Okay so the two schools that I’m looking at are Creighton University in Omaha or the University of Iowa in Iowa City. Creighton is very expensive (50k a year) so I had been planning on going to Iowa because I could go for free, however there is a chance I can get a 48k a year at Creighton in scholarships so the price thing might not matter. My gpa is 4.4 and my ACT is 32. I would be going for pre med and both of those schools have good pre med programs, although Creighton is better. Does it really matter to medical schools where you go for undergraduate? I don’t want to not get into med school because I go to the wrong college
it doesn’t matter to medical schools where you go. They are notoriously insensitive to things like prestige - much more concerned about your GPA and MCAT score (and state of residence, by the way). Therefore, assuming the price is comparable, go where you feel you feel you’d do the best academically and personally. And check out Amherst’s on-line guide for pre-meds: It is the gold standard on pre-med advising. https://www.amherst.edu/campuslife/careers/act/gradstudy/health/guide
For more information, get in touch with the pre-med groups on both campuses and ask about how supportive the schools are of their applicants, whether the intro bio and chem courses are weeders (forced curve with the goal of killing off 80% of the pre-meds early), what kind of research and medical volunteering is available close to campus, and how the committee letters are handled.
Finally, just so you know what you are up against, be aware of the admissions stats for med schools from aamc: https://www.aamc.org/data/facts/applicantmatriculant/157998/mcat-gpa-grid-by-selected-race-ethnicity.html
(This table is being updated at the moment but check the data when it goes live again.)
Don’t make your decision now. Wait until you have your admissions and scholarship packages. Go and visit each, asking questions. I assume you’d be in the Honors College at Iowa (check whether you need to apply, as in many cases if they require an application it’s due by Dec 1). Ask the questions suggested by N’s mom above. What matters is support and resources.
@AshT98 Despite what you hear, it actually does matter where you go to undergraduate school for admission to medical school.
If you pick a common set of data points like a GPA of 3.5 and MCAT of 32, the national average for acceptance to at least one medical school is about 40%. Many schools will have double that average.
Why? More than likely some schools have much better support and guidance and longstanding relationships that give their students a big advantage.
Choose wisely…
Turner, the statistics you cite are a perfect example of how schools manipulate the data to make themselves look good to pre-meds. A school with serious weeder classes and strict criteria for who gets positive a committee letter will ensure that almost 100% of their applicants get into medical school. They’ve ‘killed off’ all the weaker candidates early on. A more supportive school may not employ weeder classes at all and will try to provide a positive letter for anyone who wants to apply. Their more supportive approach may result in an acceptance rate that is lower. (I’m painting extremes here - but you can find schools at both ends and in the middle). It doesn’t make one school ‘better’ than the other for pre-meds. What you need to look at is what the school’s philosophy on this is, and how supportive they are, and how good the advising is.
And there is no evidence that ‘long-standing relationships’ between undergrad schools and medical schools exist or make a significant difference. Yes, if you go to Stanford or Harvard, you might get a small boost. But if you have a 3.5 at Harvard and someone else has a 4.0 at the state U, the State U person is much more likely to get in than the Harvard grad. In fact, for many state medical schools, the primarily criterion after GPA and MCAT is your state of residence. They exist to create doctors who will hopefully remain in state and serve the population there. The private schools will take people from all over the country - but only with the target GPA and MCAT.
OK, I am going to go against the grain here with a few comments.
First, with your stats you should certainly be able to drive the price of Creighton down to about $30-32K with merit money. That will still be more than Iowa if you are in-state, but much better than $50K. If you can get a better scholarship, terrific.
Second, obviously don’t choose now until you have all the financial information.
Third, Creighton has some unique advantages for pre-Med students. First and foremost, they give PREFERENTIAL admission into their own medical school for their undergraduate students. They also have tons of opportunity for cross-over education with the Medical School, since it is literally attached to their own academic buildings. Finally, they have a terrific pre-Med advising program called “PMED” (not too creative). They help you every step of the way with seminars on the MCAT’s, strong advising, etc.
Having been on their campus for 3 visits, I have the very strong impression that the best and brightest students attending Creighton are concentrated in their pre-med program. Creighton accordingly puts a lot of financial resources into serving these gifted and hard-working students.
In addition, with your stats, you can compete for Creighton’s Honors Program, which is for 50 students per year, and gives priority registration, your own seminars, and the best freshman housing available.
If my Son had committed to pre-Med, Creighton would have been at the top of his list. There is truly nothing quite like a Jesuit education, and we are not even Catholic.
Good luck!
@N’s Mom. I am sorry you are entirely wrong. When you analyze this issue along selected data points like GPA and MCAT you are purifying the comparison. The so-called Weeding Process has nothing to do with it.
Some schools are just more successful in the process, just as some schools are well known leaders in other parts of academia.
I am using actual data and you are just stating an opinion, which of course is your right.
