How do you Choose Med Schools to Apply to?

Pre-Med & Medical School Pre-Med Topics
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<p>Like the title of the thread suggests, I would like to find out how exactly pre-meds should start making a list for medical schools. I realize this might be a bit early (I'm a 2nd semester Junior), but I already have my MCAT done since I took it the August after my sophomore year and have the prereqs of most or nearly all med schools done w/some recommended coursework. I’m a Biochemistry major and a double minor in Arabic and Mathematics at my state flagship. </p>

<p>Are stats the most important thing in deciding where I should apply? Should I just buy an MSAR and look for med schools that match up w/my MCAT and GPA? I mean, as of right now, my goal should be finding med schools that I’ll hopefully be accepted to, right?</p>

<p>I think it would be the most helpful if I just listed my basic stats so far,
cGPA: ~3.980 (BCPM: ~3.966 and AO: 4.00)
MCAT: 40 (14BS, 14PS, 12VR)</p>

<p>There are a couple obvious one’s I’ll apply to (my instate options)—UMich, MSU, Wayne State, Oakland, and CMU </p>

<p>I’m also thinking about Case Western, Feinberg (?), and Pritzker. Am I on the right track? Do you have any suggestions for me? How many should apply to? I’ve heard 15 to 20 is a good, solid amount—especially considering med school admissions! Should I apply to DO schools at all (i.e., as “backups”) if I’m not genuinely interested in osteopathic medicine (please note: I have a great respect for DOs and shadowed one)? </p>

<p>Outside of the Midwest, I’m thinking Baylor and maybe WashU (I don’t know if I’m good enough for that though, but I heard merit is good?)? </p>

<p>Finally, I’m not interested in the MD/PhD or MSTP route and would strictly wish to go down the traditional way of applying.</p>

<p>I don't care about prestige and just want to pursue my dream of being a practicing physician. If anyone's gone through the process before, how much was price a factor in your med school list?</p>

<p>Thank you so much! :)</p>

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<p>Apply to any school your heart desires, sky is a limit.
You will get in at Case Western, Feinberg (I am more familiar with these 2 and can answer some specific questions). Pritzker is unpredictable.
Go to the one that possibly give you a scholarship.<br>
My D’s first criteria was location. It does not mean that it should be your first criteria. You are the one who knows better what is your #1 consideration. The other important point that D. considered was student body at each school. She said that it is not the same from school to school. Probably the most important was a program itself, which is different at different schools and focus on students. D. felt that some schools take better care of student’s needs than others. i believe that she also wanted to have a car at school (she did not indicate directly, but I know that she is kind of attached to her car) and Chicago did not present this opportunity as having a car there is very expansive.</p>

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<p>Apply to the various privates that interest you.</p>

<p>OOS publics can be a problem since many of them give a strong preference to instate students and will only accept OOS students who have a tie to the state or were accepted to their MD/XXX program. </p>

<p>Since you have super stats (congrats), you can apply to the top ranked med schools that often expect super stats…Wash U, ivies, UChi, etc. Good luck!! </p>

<p>BTW…with your stats, some privates may offer you some merit. There’s a current med student who sometimes posts here that had similar stats. He was offered large merit by a few name SOMs.</p>

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<p>Since you have such a great GPA and MCAT score and you are in-state at UMich, I think that is your best bet with in-state tuition. You could also apply to places like Harvard, Yale, Vanderbilt, WashU, etc., but the lure of a great med school with in-state tuition would be the tip factor for me. Having a much smaller loan amount but still an excellent education is hard to beat. </p>

<p>Work on more volunteering with patient experience and shadowing to improve your application if you don’t already have that.</p>

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<p>Thank you all for your compliments. It’s been hard and exhausting so far, but I’m pushing for my dream. :)</p>

<p>I think UMich would be my #1 if I would hopefully get in, for the reasons bookiemom suggests. The price is just perfect and the curriculum is amazing. </p>

<p>I’m right now focusing on program and price as my major factors. Location would be a secondary factor since med school admissions can be wacky.</p>

<p>The only OOS schools it seems that I should apply to are those that provide merit scholarship–which makes sense. I knew that a couple did (Pritzker and WashU, namely), but what other ones do? This would really help add schools.</p>

