@BS_MD2017 Thanks for your post. Welcome to Stanford, the Bay Area, home base of mine. Need less to say, your DD is an accomplished student and will succeed in whatever path she takes. But it will be interesting to know in 4 years time, what her next step. Even if it is not a medicine career, she will be taking up some wonderful opportunity.
Read an article, even after completing 4 years of MD in UCSF, few MD graduates decided not to pursue medicine practice, and went for startups to launch their career in Bay Area. GL.
@BS_MD2017 Thanks for your post. Please post the stats in the results thread. I need to post my DS’s stats also soon. still recovering from graduation parties
As I can see through all the CC posts about BSMD applicants, everyone wants to fit this perfect mold to get accepted. They do a bunch of hours of hospital work and get perfect scores on all these standardized tests. But that’s not what you really need. Through my personal experience, I’ve seen that it is just as important to show outside interests as it is to show interest in the medical field. During interview sessions I noticed that many of the other interviewees were stressed and it was obvious they were forcing smiles and acted rather awkward. My point is that applicants should be themselves. Even though I had very few hours of hospital work and not-so perfect test scores, I was accepted to the Rice/Baylor program. I just showed the admissions committee my idiosyncrasies versus trying to act like a perfect student. In fact, more of my application comprised of my flaws that I admitted versus my successes. Bottom line is that future BSMD applicants should not be super concerned about these CC posts and just mold themselves the way they are and also have their application reflect it. Let’s be honest. Would the admissions council want a bunch of cookie cutter models or would they want to fill their class with interesting and dynamic individuals?
Hi. Could successful applicants to BSMD programs please post their stats and profiles? My DS is interested in applying to BSMD programs. Thanks.
See the results thread of previous years. Also commit to post your stats at the end of the admission cycle.
@GoldenRock Could you provide some links to results threads of previous years?
@BS_MD2017 Congrats to your DD, you must be very proud of her! My DD was done in REA round and she is finishing up her RD app to PLME, HPME, and Stanford. Can you share why your DD choose Stanford over others?
@GoldenRock , @srk2017 , @Empire007 , @WayOutWestMom , @mom2collegekids , @dblazer , @bearchichi , @texaspg , @narkor , @grtd2010 : I am checking in to post an update on my DD who is currently at NJIT as part of the 7 year NJIT-NJMS BSMD program. Hope to hear back from those of you whose kids are still in college.
College and weather: DD is well-settled at NJIT. She survived her first cold and snow successfully, and looks forward to the next few years there. We were worried about her reaction to cold weather, and are glad she is taking it in stride. As far as comfort in the cold goes, we are very grateful for LLBean and UGGs She has settled into coursework, registration, study plan etc. Her 3 years are sort of planned out, though she’s still considering some additional (not-required) coursework.
Dorm Life: She finds her dorm very comfortable, which is not surprising since their dorm is just a few years old. Food is also decent, especially since they have stations where they can make their own food (pasta, Chinese, pizza) with an assortment of ingredients and spices. After trying out the prepped food, looks like she is now leaning more into the ‘make-your-own’ stations. She has some great friends and roommates, so enjoys dorm living. Her roommates do go back home for weekends, but she has a steady set of friends that stay back weekends that she regularly hangs out with.
Interests and entertainment: As some of you know, DD was passionate about computers and programming in high school, and that interest continues in college. She attends hackathons when she can and is going to intern at a local software company in NJ that does machine learning analysis of medical data - to bring her interests together. She’s looking for opportunities to engage in scientific research next semester. Her friends used to take day trips to NY, but looks like that has now faded away. She went ice-skating the other day, watched a football game a few weeks ago, and generally seems to be more into local events. She spends most weekends at the college, sometimes visiting friends at their homes, or taking part in weekend activities at the dorm (they constantly organize some). So far, she hasn’t felt alone or bored, but the weekends around commons (their word for exams) seemed to be a bit stressful.
Look forward to having her home soon. I plan to keep posting updates here and hope to see notes from other parents too.
I
@Mom22DDs - That’s a great update. I will post my update in couple of days.
@Mom22DDs thanks for the update. Looks like your DD has fit very well into the school and program. I will post an update within the next few days.
