<p>I agree with the general point. I know a doctor who went bankrupt due to med school debt, but … clearly if you can afford it without significant debt going to the “best” “affordable” school where you are likely to be challenged the most to get the highest MCAT helps (presumably there is “some” advantage to better teaching and challenge or why do we believe in education at all?). Most successful applicants didn’t choose to go to a low tier public (and get a 4.0) just because they are a few thousand $ cheaper than the flagship (or some generous private). It is inconceivable that a student’s MCAT scores don’t correlate at least a little with “quality of educational experience.”</p>
<p>I’m guessing your father is well aware that most students who start out thinking they are going to med school are not going to end up wanting to go to med school. I’m not saying this is going to be the case with you, but he may just want you to get the best UG degree you can.</p>
<p>either way, apply to a wide variety of schools and let him know you aren’t going to take on any undergrad debt. That will help him help you to make the best choice. </p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Oh, and I wasn’t thinking only NT, though, of course, I thought maybe NT. My daughter knew Erika.</p>
<p>I hope the club continues. Her mother is a wonderful woman.</p>
<p>You are really talking about two different things. One is getting a great education and having an outstanding college experience. The other is doing well professionally. These things are not synonymous.</p>
<p>Your father went to Yale, a school that is known not only for its superb education, but for the wonderful undergraduate experience many have in its residential college system. Added to that, of course, are all of the resources and traditions of one of the nation’s oldest and most distinguished universities. The fact that he wants to provide that–or something similar-- for you is wonderful. </p>
<p>Of course you don’t need to go to Yale, or any of the other elite Us and LACs in the nation to get a fine education and be professionally successful. UIUC and U WI are both very strong schools with lots of research resources in the sciences, if that is what interests you. They don’t duplicate the Yale experience, but that is not a necessity. It is also not something to be sneezed at.</p>
<p>I think you are wise not to pin your hopes on Yale, or on any other extremely selective and/or expensive school for several reasons. One, obviously, is your family’s changing situation. Another is the fact that you might well not get in. You sound like a fine young woman with a strong record, but you say you are not near the top of the academic heap at your school. </p>
<p>Is it just Yale your father wants you to apply to? If so, if memory serves, they only count legacy if you apply SCEA. So that matter could be settled one way or the other by early December. </p>
<p>Realistically, you aren’t likely to get into Yale with your stats, even as a legacy if the post above was accurate. but as OOS, U of Wisconsin isn’t that cheap. UICU should be on your list. Your dad may be telling a different story by next spring, depending on the divorce situation.</p>
<p>“best” “affordable” school where you are likely to be challenged the most to get the highest MCAT helps "
this is theoretical assumption and NOT the fact. Pre-meds are chanllenged absolutely everywhere, at the local, un-known, the lowest ranked college No matter the level of challenge, the MCAT score (as well as all Boards at Med. School later on) will depend on the EFFORT OF PREPARTAION to the exam. While pre-meds spend few hours every day for many weeks preparing for the MCAT, medical students spend around 12-14 hours every day for about 7 weeks preparing for their Step 1. Do they do it because their academics at Med. School was insufficient? I do not think so. They just have to and the same goes for the ones preparing for MCAT in HYP, Berkeley or your unknown lowest ranked college. Also there are plenty, lots of the very top caliber pre-meds (ranked #1 in their HS) at every place, attracted their by various reasons, including but not limited to financial side. Choosing college based on ranking in wrong anyway, no matter what is a plan. College has to match personality and wide range of interest of student or this student will have a great chance of being derailed from the original track/plan, feeling out of place, un-happy, not satisfied. It is 4 years of very important stage with lots of adjustments to more independent life style. Do not put more stress into this situation than already there, it is not worth it at all and much more so in pre-med’s situation when weed out killer classes are thrown at them often right in the first semester of the freshman year (at regular public UG, I am not talking about some Elite college here).<br>
Of course when you look at the MCAT scores of the group that was so carefully pre-selected at the admission and consists only of the cream of valedictorian pool, of course, the average score will be higher. It correlates to the amount of effort and these cream of the crop students know how to work hard. If you chek some Honors colleges at in-state unknown publics, you will find the same situation. Specifically, D’s Honors has 100% acceptance to Med. School. It only reflects the fact that requirements for this Honors were top 2% of HS class and ACT=31+ and many of these kids would have been accepted at Ivy’s if applied, but were smart to choose ful tuition Merit and some negotiated with family to foot their Med. School tuition intstead.<br>
