The Private Dean · Continuation support · $3,000 per semester

The acceptance is won. Getting through is the part no one stays for.

The admissions industry works up to the yes and then disappears. But the acceptance is the start of the hardest transition your student has made, and there are conditions they must meet to stay on the path to medicine, semester after semester, as the work gets harder and more is riding on it. The Private Dean is the physician who stays: a monthly check-in through the undergraduate years that keeps your student on track academically and whole, protecting the seat where it is guaranteed and the premed foundation where it is not.

Start a conversation → See the whole ladder →

Billed by semester. You re-decide twice a year, and step away whenever it stops helping.

By Dr. Rory Merritt, MD, MEHP: Brown PLME (BS/MD) graduate, board-certified emergency physician, and a former Assistant Dean in Brown's PLME, where the work was advising undergraduates through exactly these years.

A semester at a glance · what the check-ins watch

1. SeptemberThe course load, set right: the program's requirements, the premed track, and a schedule the student can carry
2. OctoberThe first hard midterm lands. How they study, how they recover, and whether help gets used early
3. NovemberThe push to finals: where the GPA line sits, what to protect, and how they are really doing underneath
4. DecemberGrades in. A straight account home, and next semester planned before it starts

A representative semester, not a fixed script. Every check-in follows the student in front of me.

The free field guide to these years, semester by semester →

The investment

The Private Dean is $3,000 per semester. Billed by semester, so you make two decisions a year, not twelve. Founder's pricing for the first families: it may rise for new families later, but the rate you join at holds through graduation. Stay as long as it helps, and step away whenever it stops.

Not medical care, and not tutoring. A physician who knows your student and this path, checking in every month, watching the things that hold the seat and keep your student well, and telling you the truth about how it is really going.

Who this is for.

One product, three families, the same job underneath: eyes on the years that decide the most, caught early enough to matter.

A student already in a BS/MD program. The guaranteed seat is real, and so are the conditions on it: a GPA to hold, courses that cannot slip, professionalism standards that decide who keeps the promise and who loses it. I watch those, every semester.

A student who was accepted somewhere and is now a premed. Nothing is guaranteed on the regular route, so the foundation has to be built deliberately: the grades, the exposure, the timing that keeps medicine wide open. Same physician, same eyes, aimed at that.

A family finishing Dean's List. The first semester of support is included in Dean's List. When your family wants me to stay on past it, semester by semester toward the white coat, that is The Private Dean.

Getting in is the part with all the help.

There are consultants, courses, and forums for every step up to the acceptance. The day the acceptance lands, all of that support ends. But that is the day the real risk begins: the first hard semester, the course that threatens the seat, the student who looks fine on paper and is coming apart underneath. The campus has real advisors, and I point students into them constantly, but they carry caseloads in the hundreds, contact runs on the student walking in, and the office answers to the school. No one outside the institution is watching for your family. I am.

The Private Dean is not a new idea. It is the job I already held. As an Assistant Dean in Brown's PLME, my work was advising undergraduates through these exact years: keeping students on track with their program and premed requirements, thinking through the hard conversation with a professor, pointing them to the right academic support before a stumble became a fall.

I earned a master's in health professions education from Johns Hopkins to do it well, and I was recognized with a Brown Senior Citation, the tribute graduating students give to the people who shaped their years. I went through the program as a student and I practice medicine today, so I know this path and how much is riding on it. And the reason I do this is simple: I want to see your student reach the goal they set out for, and reach it whole.

What $3,000 a semester is

What the monthly check-in is.

1. 01A monthly check-in with your student, by video, on their schedule

2. 02Course navigation: the right classes, in the right order, so the GPA, the program requirements, and the premed track all hold together

3. 03The hard conversation with a professor thought through before it happens, not after it goes wrong

4. 04The academic support already on their own campus, found and put to use early

5. 05The wobble caught in October, and a straight account to you of how it is really going, not how it looks

6. 06A physician who knows your student and this path, in their corner the whole way

7. 07Email between check-ins, always: your student is encouraged to write me when something comes up, and when it cannot wait a month, we get on a call

What you are really buying is continuity. One physician who knows your student across the years, so nothing important is lost between a September that looked fine and a December that did not. I keep this to a small number of families at a time, so every check-in is mine.

• The goal is not only the seat. It is a student who reaches the white coat whole, still themselves, still well. That is the part of this path I care about most, and the part the admissions machine never touches.

Want a physician alongside your student for the years that matter most? The first step is a conversation, so we can see whether this is the right fit for your family before anyone commits to anything.

Start a conversation →$3,000 per semester · Paid in advance, billed by semester · Stay as long as it helps

What a check-in produces

Before you decide, read what a month of this looks like.

After each monthly check-in, you get a straight account of how it is really going. This one is fictional, not based on a real student, and included so you can see the level of attention and the kind of honesty you are buying.

Monthly check-in · The note home · October · Fictional sample

Maya and I met Tuesday. The organic chemistry midterm came back lower than she wanted, and the number itself is not the concern. The pattern is: she prepared alone, late at night, the same way she studied in high school, and that approach is not holding against this course. We built a different plan for the next six weeks. The course's own problem sessions twice a week, office hours with a specific question in hand each visit, and sleep treated as part of the plan rather than the thing that gives. She agreed to all three, and next month I will ask about each one by name.

One more thing, and I want to be straight about it. She mentioned she has not been sleeping well through the crunch weeks. What that means is not mine to judge, and I will not try. What I can do is help. I walked her through booking with the campus health service, which is not obvious to a first-year, and with her permission I am telling you so you are in the loop from home. You are far away, the system is unfamiliar, and my job here is to help you navigate it, not to diagnose anything. I will follow up next month, by name.

