- which one has the hardest course schedule for neuroscience/biochem major?
- which one ensures the highest chance into a medical school?
- which one sends a lot of people to a top 20 medical school?
- which one offers the highest chance for a student to do research and get published?
- What is the environment like (I’m in NJ so its not easy for me to go there at any time as I don’t drive yet and either of my parents are barely home, but I do watch vlogs and blogs and see what people think)
I don’t believe premed is an easy street from ANY school. If you search on the net you will find a lot of complaints about grade deflation at all schools. Premed requirements are all basic science classes and are attended by lots of students, the professors won’t hand out lots of As because the number of students and its nature of weedout classes. If you are good, you will survive premed basic requirements, a little slip, you are out. The drop out rate in premed is very high, as much as 75% premed hopefuls never apply to med school. The advantages of a bio major in premed is that they can do gpa repair in higher level science classes.
When you apply for med school, you do not only apply to the top 20 med schools, no matter what your stats are, as their admit rate is around 2%. My friend works for a top 10 med school admission director, her reject file is full of perfectly scored, well groomed candidates.
“2) which one ensures the highest chance into a medical school?”
No college can do this . It is up to you to get a high GPA and a high MCAT score.
my mom did very well as a pre med and got accepted into a prestigious as a result and I have her text books and things that helped her, however they might be out dated, and I want to by the new editions of the same textbooks. In college do we have to get the textbooks the professor says, or can I get additional ones for extra detail or something?
At northeastern, they have the option of going on co-op or performing research, so there is that option if you are looking into that field. I know a few friends of mine (I got to NU) that were pre-med and after having a co-op in the medical field/hospital setting they decided that it wasn’t for them and switched their focus to research, so the one plus of NU I would say is that the co-op program allows you to really figure out if you want research or pre-med, of course you can always do both! As the others have said, for pre-med it doesn’t really matter what school you go to as it is all dependent on you. All colleges will offer the same basic classes required for medical school, so don’t worry about the classes. I would say look at what major you want and make sure the school offers that major as pre-med is not usually a major. For most science majors, you are required to take classes that fulfill med school requirements, so no matter where you go you will be taking the same classes.
All three schools are large (I toured and applied to all three), though completely different. BU is located in the city right on the green line and is a major research institute, though there is no campus. It is simply buildings located along the Main Street with no campus-y green scenery one might picture college to be.
UMass Amherst on the other hand is not in a city. It is located in a small college town and is so big that it even has its own zip code, or so I’ve heard anyways. The campus is beautiful and it is all green. So if you are looking for a green campus I recommend UMass Amherst. The campus large enough that they offer shuttle buses between dorms/buildings. I will say that it is far out in Western Mass, which means you are basically surrounded by trees. I’m a city person and hated the two/three hour drive from my hometown (10 minutes south of Boston) to Amherst, though if enjoy nature and prefer to be away from the city it is def. a great option.
NU is somewhere in the middle. It is also located in Boston and right on the green line as BU is, but there is a campus feel to it. There are parts that are green and lots of common spaces to play frisbee and lay outside, but it also located in the city. NU offers the best of both worlds if you like both the city and campus-y feel.
I will say the one major difference is the price. UMAss is a great school for pre-med, they even have their own UMASS Amherst med school (so does BU). It doesn’t cost as much as BU/NU (though that was for in-state so I would double check and look at financial aid they each might offer). To me, I think that if one is going to do pre-med and know they will have to go to medical school, which is expensive, I recommend the cheaper school as you take the same classes as an undergrad anyways, though if you don’t like the campus/school that is a different opinion.
Hope I helped & feel free to contact me with further questions!
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@kirstenm44 thank you so much for your response, you answered the other follow up questions I had as well! One concern I have is: people told me that since UMass Amherst is a public school, I am less likely to make it into medical schools such as Columbia. is that true? I know that its annoying when people say “I want to go to columbia!111!” but a lot of my mentors (neurosurgeons) 3/7 went to Columbia and said they have one of the best neuro programs. so is that true at all?
No. Applying to medical school is like applying to college all over again. So it doesn’t matter if you went to a public high school or a private high school, as long as you had the grades, the scores and whatever else the college is looking for, you’ll get in. For medical school, I imagine as long as you work hard and get the same grades and test scores as you would at another college, you would be fine at any school. The one thing I would say is that Boston has a ton of hospitals nearby that you might be able to work at or try to volunteer at, it’s difficult to get in as a volunteer as there are a lot of people who sign up to volunteer. I’m not sure what is around Amherst in regards to hospitals, but I would say that it doesn’t matter what college you go for undergrad as long as you look good when you apply.
@kirstenm44 thank you! that helps so much because I really want to apply (and get in to) UMass-Amherst but a few of my friends who are pre meds are convincing me not to. I had a meeting with my guidance counselor, and I found out that my school sends a good amount of people to jhu annually, and I fit into the sat/gpa range but my friend who got in 2 years ago regrets it- and I don’t want to have a burn out, i really like Amherst.
Don’t worry about the listed school can’t get you into the med school or not, what prevent you to get into a med school is your GPA and Mcat. Most(some thing like 75%) of the premed drop out during their 4 years in college, so your friend’s experiences are typical.It is not where they went to school, its what they did in the school that made them uncompetitive. Med school only take in top students in each college.
As a premed, do not chase “top” name UG such as JHU. You should choose a school where you are the top 25% of the entering class that makes you competitive at the very beginning and hopefully you will be competitive when you graduate.
Does any one have any insight on lifestyle at each of these schools? I haven’t lived at the colleges or know nay one who has, youtubers only show you a part of their day, so I was wondering if anyone knows from personal experience.
They’re all residential colleges, so the experience isn’t that different in the end except for when it comes to the urban setting of BU and Northeastern. More of daily life will involve the city rather than campus itself for those two compared to UMass. Depends what you prefer. Northeastern has a bit more of a traditional campus while BU is more NYU-style integration into the city. UMass is your classic more isolated college town experience where social life revolves around campus.
I would cut BU due to their grade deflation. So the real contenders are UMass and NEU. Both would be different but would offer good opportunities.
You’ll stop talking about top 20 med schools once you’re in college. You’ll have to survive the pre-med gauntlet (3/4 don’t) then apply to med school (2/3 odds you won’t get into ANY med school). Basically you don’t choose your med school - a med school chooses you and you feel lucky you got into one even if it’s in a state you’ve never been to.
A good university for pre-med is supportive, offers lots of resources and tutoring, has a collaborative student body. (So, not JHU for science/premed; it is best applied to at the med school level). It is also affordable with limited or no student debt; a best value is good quality for price, so you should be in the top 25% and it should be a decent college (top 100 university or LAC, any from the Princeton Review’s Best Colleges list or the Fiske guide.) Getting into the honors college or not gives you a clue as to where you stand relative to the student body.
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Among all 3 schools, BU is definitely the worst (their grading is really harsh). NEU is the better choice, not sure about UMass.