Hey, I got accepted to both brandeis and bucknell for the class of 2021 but I’m having a hard time deciding the two and which school would better prepare me medical school and the mcats.
I want to major in biology and linguistics on a premed track. I was also wondering how the social scene in each school is and residential/dorming is like.
Thank you so much!
I don’t know anything about how they are for pre med, but from what I understand the social scenes are quite different. Bucknell is bigger on greek life, has a dominant partying/drinking culture, and is fairly preppy. Brandeis’s greek life is very low key and there isn’t a huge party scene, but the students are big on activism and the arts, and are a bit nerdier.
When we visited Bucknell it actually seemed more sporty than preppy, but I’m sure it has it’s share of preps. I also learned that Bucknell has strong arts programs. My impression though is that Brandeis might be more intellectually oriented and Bucknell more pre-professionally oriented, but that’s just the stereotypes. I would contact each school and ask what percentage of those who apply to med school get accepted and even what the avg. MCAT scores are.
Thank you so much for your input, it really helped! :)))) @lalalemma @citymama9
What really throws me off about Bucknell is the lack of diversity? Was that ever an issue on campus to anyone who attended there?
One caveat regarding @citymama9 comment to check med school acceptance rates – it is not as easy as it sounds. If you inquire about % accepted into med school you need to be very careful to understand what numbers are in the numerator and denominator of that equation. That may sound silly but here are some variables:
–Some colleges weed out the pre-med with the early science courses so it is also important (and very difficult) to find out what % of students who started on the pre-med track ended up dropping out.
–Some colleges support all of their students med school applicants and other schools only support the applications of students who they feel have a very strong chance of acceptance. You need to see where the school falls out on this issue (ex. one school can have a 90% med school acceptance rate but may have only supported a small number of outstanding applicants in the process so a school with a lower med school acceptance rate that supported all of its students applications may actually have the better overall outcome).
–You need to also see what med schools are included in the med school acceptances – ex. you want to know if the college includes things like foreign med schools, DO programs etc. in their acceptance rate.
@happy1 thank you so much!
bumpppp
You might try posting in the individual college forums for specifics about each. I have spent quite a bit of time at Bucknell as my D is a junior. She loves it but the lack of diversity does sometimes bother her. She is not a URM herself but went to a diverse public high school so it was a bit of a shock to her. She is involved in the arts and that community seems somewhat more diverse. She also was in a residential college for two years which she liked. I would think a key difference between the two is the location. suburban with access to Boston vs small town in central Pennsylvania. Very different from each other. Also the Greek scene at Bucknell is real. If you want a “traditional” collegiate party scene you can definitely find it at Bucknell. That does not mean that students aren’t serious about their studies though. My D knows plenty of very talented, smart and hard working people there.