UChicago Pritzker

University of Chicago Division of the Biological Sciences, The Pritzker School of Medicine Chicago, IL · Private · MD

Class size: 91 (6,407 applicants)
Tuition: $65,576 (per year)
Out-of-state applicants: Welcome

Deadlines

AMCAS deadline: Nov. 15, 2026
Secondary deadline: Dec. 1, 2026

Essays

Clinical environment (450 words)

Students at the Pritzker School of Medicine complete the majority of their clinical training at UChicago Medicine (UCM). UCM, nationally recognized by the AAMC for sustained commitment to community engagement, partnership, and collaboration, has a primary service area where poverty is over double the state level. Additionally, our students lead numerous community-based initiatives throughout Chicago, including six free clinics that primarily serve uninsured patients. Please share with us the personal and professional experiences that have best prepared you to work in this clinical environment.

Research interests (MD only) (450 words)

All MD students participate in our longitudinal Scholarship & Discovery research program, which offers protected curricular time, mentoring, and funding for students to pursue their scholarly interests. Please describe your research interests and share how our research opportunities will help you advance your career goals.

Challenge, coping and support (450 words)

Medical education requires humility and resilience as students learn to become physicians prepared to deliver exceptional care within a rapidly changing and sometimes challenging healthcare landscape. Share with us a difficult or challenging situation you have encountered and how you dealt with it. In your response, identify both the coping skills you called upon to resolve the situation, and the support person(s) from whom you sought advice.

Additional information (about 300 words)

Please feel free to use this space to convey any additional information that you might wish the Committee to know. For example, if you are not currently completing a degree, please share your planned or current activities for this application cycle. We suggest that you limit your text to about 300 words.

Committee letter explanation (about 200 words)

If your school has a premedical committee or premedical advisor who composes a letter for each applicant from your school and you chose not to avail yourself of this service, please provide an explanation in the text box below for your decision not to do so. We suggest that you limit your text to about 200 words.

Editor's notes

Pritzker hands you the timing advice outright: more than 90% of admitted students typically submit the secondary in July or August. The Dec. 1 deadline is real, but acceptances start rolling Oct. 15, and a December secondary is competing for what's left.
The class is tiny (81 MD-only students in 2024) and almost entirely non-local, with 13% from Illinois. Out-of-state applicants are the norm here, not the exception.
All three essays point at the same school: South Side clinical work, funded research for every student, and a support culture. Read them as one set. Use a different experience in each, and let the research essay look forward while the other two look back.
Cost looks steep on paper, $96,128 for the first year, but 60% of the 2024 entering class received full-tuition scholarships and 2025 graduates averaged $125,742 in debt. There's no separate scholarship application.