Bluedevilmike's Ten Step Guide to Picking a PreMed School

[bluedevilmike]

<p>from the original thread:

On prestige, notice we are discussing medical students competing for residencies, but the logic probably holds:

Bluedevilmike: The general consensus is this: they have a list of “good schools” and list of “other schools”…</p>

<p>If you are from a “good” school, and your application has no glaring flaws, then you get an interview. If you are from an “other” school, and your application does not have any glaring HIGH points, you do not get an interview. Once you get an interview, that becomes the most important component of their decision, although other things still matter.</p>

<p>Special features - either good or bad - might be board scores, class rank, a second degree, etc. </p>

<p>Bigredmed: That’s a great way of putting it. What I have tried to say all along, whether it’s undergrad, or medical school, or even residency, if you do well, then where you went is not likely to impact your chances. Doing well is a panacea for almost everything.

</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/pre-med-topics/202936-good-pre-med-schools.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/pre-med-topics/202936-good-pre-med-schools.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>As for difficulty, there’s a very wide spread of talent at Duke. As is typical of highly selective colleges, about half of the student body was admitted for academic reasons and about half was admitted for other reasons such as legacy, athletics, or diversity. I had some classmates who could barely write (could they even read? I have no idea), and I had some classmates who were absolute geniuses, including the eventual Rhodes Scholar who lived next door to me.</p>

<p>If you went to a very strong high school (Exeter, Collegiate, Harvard-Westlake, etc.) then I seriously doubt you’ll have to buy textbooks, much less read them or study out of them. At the other end of the spectrum, I knew some very sweet and devoted kids who got very poor grades no matter how hard they studied.</p>