has worked at Stanford University as Associate Director in Undergraduate Advising and Research for over 35 years as an academic advisor and as both a premed and prelaw advisor.

Kathy has coached many candidates for medical school, read thousands of draft essays, and gained expertise that she uses to help applicants effectively communicate with admissions committees. Kathy is eager to share her knowledge and skills in helping prospective medical students across the country gain admission through a skillfully prepared application.

Tom, 2009 Medical Consultant of the Year and 2009 Consultant of the Year

A Kaplan admissions consultant for over six years, Tom is one of the most experienced admissions experts in the country. Prior to his retirement from full time admissions work Tom served as the chief admissions officer at several different medical schools including the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, Hahnemann Medical College (Now part of Drexel University), and The University of Iowa College of Medicine. Tom joined Kaplan in 1998 as Director of Academic Services, Prehealth Sciences and for the next two years he toured the country presenting the popular seminar series "The Inside Scoop on Medical School Admissions" on over 85 college campuses located in 29 states and Canada. Tom is a co-author of Kaplan's "Medical School Admissions Advisor" and its successor, "Get Into Medical School – A Strategic Approach", now in its sixth edition. Tom returned to the academic world in 2000 when he was named Associate Dean for Student Affairs and Admissions the Dr. William M. Scholl College of Podiatric Medicine of the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science.

During his long career, Tom estimates that he has reviewed over 60,000 medical school applications and has read at least 200,000 letters of recommendation. He has interviewed more applicants than he can count and has trained hundreds of admissions committee members and interviewers. Tom was a national leader in the area of medical school admissions. He served as Chair of the Association of American Medical Colleges National Committee on Admissions where he helped oversee the national admissions process. He was elected to leadership positions in professional admissions and student affairs organizations, has been a consultant to medical and graduate school admissions offices, and has been called on as an expert witness in legal cases involving admission to medical school. He served on the faculty of several training workshops for medical school admissions officers and helped develop the curriculum for those workshops.

Tom was named Kaplan's Medical School and National Consultant of the Year for 2009. He describes working with his more than 200 Kaplan clients as the most satisfying in his 40 year career in medical school admissions. "As an admissions officer I often had to watch admissions committees say no to very well qualified applicants who, had they only presented themselves better on their applications, might have been admitted. As a consultant, I can help individuals avoid that fate."