A. “It doesn’t matter to med schools where you go.” (1)
B. “ask about how supportive the schools are of their [medical school] applicants . . . what kind of research and volunteering is available . . .and how the committee letters are handled” (1)
A and B are not direct logical contradictions, but A tends to indicate that it doesn’t matter which undergraduate school a student attends and B strongly indicates that some colleges are much better suited for pre-med students than others. So a poster making a well articulated case (5) for a particular school is not necessarily going “against the grain,” but against one grain and with the other.
Creighton, btw, appears in “The Experts’ Choice: Colleges with Great Pre-med Programs.” So maybe there is something to that list.
^ N’s Mom is right that many colleges manipulate data. A good example of this is Holy Cross. It had 100% success because it only gave committee letters to students they were 100% sure would get into a med school. All the others were left out to dry. (They changed that policy because it started backfiring, but it’s still very telling.)
Some colleges DO weed out on purpose during the first year. Others don’t (beside the “natural” winnowing that happens when kids who’d never taken calc and bio realize what those fields entail).
And med schools do look at MCAT + GPA first. While there may be some allowance for a “name” school, it’s not important the way it is for other grad programs.
At the same time, TurnerT is correct in that some schools are more successful in the process. Look at Creighton’s support system: priority admissions to their med school, workshops, etc. Not all universities offer that. The support system and the resources are the MOST important things for students.
Typically, students with high test scores will test well for the MCAT, and students with low entrance test scores will have to take prep classes and take a glide year and keep their fingers crossed. Most intro classes in the premed core will adequately cover the basics. No undergraduate class is “MCAT prep”. So none of this matters.
The big difference is in the support and resources for premeds. So, what matters is 1° attending a school where one is highly ranked compared to the rest of the admitted students AND 2° where resources, support, and opportunities are plentiful. The “best” combination of 1° and 2° will vary depending on the student.
In OP’s case, anyway, it’s too early to choose: once the financial aid packages have been given, it’ll be time to investigate in-depth.
OP: there’s a premed forum on this website where you can ask questions… or even ask what questions you should ask to determine which college will serve you best.
Turner, we can agree to disagree. I too have looked extensively at the data, which is how I have learned about the many ways schools manipulate it in order to make their pre-med stats look good. The weeder classes are in fact the most common way that schools make their admission stats to med school look good, but by no means the only way.
Schools do differ in their supportiveness/level of expertise for supporting of pre-meds and that this is the information that OP needs to get at. But because of the availability of extensive on-line resources these days like Amherst’s premed guide, forums like SDN, and various other resources, it is no longer the case that if you are attending a school that doesn’t do a good job of pre-med advising that you are out cold. (Many students can’t afford to attend the schools with top pre-med advising.) Happily, you can go anywhere reputable and still get into medical school. Just look at the list of colleges from which applicants were admitted at the various medical schools and you can readily see that students do not come primarily from schools with ‘good’ pre-med advising or that have high admit rates to medical schools. What they do have is high GPAs and MCATs and the state of residence (where that matters).
Sounds like Creighton has an unusually good pre-med program by the way - but if you have to take out a lot of debt to attend, it’s not worth it. Iowa State sends plenty of kids to medical school too.
@TurnerT Your argument is wrong. The stat about % accepted from a school has nothing to do with your point.
It will not matter AT ALL to med schools whether this student goes to his state school or Creighton.
It doesn’t matter if you attend one “good school” or another “good school”. However, if cost is similar, then choose the school that would have better premed support, writes Committee Letters, good premed clubs, etc.
Creighton is a premed machine. However, I don’t think they’re any better at getting students into med schools than others. It’s popular, particularly for Catholic premeds, because it has a med school.
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Creighton is very expensive (50k a year) so I had been planning on going to Iowa because I could go for free, however there is a chance I can get a 48k a year at Creighton in scholarships so the price thing might not matter. My gpa is 4.4 and my ACT is 32
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how would you get awards for $48k to Creighton? Which award? Is that a highly competitive full ride or what?
What award would you get to Iowa to go there “for free”? Do you mean free tuition? or free tuition, room, and board?
@mom2coIIegekids What is so hard to understand? If using a benchmark of GPA and MCAT nationally says X% acceptance but a particular school is X% PLUS acceptance on the same benchmark, how can you not attribute the positive differential to certain characteristics of the school? Is it just coincidence that over 10% of all living Holy Cross alumni are doctors or dentists?
People are so married to this notion that it doesn’t matter, that no evidence will convince them. I guess the more you say it the more it is true.
I am sorry I cannot accept this is the only area of graduate study in the entire world where your ungraduate institution does not matter. It can be due to a variety of factors, not just prestige.
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A school with serious weeder classes and strict criteria for who gets positive a committee letter will ensure that almost 100% of their applicants get into medical school. They’ve ‘killed off’ all the weaker candidates early on. A more supportive school may not employ weeder classes at all and will try to provide a positive letter for anyone who wants to apply. Their more supportive approach may result in an acceptance rate that is lower. (I’m painting extremes here - but you can find schools at both ends and in the middle). It doesn’t make one school ‘better’ than the other for pre-meds.
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very true.
You can’t just look at a one stat (3.5 GPA 32MCAT 48% acceptance rate) and conclude that schools that boast an 80% rate is doing a better job. In a state like Calif, the result would be low. In a state like WV or MS or AL or TX, the result would be higher.