Fictionalized sample. Not a real student, and no outcome is implied. The seat conditions named in a real note are the student's own program's, read from their handbook, not a generic list.

From students I advised through these years

What it was like to have me in their corner.

These are students I advised as an Assistant Dean, in exactly the years The Private Dean covers.

“Thank you for always being someone the students could go to for anything. I never felt anything less than fully listened to and understood, and the emails checking in with your advisees always made me feel supported.”

Former BS/MD student

“From advice about courses to recommendations for programs, you encouraged exploration and gave me the freedom to try many different courses and extracurriculars, and to regain my motivation.”

Former BS/MD student

The terms

Two decisions a year, and every semester stands on its own.

The Private Dean is $3,000 per semester, billed by semester. There is no long contract and no subscription to forget: you decide twice a year whether to continue, and each semester stands on its own. Stay as long as it helps, and step away whenever it stops. This is founder’s pricing for the first families, and the rate you join at holds through graduation.

What The Private Dean covers, and what it does not

The Private Dean is continuation support: a physician watching the things that keep a seat and keep a student well, and telling you the truth in time to act. That scope is deliberate.

What The Private Dean is not:

• Medical care. It does not diagnose, treat, or replace your student's own physician
• Therapy or counseling, or a clinical call on what care your student needs. That judgment is not mine to make. What I do is keep you in the loop and help your family navigate getting support in place
• Tutoring. It is judgment and early warning, not subject-matter instruction
• A guarantee the seat is kept. No one can honestly promise that, and I never will

If your student has not applied yet, this is not where to start. Begin with the free library and the way we work together, and come to The Private Dean once the seat is real.

Why a physician, and why continuation is its own job

Getting in and getting through are not the same skill, and almost no one does the second one.

The whole industry is built around the application. It ends at the acceptance because that is where the money and the attention are. But the acceptance is the halfway point, not the finish line, and the second half is where a guaranteed seat is lost: a rough first semester, a professionalism flag, a student who stops being okay and tells no one.

To watch for that, you have to know both the path and the person. I know the path because I went through it, served inside it as an Assistant Dean, and practice medicine at the other end of it. And the person I get to know, one monthly conversation at a time, so that when something starts to slip I see it early, and you hear about it in time to help.

Questions families ask.

Is this medical care or therapy?

No. The Private Dean is not clinical care and does not replace your student’s own physician or a mental health professional. It is a physician who knows your student and this path, watching the things that keep the seat and keep your student well, and telling you the truth about both. When something looks off, it is not my place to decide what care your student needs, and I will not pretend it is. What I do is keep you in the loop and help your family navigate the campus health system, which is a hard thing to work from far away.

My student is not in a BS/MD program. Does this still fit?

Yes. Whether the seat is guaranteed in a BS/MD program or the path is the regular premed route, the first years decide the most, and the support is the same: a physician watching what matters, catching the wobble early, and telling you the truth in time to act.

What if my student does not want this, or does not want you reporting back to us?

Then it does not start. This only works with the student’s buy-in, so the first conversation includes them, and we set the ground rules together on day one: your student always knows what goes home, and nothing sensitive travels without their knowledge. If your student stops engaging partway, I tell you rather than keep billing for check-ins that are not happening.

What if my student needs more support than a monthly check-in?

Then we talk about it, together, as a family. Sometimes the answer is a stretch of closer contact from me. Sometimes it is support the campus provides. Deciding what care your student needs is not mine to do, but helping you navigate a complicated landscape is, often while you are far from campus, so you are never sorting it out alone. What I will not do is pretend a monthly check-in covers a situation it does not.

The college already gives my student an advisor. Why this?

Use the campus advising office, truly. I point every student into it. It is also built differently: advisors carry caseloads in the hundreds, the contact depends on the student walking in, and the office answers to the school. This is the opposite shape: one physician who already knows your student, reaches out every month whether or not anything looks wrong, stays across semesters, and answers to your family. Your student should have both.

How is it billed?

Three thousand dollars per semester, at the start of each semester. You decide twice a year whether to continue, so you are never locked into a long commitment. Stay as long as it helps, and step away whenever it stops. And your rate never rises once you begin: the price you join at holds through graduation. Founder’s pricing may rise year to year for new families, never for yours.

Do you guarantee my student keeps the seat?

No. No one honestly can. What I stand behind is the work: knowing your student, watching the right things every month, and telling you the truth in time to do something about it. A read, not a promise.

How do we start?

With a conversation. Use the short form below to tell me where your student is, and we talk about whether this is the right fit for your family before anyone commits to anything. If it is not the right fit, I will tell you.

How to start

Start a conversation.

Tell me where your student is and what is on your mind. I read every note myself and reach out to set up a conversation, no charge, so we both know whether this is the right fit before anyone commits to anything.

Where is your student? In a BS/MD program Accepted as a premed at a regular college Finishing Dean's List with you Somewhere else, or not sure yet Start a conversation →

Prefer email? Write to rorymerritt@bridge2md.com.

The seat is won. Now keep it, and keep your student whole.

$3,000 a semester. A physician who stays, from the acceptance toward the white coat.

My promise is on the work, not the result. No one can promise a seat is kept, and I never will. What I promise is that I will know your student, watch what matters, and tell you the truth in time to do something about it.

Start a conversation → Not in yet? See Dean's List →

Questions before you decide? Email rorymerritt@bridge2md.com

Start a conversation →