University of San Diego would hit everything on your list. Cannot beat the climate, campus, and attractive student body. If rah rah sports is important, then not the right place. Also, most partying is off campus, at beach or student apartments near beach. Or at SDSU!
Super pleasant lifestyle, mid-size, gives merit. Really fun if you have a car.
Will the amount spent on college affect how much your parents will help you with expensive medical school costs?
If you do make it to medical school, your experience as a physician will be better if your debt level is lower.
Also, pre-med is an inherently competitive weed out process.
@ucbalumnus yes they know about how expensive medical school is and they have been saving accordingly.
If anyone here could give me their opinions of
Auburn university, Clemson university, Alabama university or some other fun schools that would be delightful!
UC Santa Barbara or UC Santa Cruz would be really great lifestyle. Probably not as hard to do well enough there for med school after.
Agree with University of Miami too. University of Georgia. University of Florida.
Good luck!
Medical school application includes interviews, so you may want to choose college where it is easier to travel to your in state public medical schools. For medical school, usually in state public = reach, while all other = high reach, even for the strongest applicants.
If your parents have $700,000 to help you through college and medical school with no debt, be very thankful of them.
Any college where OUR kids are happy can show up on this thread. But you’re you.
Get a Fiske Guide and sort through. Know that good holistic colleges will vet you based on a lot more than scores and gpa.
And “happy” is pretty darned vague. My friend’s son was very happy at W&M as a chem major, had fun, and worked his butt off. Now at a fully funded prestigious grad program. And you’re you, not him.
Btw, premed is about looking for a collaborative philosophy, versus the competitive, brutal weed out programs. Not just “easy.”
Cal poly or UCSB — that area is known to be the happiest place on earth…
Disneyland is known to be the happiest place on Earth.
Seriously though, you need to visit these schools, read up on niche.
Not near cities, but I have read that James Madison and Virginia Tech have happy students
Tufts?
@lookingforward Btw, premed is about looking for a collaborative philosophy, versus the competitive, brutal weed out programs. Not just “easy.”
^in theory yes, but with an almost static number of residencies spots and an ever increasing talented applicant pool competition is inevitable, its better to be a big fish in a small pond, at least that is my take on it.
also in my first post, i already defined the top 3 things i wanted in a college, so no, its not really that vague…
@ImASoccerPlayer yeah i am doing a lot of research on west coast schools! im definitely adding that one to my list.
@JBSeattle haha ur very funny
@citymama9 yeah i should look into those more, both of my parents are actually V-Tech grads, i heard the food at both of those schools is really good so thats always a plus!
@suzyQ7 lol im pretty sure I would get chewed up and spit out, im not interested in getting down curved by some valedictorians… haha
@Student1928 You’ll have to work hard in those classes, but I would bet that Harvard, Yale, UVA, Georgetown will probably have higher GPAs on average in pre-med classes than Clemson, Alabama, or LSU. Gradeinflation.com has Harvard overall 2015 average GPA as 3.65, Georgetown 2013 was 3.54, UVA 2013 was 3.32. Alabama 2013 was 3.13, LSU 2014 was 2.96, and Clemson 2008 was 3.14.
I see several people gave mentioned UCSB, but that was the #1 school that came to mind when I read your post. I think Clemson is also a good choice, maybe TCU too? The students I know there are very happy.
At some of your schools of interest the cohesiveness of the student body may be hampered by fairly low retention rates or extended times to graduation. Clemson, for example, registers a 59% 4-year graduation rate. This may not be atypical for its class, nor should the figure necessarily be of serious concern to you. However, the happiness quotient for students at schools at this and similar levels may – at least to the extent that it depends on a consistent social group – be transitory.
https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/highest-grad-rate
However, graduation rates are mostly correlated with admission selectivity, for obvious reasons. Generosity of financial aid or lack of need of financial aid among the students is also a factor.
But a strong student who does not have trouble affording his/her college is personally unlikely to fail to graduate or need to take extra semesters to graduate.
@merc81 huh i never thought about completion rates like that, great insight! i’ll keep that in mind.
@IzzoOne yeah those statistics reflect the performance of the student body and how capable they are [on average]. Im just curious, in your opinion, would u think i have a greater chance of becoming accepted to medical school with entering lower tier safety school or a reach school?
There are no shortage of schools known for grade inflation – Brown, UPenn, and Harvard come to mind. Brown open curriculum provides the most flexible requirements of any school.
I think that both Rice and Tulane would be great, but we’re talking Houston and New Orleans, so I don’t know if you would want to be there. Vanderbilt has a work hard/play hard reputation (strong Greek presence and it’s in the south – Nashville – so again, not sure if it meets your weather criteria.
If California is not too hot and sunny for you, there are lots of schools – public and private – that meet your criteria.
One reason my son ended up at Vassar was that it had a friendly, happy vibe. At one time he was considering a pre-med track, and as I recall, Vassar students have good success in med school admission. You might find that LACs offer a more collaborative atmosphere than larger schools. Also, remember that you can major in anything you like and go to med school, so you can immediately take some pressure off by not majoring in biochem or any other subject filled with pre-med hopefuls. You said you want to major in chemistry, and that’s great, but it should only be because you really love chemistry, not because you think you have to major in it to go to med school.
As a resident of Virginia, consider the University of Virginia.
In order to generate tailored responses, you need to give a more detailed description of what makes you happy. If you think that frat parties equal happiness, then you can find those almost anywhere. If you think that less academic pressure equals happiness, then why are retention rates highest at the most academically challenging & demanding schools ? And the drop-out rate so high at schools with low standards academically ?
If you want to be happy, then you should consider schools which are likely to be populated with students of a similar intellect. For large state universities, target honors colleges.
Students are very happy, and some unhappy, at Georgia, Auburn, Alabama, Clemson & Florida. Also at Harvard, Northwestern, Williams & Amherst.
Based on the limited information shared, you may want to avoid Princeton, Carnegie Mellon, Chicago, Johns Hopkins, Georgia Tech, Swarthmore College, & small rural schools.
Another poster mentioned schools with high graduation rates as a measure of “happiness”. In my opinion, average first year retention rate should be considered as an important indicator of satisfaction & happiness. The colleges & universities with a first year retention rate of 98% or 99% are comprised of the most academically demanding & challenging schools (Brown, Northwestern, Dartmouth, Stanford, Columbia & Yale as well as Williams College, Amherst College & Pomona College).
The large state universities that you mentioned have low retention rates overall, but may have significantly higher retention rates for honors college students.