Can you help my son?

Parents Forum
61

<p>“mini - from what I heard, the joint sciences department with pitzer and scripps, is great, especially since 90% of applicants to medical school got in, which my son, if he does major in a science, hopes to attend.”</p>

<p>You will find that almost all of the top 100-150 schools will say the same thing. The questions to ask are how many students who went in thinking they were pre-med ended up being so, how many were “weeded out”, and whether the % is of all applicants, or only those receiving the recommendations of their departments? (It will be different everywhere - at my own school, Williams, and this is a long time ago - my class began with 110-120 pre-meds. After all the weed out, etc., 95% of them were admitted to med school, but only 30-35 applied. Now some of the original group shouldn’t have been doctors. But I suspect 80-85 of them would be doctors today had they attended reasonably good state schools.)</p>

<p>(By the way: I have visited the joint science center at Claremont, and it looked terrific to me! The question I’d have, and I don’t have an answer, is the cohort of premeds large enough to be mutually supportive? and would it matter?)</p>

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<p>Large cohorts of premeds don’t tend to be supportive, in my experience. Cutthroat is what my very premed ungrad college called them. And it has a 100% admit rate after it does its own weed out which impresses me not at all.</p>

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<p>I suspect that a moderate cohort is likely best - enough so there is interesting research going on, and enough to promote a steady stream of internships and opportunities, etc. And enough for interesting conversations.</p>

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<p>Late to this thread - but my son is a 2010 Vassar grad. I could not be happier with the education that he got at Vassar. (He was not pre-med.) Feel free to PM me if you have any specific Vassar questions.</p>