My DS completed first semester at Vandy and ended up with 3.98 GPA (A- in Chem lab!). He had to work harder than he thought for Gen Chem and Intro to Bio classes since they are weed out classes. So far he is happy about choosing Vandy (over other elites and BU SMED).
He found good diverse group of friends and enjoying the dorm life and Nashville. He goes to Vandy games, concerts, near by restaurants, frat parts (no plans to join them though). No GF yet (as per I know) He started mentoring a middle school science team and planning to mentor robotics teams next semester. He even danced in a cultural program
We saw him once a month during this semester (he came home for fall break and thanksgiving and now for winter break) and Spring semester we may not see him that much.
:-bd
Reminiscing about it, D did not get any full ride, though considerable scholarships else where. Perhaps she could have taken the traditional route, to finish the course work in 3 years or less (with all her AP credits with perfect scores) and saved some money for us.
But she did not want to let go an opportunity like at BU’s famed medical school and we did not hesitate much about the money aspect and also did not want her to take the risk of not getting in later (have known cases personally where kids let go off their accelerated program selections and went traditional route but couldn’t make it later)
@rk2017 - Yeah, going traditional route has risks. We offered to pay full cost at BU but S chose to take traditional path.
@srk2017 Looks like that was the right decision, he is off to a great start and seems to be well on target, glad to learn.
Another major factor in D’s decision making besides the reputation of the med school was the city itself. With so many wonderful academic, bio medical research and medical institutions and facilities all around, Boston can very well be regarded as the health care capital. She was thrilled at the prospect of spending the next 7 years in the midst of all that great action and environment.
Happy New Year, everyone!
Here is report back from DD at Rice/Baylor program. In her first semester, she experienced her first major natural disaster Harvey, but somehow the campus was pretty much spared from major damages. Wish the quick recovery for all people affected. DD went to university presentation for all pre-med frosh, and was extremely surprised to know that there are traditional 90% of all incoming freshmen are interested in attending Medical school, eventually there will be 12-16% graduates (gap or no-gap) being able to get in one. It is hard for me to believe that high percentage of freshmen want to go into medical school, but I was convinced with the presentation slide showed to me. DD took normal pre-med courses with some other interesting courses due to non-restricted requirements by the program. But she had worked very hard since the competition was very very tough and the library was always filled up with students. DD was able to get balance between enjoying college life and maintaining high academic standards, and she got all A’s with one A- in Gen Chem. She felt blessed with the program which gives her space to grow and pursue other interests. DD loves Rice, professors, dorm and food. She will start research in nearby Texas Medical Center next semester, and it seems that many labs around campus would like to offer opportunities to Rice/Baylor students.
As a parent, I strongly believe the guaranteed direct med program shift huge burden from shoulders of students. The program helps them in many ways, including keeping good mental health, pursuing broader interests and growing stronger as a person.
i am glad she has done well
Here is the report from DD at OU MHS Program. Reached half way in her UG, plans to complete in 3 years though the program is 4 years but flexible. So far she is very happy with her decision to join OU and likes the place & people. After a year of dorm life, decided to move to an apartment with few of her friends and dabbling with cooking! Involved in any club / society where some free dinner is provided! She watches many of the local school events (music, dance, ballet, gymnastics) to entertain her.
Academically she is doing well and will be done with all pre-med courses this semester and plans to take MCAT this spring and complete the formality of application to MD school this summer/fall. Majoring in History, minoring in Bio, Chem and Medical Humanities along with satisfying pre-med and honors college reqs. Being a large public school, many core classes have 300-400 students on the first day and ends with 200-250 students during last day of the semester in courses like OChem, BioChem, Genetics etc. and there are some Profs and Courses tough hurdles. But many of the Honors courses and History courses are very small size like 10-40 students. She also got an opportunity to do research (in Chem lab) from 2nd semester on wards and also gets credits (1-3 depending on how much time is committed).
It appears she misses home (parent view and she may not agree as usual!) since she is at home for semester breaks, thanksgiving and spring breaks promptly and simply wants to sleep and eat (may be do some online courses to kill time or do some volunteer work at local hospital).
Agree with @dadofd that it removes lot of stress and allows her to have a balanced life and do courses just for fun (glass blowing, music in movies etc). Will provide next update around this time next year.
@GoldenRock - Thanks for great update.