Best PreMed Programs

<p>thanks guys
i always thought that the most prestigious colleges would be the best choice for an undergrad. thanks</p>

<p>In regard to low number of applicants from some schools, e.g., Swarthmore, it is generally a well-known fact that students can enhance their c.v.s if they take off time and do some meaningful medically- or service-related work, or pursue an advanced degree. Additionally, honors degrees and other distinctions are often awarded at the end of senior year, and that enhance an application. It is possible that only the top students are encouraged to apply by the premed committee. Additionally, it could be that many students at Swarthmore want to do something else (?perhaps sociallly meaningful e.g. Peace Corps, Teach American etc) before going to medical school. Would like to see the GPAs and MCATs of the Swarthmore students that applied directly to medical school vs. those who applied later. I would guess those in first group are higher than those in the alumni pool.</p>

<p>Can any one give me a list of schools with combined BA/MD programs in California</p>

<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/multiple-degree-programs/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/multiple-degree-programs/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I am so sick of hearing about grade inflation at top schools like yale, princeton, harvard, etc. I'm a freshman pre-med at yale and believe u me the math and science departments here are ACTIVELY fighting grade inflation. It IS true, though, that you have to mess up big time to get less than a C.</p>

<p>lol i would consider that major grade inflation. even though you try your best at my school, sometimes your best is a C.</p>

<p>i don't have time to read the entire thread, but i'm wondering if you guys took into consideration the quality of the premed students at their respective schools when calculating for the best premed school. if i had to guess, i would think that a student from harvard would do just as well if placed at a no-name college. much of the speculation here appears to be based off of a couple schools, and the data is incomplete at best. hey, who knows, perhaps even the admissions people don't care enough to consider grade deflation.</p>

<p>Candidates are often compared within schools so that offsets effects of grade inflation/deflation at different schools. What could hurt you is if you are the only applicant from a school where there are no other applicants and where no one else from your school has applied in several years. There is no comparison within your school and you are likely to be compared with other students from peer universites. The MCAT attempts to be an equalizer in those type of situations.</p>

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I'm a freshman pre-med at yale and believe u me the math and science departments here are ACTIVELY fighting grade inflation. It IS true, though, that you have to mess up big time to get less than a C.

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<p>I have to agree with theslowclap's reply in post #246. Whatever you might say regarding Yale's attempts to combat grade inflation, I know a LOT of students at other schools who would LOVE to have Yale's science grade curve. Nor are they just schools with less capable students. There's a certain technical school in Cambridge Mass and another in Pasadena in which you can work extremely hard and still end up with a terrible grade.</p>

<p>^I think you tend to overvalue differences in grading b/w schools. The difference in grading b/w majors is actually greater in my opinion. Thus, schools with a lot of engineering majors are going to have lower avg. GPA's than schools with a lot of English majors. But, do I think being a bio major is tougher at MIT than at Harvard? No.</p>

<p>I would love to see the curves in MIT bio or chem classes compared with Harvard or Yale bio or chem classes. I don't think there'd be much of a difference.</p>

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^I think you tend to overvalue differences in grading b/w schools. The difference in grading b/w majors is actually greater in my opinion. Thus, schools with a lot of engineering majors are going to have lower avg. GPA's than schools with a lot of English majors. But, do I think being a bio major is tougher at MIT than at Harvard? No.</p>

<p>I would love to see the curves in MIT bio or chem classes compared with Harvard or Yale bio or chem classes. I don't think there'd be much of a difference.

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<p>But that's not the right way to look at it. I would absolutely say that the bio major at MIT is harder than that at Harvard, for one simple reason. Everybody at MIT, including the bio majors, still have to complete the tough General Institute Requirements which consists of a full slate of technical coursework, including quite difficult math and physics. Harvard bio students (and bio students at many other schools) can get away with taking a less rigorous sequence of math/physics. As a specific case in point, all MIT students, including bio students (heck, even including humanities students) have to take multivariable calculus. Harvard and Yale bio students do not. Harvard bio students are only required to take 2 semesters of college math (which can just be single-variable calculus), and Yale bio students are required to take only one semester of math which, again, can be just a single semester of single-variable calculus. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.biology.yale.edu/undergrad/Biology_Booklet.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.biology.yale.edu/undergrad/Biology_Booklet.pdf&lt;/a>
FAS</a> Handbook for Students: Chapter 3: Fields of Concentration</p>

<p>Hence, when we consider a possible comparison of grade curves, we have to consider the grade curves of courses that all MIT students are forced to take, whether they want to or not.</p>

<p>While the grade distribution of curves in intro bio and chem may be similar among MIT, Harvard, and Yale, it arguably could be harder to get an A at MIT because everyone in the class excelled in sciences in h.s. whereas at Harvard and Yale you will have a wider distribution of science ability among the students taking those classes. MIT is pass/fail the first year so the curve is a moot one for many intro classes Additionally, the majority of students at Harvard and Yale that are taking the intro sciences courses will be premed and thus prepared to take the courses seriously. At MIT, engineers may take some intro science courses to round out their education in another area so getting an A in the course may not be as important. I guess in the final analyses, there probably is not much difference among these schools in terms science grades of intro courses. In our admissions committee, we really did not make such fine distinctions among these top schools. Also, when students take higher level courses, curves don't matter much as students generally are graded on objective levels of performance rather against each other.</p>

