I am a California resident that was accepted into four UCs (Cal, UCLA, UCSD, and UCSB), as well as Cornell. I am majoring in Biochemistry at all of the schools I applied to, except Cal (Chemical Biology in the College of Chemistry) and UCSD (Bioengineering). I received the Regents Scholarship ($6000/year) at UCSB and the Tanner Dean’s Scholarship ($1000, one time) at Cornell. I am thinking about applying for medical school in the future, but I want to have a back-up plan (e.g. grad school) in case I do not get in a medical school. Since I am in-state, UCs are far cheaper than Cornell. UCs also are more generous with giving out credit for AP tests. However, Cornell students have an easier time getting into medical school due to the extra resources a private school offers. Currently, I have trouble deciding which school would be best for me.
Bump
Assuming $75,000 per year for four years of medical school costs, what would your total debt be when you enter medical residency in each scenario? (Of course, medical residency is another 3-7 years that is not paid enough to significantly pay down large amounts of debt; that will have to wait until after residency when you reach post-residency levels of physician pay.)
My parents can help me with undergrad tuition, but for medical school, I’m largely on my own. I estimate that the amount of debt is probably only moderately higher at Cornell than at the UCs.
Follow your passion and forget about debt.
If you spend less on undergraduate, your parents will not use the leftover to help with medical school?
The cost difference between a UC and Cornell is around 30k a year, for ~3 years, so the total difference is ~90k. Since medical school is far more expensive (75k/year for 4 years), this is only a moderate difference in the grand scheme of things.
You have enough AP credits to get out of Cornell in 3 years?
Theoretically, yes, but at the expense of my soul.
You should probably plan for 4 years of undergraduate, so that you can complete your major and pre-med courses without excessive stress and have time for pre-med extracurriculars.
Note also that many medical schools do not accept AP credit for pre-med courses, so you will likely have to take more advanced courses in the same subject areas if you skip the introductory level courses with AP credit (e.g. if you skip a semester of general chemistry with AP credit, you may have to take a more advanced non-organic chemistry course instead).
While $90k or $120k additional debt above $300k medical school debt does not seem too big in comparison, it is still a large amount. Also, for undergraduate, you cannot borrow $90k without a cosigner, which is not generally a good idea for either you or the cosigner.