Colleges with good Pre-Med programs

<p>I would like to know some good colleges/universitys that have a good pre-med program</p>

<p>Actually ANY good school is good enough for premed.</p>

<p>There aren’t “premed programs”. The premed prereqs are basic science classes that are taken by STEM majors and students of other majors who are also premed…the classes are not unique to premed students.</p>

<p>What state are you in?</p>

<p>What are your stats?</p>

<p>How much will your family pay per year?</p>

<p>Holy Cross, Duke, Tufts.</p>

<p>A “good pre-med” program is going to depend upon your stats. Kids from school who have done well have almost always been in the top 25% of stats for their school.</p>

<p>Otherwise, cases can be made for LACs to state schools to private research schools. Med schools pull from them all. You have to find your fit. You’ll likely do best when you find the right school that fits you.</p>

<p>Put some fit ideals, stats, and whether looking for merit or need based aid info on here and folks can offer some intelligent suggestions for you to consider.</p>

<p>How successful you are in applying to med school depends on what you do in college and not some magic the college has with regards to preparing students for med school. So if you want lists of “top 20” someone will supply it, but I doubt such rankings are that meaningful. There are hundreds of colleges that can give you the opportunity to be a strong med school candidate.</p>

<p>One thing to avoid is placing any importance into acceptance numbers. Some schools boast incredible rates, but it boils down to one of two things. Either they start with great students (think Stanford, etc) or the school weeds out students. Look out especially for the “committee letter” which small schools with average students coming in wield like an axe to prevent all but the strongest applicants from applying right out of college; to no surprise, they often boast 90% or better med school “acceptance” numbers for their undergrads.</p>

<p>There is an excellent online handbook at Amherst I recommend you read to get an understanding of the process and what really matters

</p>

<p>All of the above.</p>

<p>That said, the fact remains, elite institutions have better track records at getting students into elite med school programs or med school in general. The question is, are they successful because of who attends the elite institutions or because of what the elite institutions do? It’s the chicken or the egg question that no one can really answer. But I’ll end with this anecdote:</p>

<p>Local kid gets into Ivy (not HYP). Parents decide they can’t afford Ivy, send kid to local state flagship on partial scholarship. Kid graduates, applies to med school. Can’t get accepted, keeps applying for two years, gets accepted in state flagship med school. </p>

<p>So he eventually made it regardless of which school he went to, but if he had gone Ivy, would it have been so difficult? We’ll never know. He was good enough to get accepted to an Ivy, so obviously if you’re that good, you’ll probably eventually get in no matter where you go, but instinct tells me that elite schools can open doors that middling flagships cannot. Or I and everyone else wants to believe that. Objective research may say otherwise.</p>

<p>Top schools don’t do anything to help get kids into med school. They don’t “teach” to the MCAT, or anything.</p>

<p>Look for a good school with good science classes and Premed Advising. It also helps if the school writes Committee Letters and does Mock Interviews.</p>

<p>*Local kid gets into Ivy (not HYP). Parents decide they can’t afford Ivy, send kid to local state flagship on partial scholarship. Kid graduates, applies to med school. Can’t get accepted, keeps applying for two years, gets accepted in state flagship med school. *</p>

<p>I bet that had NOTHING to do with his undergrad. I would be willing to bet it had to do with one of more of the following:</p>

<p>1) He applied too late the first time or two. many students do NOT understand that you must apply nearly as soon as AMCAS opens.</p>

<p>2) He didn’t have enough ECs, volunteering, shadowing, etc.</p>

<p>3) His app was lacking. Personal Statement was boring, etc.</p>

<p>4) Applied to the wrong schools for his stats.</p>

<p>5) Got his secondaries in late.</p>

<p>6) His first MCAT had some flaws (maybe a sub 10 number), so he retook it later and got a better score.</p>

<p>7) He’s from a state with a ridiculously high number of premeds (like Calif).</p>

<p>Disclaimer: My own son went to a mid-level flagship. He only completed 6 med school apps, got accepted to 3 (all with merit scholarship offers).</p>

<p>It’s possible it’s any of those except #7. We’re in flyover country.</p>

<p>Here’s where those top 6 can be helped by going to an elite school - better pre-med advising. All advisors are not created equal, it’s certainly true at the high school level and I’m willing to bet it’s true at the college level as well. Yes, you can overcome those problems at either the HS or college level by doing it on your own, but it’s so much easier if you don’t have to reinvent the wheel.</p>