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MIT is pass/fail the first year so the curve is a moot one for many intro classes

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<p>Actually, MIT used to be P/N for the first year, where N stands for no grade recorded. Now, that's only for the first semester. The second semester is graded A/B/C/N. Hence, getting a C in 2nd semester multivariable calculus doesn't exactly help your cause.</p>

<p>Furthermore, there are some med schools, notably Johns Hopkins, that will insist on viewing your hidden first-year grades. So if you fail your first-year courses, they will know about it. Personally, I find it ridiculous that JHU makes such a request, and I find it even more ridiculous that MIT goes along with it (for example, why doesn't MIT just purge the data and then plausibly claim that the data does not exist?). But what can I say? It's not my policy. Nobody asked me. The bottom line is that many MIT premeds who did poorly in their first year will not be able to hide behind the hidden grade shield.</p>

<p>Dear sakky,
Thanks for the update on MIT. I believe there are other elite schools, notably Swarthmore, that have P/F first semester. Perhaps other posters can chime in if there are more. </p>

<p>Hopkins' insistence on those grades is a mixed bag. On one hand, it defeats the purpose of P/F for the first year student-which is the opportunity for them to adjust to college academics with less stress. On the other hand, they want to make an assessment that uses all available data and is fair to other applicants. I agree with you that MIT should just destroy/expunge that data since they only have the first aim. Med schools have subsequent courses and MCATs to use for there evaluation of MIT candidates.</p>

<p>Obviously students cannot fail a P/F course without consequences. Also, although seeing those grades may be a policy of JHU, most schools do not insist on it. If a student did not do well that first semester, he/she would just not apply there. Hopkins is not the only school in the universe.</p>

<p>Sorry to but in but I am at my wits end. My son is looking for a good school here on the east coast with a good pre med program. What would you consider some good schools and which ones have the highest acceptance rate for Med School acceptance.</p>

<p>1.) Sometimes it's good to get away from home.
2.) Our answers are going to be very limited based on where he can get in and what you can afford.
3.) He should find a school he's comfortable at; see <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/pre-med-topics/377780-premed-forum-faqs-read-first.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/pre-med-topics/377780-premed-forum-faqs-read-first.html&lt;/a>
4.) Acceptance rates are very easily manipulated and not the best measure.</p>

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Thanks for the update on MIT. I believe there are other elite schools, notably Swarthmore, that have P/F first semester.

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<p>I think it should also be noted that the effect of the P/F or P/N policies of certain schools (i.e. MIT) on the chances of premeds to get into med school is unclear because the policy is involuntary. In other words, your first semester grades at MIT are hidden behind the P/N shield whether you like it or not. For example, what if you do very well - i.e. get straight A's - in your first semester at MIT, but then don't do so well in later semesters? Well, unfortunately, your excellent first semester doesn't help you because the only thing that the med schools (with the exception of places like JHU) will see is a bunch of "P" grades. You will get no credit for all those A's.</p>

<p>I wonder if MIT grads get into Hopkins at disproportionately high or low percentages relative to their performance at similarly selective schools.</p>

<p>Sakky raises an interesting hypothetical point, but in practice it is unlikely many people suffer from this effect. first of all, by the time they are evaluating an applicant, the med schools have at least 6 semesters worth of grades to go on, and will be more interested in the later courses. Second, MIT studies show that freshmen, and particularly first semester freshmen, get substantially lower grades than students in later years. So individual students are unlikely to find that they got their best grades in first semester of first year, and if they did, including these grades would have little effect on their admission prospects.</p>

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Second, MIT studies show that freshmen, and particularly first semester freshmen, get substantially lower grades than students in later years. So individual students are unlikely to find that they got their best grades in first semester of first year,

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<p>I wonder how much of that is actually endogenous. </p>

<p>For example I know an MIT alum who told me that he had deliberately planned his course schedule during his first semester at MIT to take the absolutely hardest possible set of courses that he could handle without violating prereqs (and sometimes those prereqs were violated). Why did he do this? Simple. The first-semester P/N rule meant that he knew that his grades wouldn't count. Hence, it was entirely logical for him to want to take the most difficult coursework he could in that semester, knowing that employers and grad school adcoms (other than med schools like JHU) would never be able to see those grades. I strongly suspect that other MIT students have done the same. </p>

<p>Heck, people don't need to be that strategic and devious for there to be a strong endogenous effect. For example, if you know that your grades are hidden behind a P/N shield, then you have little incentive to push hard for the A, because it won't matter. All you care enough is doing well enough to just pass. So if you do very well on the midterms, you know you can slack off for the final exam.</p>