One additional consideration, being in homogenius environment of top elite UG is NOT a very good idea for the future doc. at all. it will not help a person to be able to connect easily to variety of people under his care, most of whom are not at all at the same intellectual level at student body at Harvard. This kids are usually less mature socially and this is a very important aspect of Med. School. D. has stayed away from some of this type of people, too intense, too elbowy by her taste, using any chance to put you down (because they had to play those games in UG to get ahead)</p>
<p>Miami- all due respect… it’s a little early to be cautioning this kid that the folks at elite U’s are snobby and disconnected from reality, not mature socially, etc. My gynecologist is a Harvard grad and I can assure you that he relates to his patients just fine- many of whom are indigent or have no health insurance. He has worked all over the world teaching midwives safe birthing techniques- many of them are illiterate. He seems to cope just fine on his volunteer missions. My oncologist graduated from Yale (with a degree in history) and is regularly highlighted in the local media for her contributions to under-served populations-- she is the first referral when a van service which offers free mammograms to indigent women discovers a breast mass.</p>
<p>Was she a snob in undergrad? Who cares. She spends hours of her time per week trying to find medical resources for people who don’t have adequate resources for their medical issues, including getting free babysitting so a young, poor mom can go to chemo without having to take her baby with her.</p>
<p>Why are you so fixated on the evils of elite universities? We all appreciate that your D has done remarkably well without attending one. That doesn’t make the students who go on to med school from Harvard and Yale shallow elitists. They get their hands just as dirty as physicians from every other university on the planet.</p>
<p>Also, given the area this student attends HS, she has every single competing type around her already. She will do fine anywhere. I’m sure she has learned to finesse that stuff already. </p>
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@mom2collegekids - My dad has offered to take care of all the college costs, ** as long as the assets he supposedly has to pay for them are left to him**. But who knows what my mom will get and what he’ll get. And trust me, I am being very cautious, hence this thread.</p>
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<p>Ha! Wishful thinking. “The assets he has…” Unless he has protected assets from either before his marriage or an un-mingled inheritance, then “his assets” are also your mom’s assets…and he knows that . I hope he isnt’ trying to set up a situation to “starve” your mom by claiming that the assets are needed to pay for your college, so she would be “mean” to take half. He has the means to re-earn those assets, she doesn’t. Don’t play his game. This is stinking to high heaven. I hope he doesn’t try to put something in the divorce decree that each parent is to pay half…when mom doesn’t have his means. </p>
<p>Tell him that as far as you are concerned, mom is getting half the assets (and she will need them for herself), and unless HE will still have enough money to pay all costs for you and any younger kids to go to college.</p>
<p>Glad to hear that you are being very cautious. Talk to your mom as well. Have at least 2-3 schools on your list where your stats will get large merit. There’s a good chance that come next spring Dad will realize that he won’t be able to direct all the assets like he thinks he can. </p>
<p>My dad isn’t a bad person, please stop bashing him. I don’t know all the little details of the financial settlement they’re working on, and you all don’t have all the details of our day to day lives. I just don’t think he understands how different college is now versus how it was when he went to school, and I don’t think he wants me to feel like I have to worry about the cost, even if I do. This is why I’m looking at schools I can hopefully get merit at.</p>
<p>The point of this thread though, was asking for some facts and statistics i can use to show that kids who go to colleges that aren’t super duper elite can still get into good med schools and go on to have successful careers. I know I need to look for merit aid, and I am.</p>
<p>“Realistically, you aren’t likely to get into Yale with your stats, even as a legacy if the post above was accurate.”</p>
<p>We can easily argue nobody is “likely” to get into Yale. But a female legacy with a 33 (and possibly higher if she retakes) ACT certainly has a better chance than 90% of Yale applicants. If her dad is at a white shoe firm in Chicago, she’s a lock. Perhaps dad knows this, yet doesn’t want this to impact her motivation to continue achieving at a high level.</p>
<p>“I just don’t think he understands how different college is now versus how it was when he went to school, and I don’t think he wants me to feel like I have to worry about the cost, even if I do.”</p>
<p>The current admissions system has been around since the late 60s, so unless your dad is an old boomer, he likely got into Yale with As and a top ACT/SAT score. And he also likely attended an elite law school, so he understands the meritocratic admissions landscape. I urge you to attempt to capitalize on your legacy status at Yale. </p>
<p>I’m sure that such stats exist. For one thing, schools often publish the acceptance rates of their med school applicants. That can be an iffy road to go down, though, because from what I’ve heard, some schools also tend to discourage weak applicants from applying.</p>
