<p>I heard there's a program at Cornell in which sophomore students are allowed to apply for an advanced curriculum for medical school. Is this true? I can't really kind anything on it. If it doesnt't exist, then how is the pre-med at Cornell? I saw on another thread that it fairs pretty well, but grade deflation is something to consider? Is this also true? Thank you!</p>
<p>i haven't heard of any 'advanced curriculum' for medical school- and im a junior. that isn't to say i may be in the dark on this, but i dont think there is.</p>
<p>premed at cornell is similar to premed at other equal-caliber universities- youll need good grades via beating curves for those a's and a-'s in classes with hundreds of stellar students, which requires a decent amount of motivation. </p>
<p>grade deflation, however, is a myth in my honest opinion. on cornell's website you can see that median grades are mostly B's and many classes are even in the A range. if you're not a slacker, a respectable gpa is VERY attainable. </p>
<p>you should look into HCEC, the cornell 'premed' service that helps with letters of rec and other information, but typically people dont get involved in that until later on maybe in junior year.</p>
<p>and a huge thing to consider is that med schools aren't dumb. they realize that cornell gpas are not on the same scale as state school gpas, and they take that into consideration, which is why mcats,recs,volunteering, etc are crucial. proof of this:
<a href="http://www.career.cornell.edu/downloads/AaChart2007ForWeb.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.career.cornell.edu/downloads/AaChart2007ForWeb.pdf</a></p>
<p>you can see that most students with gpas between 3.4-3.6 (reasonable to obtain for a premed) got into med school, and if you did well on the mcat (30+), chances go up even more. </p>
<p>med schools will see your 3.4 for what it is at cornell, not as a deviation from the absolute expectations of premed applicants that are typically higher in terms of gpa.</p>