<p>Another anecdote: On an elite college tour, I asked a dean how they could explain their high med school acceptance rate. On the order of 80%. He said straight out it was due to the pre-med advisor - that nearly anyone at their school had the smarts to go to medical school if they so desired, they just had to follow the recommended courses of action. (We’re talking Top 10 LAC) The 20% who failed either never used the pre-med advisor’s services or didn’t do what he said.</p>

<p>Actually makes sense, med school generally requires an IQ of 125, which is an ACT of 27. Most elite school attendees have that. Given the IQ, getting good advice can really help your chances.</p>

<p>asked a dean how they could explain their high med school acceptance rate. On the order of 80%</p>

<p>that’s not unusual. My son’s flagship has an 80%+ acceptance rate. It’s all in the weeding that’s done BEFORE med school apps go out.</p>

<p>Actually makes sense, med school generally requires an IQ of 125, which is an ACT of 27. Most elite school attendees have that. Given the IQ, getting good advice can really help your chances.</p>

<p>there’s actually a correlation between ACT score and MCAT score.</p>

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<p>ALL of these could have been improved by picking a school with decent pre-med advising AND going to their sessions or meeting with the adviser. Chances are, the large state U had such offerings, but the student failed to take advantage of it (can easily happen). For students who are not as likely to take the initiative to find such offerings at a large school, a small school can be a better choice (that fit issue again). It need not be Ivy.</p>

<p>It’s also entirely possible that the student, while high enough stats-wise to get into an Ivy, didn’t quite have the work ethic needed for a great GPA once discovering the freedom of college. This happens often and is not dependent upon where one chooses to attend. It’s easy to get over-involved (doesn’t even have to include parties) and let the academics slide the first year or two. It doesn’t take much to lower the GPA.</p>

<p>In general, students with high stats with a good work ethic keeping high stats can make it into med school from almost any college. It can help many to choose some with good pre-med advising. For others, that might not matter as much (those who do research online, etc).</p>

<p>Kid graduates, applies to med school</p>

<p>If the kid graduated and then applied to med school, then it is likely he didn’t pay attention to what his school offered for advising, etc. </p>

<p>You can force current students to attend some stuff if the school does Committee Letters, but it’s impossible to do that if the student applies after graduation. </p>

<p>Anyway, even with advising students can still be headstrong and apply to the wrong schools, submit to AMCAS late, get secondaries in late, etc. Just because a student is told (over and over again) to do A, B, C, it doesn’t mean that he’ll do them.</p>

<p>My H’s niece went to a popular LAC. She completely ignored her school’s advising. She’s been thru 3 app cycles w/o any acceptances. If she had just followed the common wisdom out there, she’d, at a minimum, be a current med student at IU SOM…a very good med school.</p>

<p>Her biggest downfalls have been getting her apps in early. Kids think that med school app deadlines are like college app deadlines. They think if the app cycle is Summer thru Fall, then it’s ok to get apps in by Sept…or even the last day!!!</p>

<p>the app process is also expensive. That also causes some kids to delay, even if they know that they should apply early. The student works over the summer to get the couple thousand together to send in the apps and secondaries in. Advising can’t fix that.</p>

<p>Holy Cross has a very high med school acceptance rate and a good feeder school to many top med schools. Plus, HC IS NEED-BLIND FOR ADMISSIONS-meets 100% demonstrated financial aid.</p>

<p>Holy Cross probably has a high acceptance rate because they screen their applicants and only write a favorable committee letter for the best ones.</p>

<p>Also note that meeting 100% of financial need is a meaningless phrase. What really matters is the mix of grants and loans in the package. A school can offer you not a single dime in grants, just a jumbo loan, and claim they are meeting all of your financial need.</p>

<p>Going back to med school admissions, I find it shameful that a college would block any but the strongest students from applying instead of standing behind all students and letting the med schools make the decision</p>

<p>find it shameful that a college would block any but the strongest students from applying instead of standing behind all students and letting the med schools make the decision</p>

<p>a univ can’t really prevent a student from applying, but they can prevent a student from getting a Committee Letter. A student can still apply and include LORs. </p>

<p>Schools that do CL’s may need to limit simply because of time/budget constraints.</p>

<p>I’m not positive on this, but I believe that many of the smaller schools do not screen and will let you know if they do. You just have to ask them. They may put pressure on you in other ways and advise against it, and not tell you that, but I was told by a least a few of the elite LACs that they don’t screen.</p>

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True, and next time I post about this I’ll use more careful wording. While a school can’t prevent anyone from applying, any but the densest applicant knows that if your college says you are “recommended with reservations” or “not recommended” that you are wasting thousands of dollars in application fees by trying. So it is a de-facto veto power. As Holy Cross writes

Clearly they have the power to affect your chances and make no bones about using it.</p>