Hey guys! I’ve been offered admission to the AB Duke Scholarship Program (full tuition + research stipends + all-expense paid trip to Oxford), Stony Brook’s Combined Medical Program (7 or 8 years with guaranteed admission to Stony Brook Medical School), and Stanford University. I would have to pay full price at Stanford – the other two options are both full undergraduate scholarships (I’d still have to pay for Stony Brook’s med school, but I’m considering an M.D./Ph.D, which would be free anyway). I have around two weeks to make my decision. Which of these opportunities would you select, and why? Thank you!
Cross Stanford off since you want to go to med school. You need to save that money for grad school.
I say you go to Duke. You got the AB Scholarship, you’ll just have to pay room and board, and it’s a great place for you to go, discover yourself, receive a solid education, and eventually move on to med school. Unless you REALLY want to go to Stony Brook’s med school or you like Stony Brook so much, I would keep your options open med-school wise and not tie yourself down to a certain grad school.
The AB Duke is a full ride. Room & board and fees are included.
Oh okay, @warblersrule. Thank you for the clarification. OP had said full tuition + research stipends + paid trip to Oxford.
I think you should definitely choose Duke. I poked around and the Duke Scholarship program seems amazing - not just for the financial rewards but for the experiences and exposure that you’ll get.
The Duke AB scholarship seems too good to pass up. No doubt you will have to work hard, esp. if you’re considering MD/PhD, but I think it’s worth taking the ‘risk’ of not having a guaranteed seat in a medical school.
As with other BA/BS->MD programs, some details may be relevant:
- GPA and MCAT score needed to maintain one's place in the BA/BS->MD program: For Stony Brook, it is a 3.4 overall and 3.2 science every year, with an MCAT score at least as high as the national average (= 25.3 according to https://www.aamc.org/students/download/361080/data/combined13.pdf.pdf) but no section lower than 8. See http://www.stonybrook.edu/ugadmissions/newhonors/scholarsmed.shtml . These thresholds are not as high as some other BA/BS->MD programs, and not as high as one would ordinarily need to be a competitive applicant to MD medical schools in the US (applicants in the 3.4 GPA 26 MCAT range had a relatively low rate of admission to MD medical schools, according to https://www.aamc.org/download/321508/data/factstable24.pdf ; see also https://www.aamc.org/data/facts/applicantmatriculant/157998/mcat-gpa-grid-by-selected-race-ethnicity.html ). In addition, keeping the BA/BS->MD spot means not having to deal with all of the interviews and uncertainty of medical school applications.
- Cost of the associated medical school. https://services.aamc.org/tsfreports/report.cfm?select_control=PUB&year_of_study=2015 indicates that Stony Brook's tuition and fees (not including living expenses) are $40,286 in-state and $66,326 out-of-state. If you are not a NY resident, then the out-of-state cost is more than most private medical schools.
So the Stony Brook program increases your chance of admission to medical school compared to the normal route. There are three hypothetical futures to consider:
A. You get a high GPA and MCAT score, where you would have a high chance of admission to medical school the regular way (although with interviews and subjective admission processes, one cannot be sure). Would you rather be at Stony Brook guaranteed a spot a Stony Brook medical school, or at Duke applying to medical schools?
B. You get a 3.4-3.5 GPA (3.2-3.5 science GPA), 26-29 MCAT score, where you would have a low chance of admission to medical school the regular way. Would you rather be at Stony Brook guaranteed a spot at Stony Brook medical school, or at Duke applying to medical schools.
C. You get a <3.4 GPA, <3.2 science GPA, or <26 MCAT score, losing the guaranteed admission to Stony Brook medical school and having a very low chance of admission to a medical school the regular way. Would you rather be at Stony Brook or Duke?
D. You decide not to go to medical school. Would you rather be at Stony Brook or Duke?
If all of the above answers are the same, your choice is obvious. If the answers vary, then you need to weigh your estimate of the probability of each, and how strongly you prefer each school in each scenario.
Sorry for the confusion, @TheDidactic – I meant to say full scholarship. Thank you all for your prompt responses. I, too, am leaning heavily toward Duke but wanted to make sure I wasn’t missing any important considerations.
Wow, @ucbalumnus , thank you for your extensive response! I wish someone else had posed the question to me in that way before! You’ve helped make the decision much easier!
OP,
In 2013, Duke offered 22 students A. B. Scholarships. 8 students accepted the offers and stayed with Duke, the rest of 14 students went to four schools only : Harvard, Stanford, Princeton and MIT.
http://www.dukechronicle.com/articles/2013/05/23/scholarship-yields-reflect-competition
There was a reason why Duke offered you this scholarship and there were reasons why 64% of scholars did not go to Duke but to attend HSPM (no Y) only, for whatever reasons and intended majors.
@ewho , would you like to clarify what these reasons might be? What are you trying to imply?
I had the pleasure of meeting those 8 incredible students during my finalist weekend – they are a stellar bunch and I’d be honored to go to school with any of them.
I would not worry too much about GPA, etc as you are obviously strong enough to compete with any student at HSPM. Those four schools may offer you more options too.
I really can’t think of any reason, except a blatant and shameless bias toward Stanford, that one might recommend paying full freight for Stanford over a full ride to Duke for a pre-med.
I am especially curious to hear more about these “more options” that the other four apparently somehow possess. If they even exist, I am skeptical indeed they’re worth $65K a year!
The difference between list price and full ride is enormous for a pre-med, since the money saved after an undergraduate full ride can be applied to greatly reduce medical school debt. High debt after medical school can severely restrict one’s options, such as pressuring the new physician to seek the highest paying specialty even if s/he would prefer one that does not pay as much. There can be other undesirable consequences of heavy medical school debt, such as temptation to do ethically questionable things, according to one physician’s memoir in Doctored.
If cost isn’t an issue, go to the Farm. If it is an issue, go to Duke.
^^ agree with Seattle. If your family is wealthy, why not S. But if you are not a 1 percenter, Duke is a no-brainer.
If you’re a good enough student to win those scholarships and to get into Stanford, you will get into med school if you apply yourself. Stony Brook’s med school guarantee isn’t worth much in your case–you will probably get into better med schools anyhow, or as you said get a scholarship via MD-PhD or other means. Duke’s offer seems very attractive. Unless your parents are very wealthy and happy to pay so much more for Stanford this seems like a clear choice.
I suppose if you were absolutely positive you were going the Md/PhD route you could go to the Farm, but I think Duke will give you the best college experience. Stonybrook is a bit of a commuter school - it’s over an hour into NYC. And I suspect a student with the scores and grades to get into the colleges you did, is likely to do well enough in college that med school admissions won’t be an issue.
mathmom:
why do you believe that Duke would be a better “college experience” than Stanford? (just curious)