Doctor of Pharmacy Admissions Prerequisites

To be eligible for admission to the PharmD program, applicants without a Bachelor's Degree must complete a minimum of 54 semester credits of prerequisite courses at a regionally accredited college or university in the United States.  Applicants with a Bachelor's Degree must complete a minimum of 39 semester credits.

Note: Required prerequisite coursework does not need to be completed to apply to the PharmD program. To be eligible for admission for a given academic year you need to be able to show that you can complete all required coursework by mid-July of enrollment year.  To matriculate into the pharmacy program, applicants must receive a grade of "C-" or better in all prerequisite courses. 

Recommendations to be Competitive

The Admissions Committee has several recommendations on how to be a competitive applicant. Recommendations that specifically focus on prerequisite coursework include:

• Applicants are recommended to have a 2.7 GPA in three areas: cumulative GPA, science GPA, and last 45 semester credit GPA (most recent coursework). Applicants with a GPA below 2.7 are still welcome to apply and their application will be reviewed.
• A bachelor’s degree is not required but it can make an application more competitive.
• Applicants do not need to have all prerequisites done at the time of application but having most courses, if not all of them, done before applying can make an application more competitive. 

Prerequisite Evaluation

We offer a complimentary service to unofficially evaluate your prerequisite coursework to help you determine which prerequisites you have fulfilled and those you have remaining to complete. To take advantage of this service please complete an unofficial  prerequisite worksheet (pdf) and follow the instructions below.

For an unofficial course evaluation please send us your completed worksheet and unofficial college transcript(s) by email.

Email: pharmd@pacificu.edu 

Prerequisite Courses (Note: 1 semester credit = 1.5 quarter credits, ie. 8 semesters = 12 quarters)

General Biology with labs | 8 semester credits

• Year-long series of general biology with labs.

Human Physiology  | 3 semester credits

• Preferred: Anatomy and Physiology series

General Chemistry with labs | 8 semester credits

• Yearlong series of general chemistry with labs.

Organic Chemistry with labs | 8 semester credits

• Yearlong series of organic chemistry with labs.

Additional Science| 6 semester credits

• Microbiology/Molecular Biology/Biochemistry/Physics/Anatomy

Pre-Calculus or Calculus | 3 semester credits

English Composition/Writing | 3 semester credits

Speech/Communications | 3 semester credits

Economics | 3 semester credits

Social/Behavioral Sciences | 6 semester credits

May include psychology, anthropology, geography, government, history, human development, philosophy, political science, sociology

Humanities/Fine Arts | 3 semester credits

May include writing, foreign language, drama, geography, history, religion, philosophy, literature, performance arts, visual arts

Conversion of hours | All quarter hours can be converted to semester hours. Quarter hours divided by 1.5 = semester hours. Example: 12 quarter hours = 8 semester hours