<p>Note that the WUSTL class includes students from 65 undergraduate institutions; JHU, 63. That’s a lot more than the top 10 LACs and top 10 research Us. Or even the top 20 of each. (Also, since both of these schools are private, you probably wouldn’t find a large number of students coming from one or two in-state schools.)</p>
<p>Would it make more sense to try and “capitalize” on being a legacy at Yale, or apply ED at another school where I might have a better shot? I haven’t been given very many positive predictions on acceptance to Yale, so I was thinking of applying ED somewhere else, if I apply ED/SCEA.</p>
<p>I disagree with this. And since you have already taken the ACT twice, retaking seems questionable. Yale does NOT participate in score choice. They will see it all.</p>
<p>A 33 is roughly the equivalent of a 2180 SAT. No one but a development admit or a recruited athlete is a “lock” at Yale with that score. And I don’t think simply being at a white shoe firm in Chicago is good enough for a development admit at Yale. They are accustomed to seeing serious money. Sure, it doesn’t hurt. </p>
<p>OP, I think your dad is likely not a bad person. But in this society, just like many people tend to view a rich person like CEO negatively, many tend to view a dad who is divorced negatively, justified or not. Some may even view a person who attended your dad’s school negatively.</p>
<p>At least he seems to be “on your side.” I know a case where a kid got in and planned to attend an elite school like your dad did, and her grandparent was plainly on the wrong side because he was not happy.</p>
<p>Some “top” med schools tend to admit many students from their affiliated or comparable colleges. But over 70% of students from an elite college still attend a public med school in their own state in the end. Unlike in the law field (where the students are often advised to go to a T14 law school), students do not have to go to, say, a T14 med school in order to be successful. But they all need to work long hours (e.g., no summer break in some clinical years, only one day off in a week - almost like a person working in a “third world” in terms of the number of working hours) for many years no matter what med school they attend.</p>
<p>However, divorce tend to cause significant damage to family finances. With the OP’s thoughts on medical school, and two younger brothers, there may not be enough family money to pay for all of this education, especially after the expenses of divorce.</p>
<p>The father needs to figure out how much he can realistically promise the OP and the younger brothers for their college (and medical school or other professional school if he is willing to pay that), so that the OP (and the younger brothers when their time comes) can make a realistic application list.</p>
<p>Otherwise, we are likely to see in April a thread like “got in to [colleges], but need to take $30,000 loans per year – help!” from the OP.</p>
<p>First off, let me applaud the OP for insight well beyond most 17-18 year olds. In many ways, the approach is more grown-up than that of the parent. More likely it comes from a lack of interest or information about things and subjects outside of his experience. That is not really a bad thing, he just doesn’t know what he doesn’t know.</p>
<p>The metrics for admission to Yale and similar institutions are not such that you are unlikely to get in. There is a fundamental disconnect here with higher always being better and that is simply not the case. The difficulty is in faking that you really want to be there. Your feelings will come across in your writing and your interviews. Taking advantage of legacy status is fine if that were actually a goal. Doing so when you truly do not wish to attend there would be morally reprehensible as it would be keeping someone else out of a spot (at least in theory). </p>
<p>Dad may need to understand that it is your life, too. You may need to go it alone, but most of us dads want what is best for our kids. You could simply say that your choices are UW, Illinois and whatever other U. He can help you with your dream or he can hope that one of your siblings wants to go to Yale. Mom may be a better source of resources. If they are not already divorced, you could even have her lawyer insist that money is available for college without strings (or at least without Yale as a string). Rather you worked it out with him, but that could be an option.</p>
<p>Good luck. With your attitude, you will be successful in whatever you do!</p>
<p>A 33 ACT at Wisconsin puts her in the top 5% of her class. It sounds like her father would likely prefer her to be around a denser cohort of equally disciplined and accomplished students, where she’s more likely to be pushed and challenged on a frequent basis. I infer she’s at a Chicago area day school, which could easily be $30,000 per year. Parents, especially Ivy alums, who pay to send their children to pricey day schools rarely do so dreaming of one day paying out of state tuition to a public university. If finances are a concern, UIUC would be the school, but many high status families in Illinois think UIUC is beneath them. I don’t believe Wisconsin would be on the menu at all, as it would be nearly price neutral with Northwestern and Wash U.</p>
<p>In response to Yale ACT: I didn’t see where she admitted to sending the first two scores to Yale. Further, Yale doesn’t average your submissions to use for their data set or US News. Only the top score would be used. It seems some of you are implicitly attacking Ivy league schools and talking about their policies with no first-hand experience. You must understand the rules are very different for legacies at the Ivies and schools like Notre Dame.</p>