Also…The schools doing a better job may seriously discourage the premeds who have less than MCAT 30 3.5 GPAs from applying at this point, so their pool of applicants has an average of MCAT 33 3.8 GPA has an 83% acceptance rate.
@mom2coIIegekids What you say may be true but it doesn’t matter at all when you are benchmarking to a fixed set of data points. It is post weeding and other pre-application factors.
This is an apples to apples method.
School A @ 3.5 GPA and 32 MCAT - 50% Success
School B @ 3.5 GPA and 32 MCAT - 90% Success
There is something attributable to school B whereby the same GPA and MCAT results in a higher acceptance rate.
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don’t want to not get into med school because I go to the wrong college
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that will not happen based on choices between Creighton and other respectable schools.
Getting into med school has more to do with YOU and your state of residency, than any particular school. Don’t think that if you have an (equivalent to old) MCAT 32 and a 3.8 GPA from Iowa that your chances are hurt because you didn’t go to School X.
What are your parents saying about how much they’ll pay. I looked over the Creighton scholarship pages, which I admit are not clear, but I don’t see any reasonable way that you’d end up with anything close to $48k per year in merit.
An ACT 32 is probably about midway within their upper quartile. Not high enough to warrant awarding a rare full ride.
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some schools have much better support and guidance
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I do agree that some undergrads do have better advising offices and/or write Committee Letters. I will say that is a help. I wouldn’t say it doubles someone’s chances.
Does anyone know what the “preference” is to getting into Creighton SOM from Creighton?
If this student can go to Iowa for a much lower cost (and it has adequate premed advising) and he get into Iowa’s med school (MUCH lower cost), then going to C won’t be any plus.
http://admissions.uiowa.edu/academics/medicine-preprofessional-program
@mom2collegekids Creighton does give “preference” to their own UG’s for Med School admission. However, they don’t publish what that amounts to, statistically. I do know that they have a large percentage of Creighton UG’s in their Med School classes.
I agree that I am not aware of how the OP will get $48K. My S had similar stats, was fortunate enough to be offered admission into the Honors program after an interview process, and, even so, we were looking at about $25k per year net, which was still a very attractive deal. If our S had committed to pre-Med, he would be a Blue Jay now.
We will see if the OP is still monitoring this thread for more data…
I dug up my notes from our visit to Creighton two years ago now. This was the visit where we met the Admissions director for the Med School.
My notes indicated the session included 3 students and parents, and lasted an hour. We met over at the Med School, which was attached to the rest of the college’s natural science building.
Many Med School prof’s also teach upper level UG classes, so they actually get to know many of the Creighton UG kids that end up applying, sometimes writing recommendations. Many research opportunities for UG’s to work at the med school.
Creighton UG’s get preferential admissions. This information was a bit vague, but the “hint” was that if an applicant had a 29 MCAT and was from Creighton and they liked the applicant, that person might get admitted where they otherwise would have wanted a 31 or 32 MCAT.
So, it sounds like it could be worth a couple points on the MCAT, which could be a potentially huge benefit.
The real benefit is that medical schools in the midwest generally, and Creighton in particular, want to attract kids who are likely to stay in the area. S interviewed (and was accepted) at Creighton for med school - his stats were certainly above their average - but the main reason they wanted to talk to him was because he’d gone to college in the midwest, is married to someone from the area, and indicated his strong desire to live and work in the midwest. That is worth a few points of GPA/MCAT at many schools - even those that are private.
At state medical schools in many states, not being a resident is deal breaker. It is in those states where the MCATs and GPAs are often on the lower end of the aamc’s GPA/MCAT tables, which means the tables actually underestimate the difficulty of getting in without the necessary GPA and MCAT. Those state do not have the luxury of choosing candidates from the national pool of available applicants. So friend’s D who is a resident of a NE state with a 3.5 from Northwestern and an MCAT of 30 is now at an overseas medical school, while kids with lower stats who are residents of Mississippi and New Mexico got admitted to their state medical schools. Purely anecdotal, of course, but illustrates the point. Her medical school, which consists entirely of Americans studying medicine overseas, is full of kids just like her: top schools but a GPA or a test score that didn’t cut it.
Back to OP: Sounds like you have two good options and hopefully the money will work out so you can attend Creighton if that’s what you really want to do.
My son didn’t apply to Creighton SOM, but he did apply to SLU SOM (also Jesuit), and was accepted with a merit award. He didn’t go to SLU for undergrad, and we’re not from the MidWest.
I don’t think it’s that hard to get into either med school if your stats are strong and you fit their mission.
One thing that shouldn’t be overlooked is that if you can get into your state SOM, the cost would be much more favorable. Even with the merit award, SLU SOM would still have been significantly more than our state’s top public SOM.
Private and OOS public SOMs are approaching $75k-100k+ per year COA. Yes, if that is your only choice, then…
But, instate Iowa (Carver) is not only much less expensive, but is also higher ranked (not that ranking means much in the SOM world).