**HELP** UGA FF vs. Rice/Baylor vs. UMiami HPME vs. State BS/MD

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Georgia
1

So I’m in a bit of a dilemma. I’ve been accepted to

Rice/Baylor 8 Year BS/MD program (with $26500 merit scholarship at Rice + $4000 yearly stipend for research),
UMiami 7 Year HPME (with full-tuition undergrad scholarship),
my state’s 7 year BS/MD program (the medical college is ranked 75 in the country)

I’ve also been accepted to the University of Georgia’s Foundation Fellows program, which provides an $11000 yearly stipend. Students from the Foundation Fellow Program have regularly gone to Duke Med, Vanderbilt Med, and some have even gone to Harvard Med and John Hopkins Med.

My question is, what should I pick? I live in Georgia, and my parents would like me to live close to them before I head off to med school/residency. With UGA, I would be able to have a shot at Harvard, John Hopkins, etc. with full resources of a state univ at my disposal. With BS/MD programs that are out of state, I would be far away from home. With the Georgia BS/MD, I would feel that I’m turning down better offers from Baylor (ranked #21) and Miami (ranked #48?) at the expense of living close to home for 7 years.

What’s the best course of action?

2

I am biased as a former FF at UGA, but I would vote Georgia. The FF program is so very good at supporting students in their passions and helping you to achieve admission/scholarships to grad school. I went from UGA to med school at Washington University in St. Louis on full tuition scholarship.

Congrats on all of your opportunities - I’m sure you can’t go too wrong with any of these choices!!!

3

@kidsrexpensive Wow that’s amazing! Are full-tuition scholarships for med school and WashU based on merit?

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@randomDouble - yes, merit based. I believe that WashU is one of only a handful of med schools with generous merit based scholarships. I feel like I received it BECAUSE I was from Georgia, rather than in spite of it. Most of my med school class hailed from Ivy’s and expensive privates. Interestingly, at least half of the students with merit scholarships were from state schools - I think this is because we were promoted effectively rather than being one of many at an Ivy.