<p>I know its a bit early for me to really be thinking about this, but i'm curious as to how a premed student chooses which med schools to apply to. When applying to undergraduate schools, there are several criterion that make it relatively easy to choose suitable schools (strength of certain depts., social atmosphere, prestige/selectivity). However, it doesn't seem as though you can use these as determining factors for selecting med schools to apply to (you aren't choosing a major, and i doubt any med student has a lot of time to party).</p>
<p>So do you choose where to apply purely based on where you think you may be accepted, or perhaps location of the school? Are there other aspects you can look at as deciding factors? </p>
<p>The main strategy is to maximize your odds of getting in somewhere. This should include a good mix of both state and private schools. Obviously the state school in your home state is where you'll have the "best" shot, just looking at the numbers. While there are certainly some schools where admission is limited to in state residents, don't let schools which have in-state rates in the 80%+ range scare you off - someone has to make up that remaining 15-20%. I can personally attest that several state schools in the midwest are pretty accepting of out of staters (my school even offers out of state tuition waivers so you only have to pay in-state tuition...it's pretty awesome to have one). </p>
<p>Finally there are some other state schools which are on the other end of the spectrum in being surprisingly low on the number of instate students. I was surprised by some schools like Michigan, Ohio State, Virginia, Vermont and Penn State are near 50% instate...</p>
<p>Other than that, pulling out the MSAR and looking where you are going to competitive simply by a GPA and MCAT standard is how I went about. After that I thought about geography, but that was a pretty secondary concern...I would have gone wherever if I had needed to.</p>
<p>The only other major consideration you might want to think about is curriculum style. If you hate working in small groups going some place like Missouri where it's almost entirely Problem Based Learning is not going to please you. Again, the MSAR is an absolute necessity.</p>
<p>Thanks a lot for the reply, BRM. I was actually looking around at some state schools just based on geography, as i think i'm ready to try something else besides the east coast/lower midwest. I'll admit that i was a little discouraged by some of the out of state acceptance rates.</p>
<p>This MSAR that you're recommending/requiring, is it a book that provides information on each medical school? It has been a pain doing med school research without a compiled source.</p>