<p>So is this list good so far?
Michigan, MSU, Wayne State, Oakland, Central Mich, Case, Pritzker, WashU, Feinberg, and Baylor</p>

<p>That’s 10. I don’t want to stress myself out with a lot of apps, so would a good protective amount be 15? Or should I go all out and do 20 to 25?</p>

<p>Also, Miami, how could you be sure I’m in at Case or Feinberg? Aren’t they (and all med schools) unpredictable in admissions like Pritzker?–definitely less so though</p>

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<p>Vanderbilt might offer some merit aid.</p>

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<p>Don’t forget WMU for instate! Keep us updated on your decisions!! Good luck!</p>

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<p>Others can chime in, but with your stats, you might want to avoid too many SOMs that will reject you because they’ll assume that you’re using them as safeties.</p>

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<p>Schools that give merit off the top of my head: Northwestern, Case, Cleveland Clinic, UChicago, Mayo, Vanderbilt, UVa, Baylor, UCLA, UTSW, Washu, UMich, Columbia (pretty much for URM and really special cases), NYU, Duke, UPenn, Mount Sinai, UWisc, USC</p>

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<p>Surprised Kristin hasn’t posted yet, I believe she’s written her thought process a few times and I’ll share what mine was (although it’s slightly different because I was MD/PhD but I’ll point out where I think you should go different).</p>

<p>First off buy the MSAR. I literally don’t know how I would have done this without it. I also had the princeton review guide to med schools but the MSAR is enough and much more useful.</p>

<p>Factor 1. Location - for me applying MD/PhD, I didn’t have to worry about IS/OOS for public schools and I also put lots of weight into location because I was committing 8 years of my life. With MD only being 4 it’s not as important to be in a desirable place but unlike me you have to factor residency status and how much of an IS bias the school has (you can get that info from the MSAR).</p>

<p>Factor 2. Med school curriculum. I read through the MSAR page for each school and started to develop a preliminary ranking of all the schools that made my location cut. Thins to consider: p/f or not, any unique things to the program, PBL vs lecture, what kind of clinical environments will be exposed to in clinical years, what are the most frequent specialties coming out of the school? Does it stress research or primary care, etc.</p>

<p>Factor 3: Research (you can probably skip this, I looked at the faculty pages for the departments I was interested in and made sure there were plenty of people doing research that I wanted. Schools moved around in my rankings based on having lots of people or too few people.</p>

<p>Factor 4: Getting a good spread of chances. At this point you probably still have too many schools so here is where you look at MCAT/GPA (especially for you since your MCAT/GPA are going to be competitive everywhere) and make sure that you have a good mix of schools where you’re reaching (e.g. any top 5 school on your list just cuz that’s always a reach even with stats like you), solidly competitive and then extremely competitive (e.g. average MCAT closer to 30)</p>

<p>Factor 5: Maybe this comes earlier? Cost. As an MD/PhD student this obviously wasn’t on my radar. I don’t think you’ll really know what kind of FinAid you’ll get until you’re accepted so my friends have only factored this in when choosing among acceptances.</p>

<p>If you have a good spread, with stats like yours you def don’t need more than 15 apps.</p>

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<p>Geez IWBB, it’s only been a little more than 24h since OP posted–and in that time I hosted a dinner party for ten (it was delish), watched Inglourious Basterds (we’ve been on a Tarantino kick), attended 5 lectures, gotten my car washed, went to the optometrist (cute new glasses!), hosted an interviewee, and watched the BCS championship game (go SEC!). Sorry it took me a little while ;)</p>

<p>Anyway, to the OP, here are some thoughts:</p>

<p>1) I think you have gotten very solid advice so far.</p>

<p>2) As you know, your state’s state school will be your best chance as far as admissions and price goes. It’s convenient you like your state school to boot. I was in a similar position (and off the top of my head, am the only current med student who posts here who attends a state school (there are at least 2 parents w/ kids at state schools)) a few years ago. My recommendation to you would be to aggressively market yourself to whatever Michigan wants. Eg: my school is more or less obsessed with collaboration, patient-centered care, and serving our state. Knowing that my goal was to go there, you can bet your bottom dollar I found ways to showcase my dedication to each of those things at every opportunity (while remaining genuine). I’d apply to every state school in your state unless you have a compelling reason not to.</p>

<p>3) From there, add some private schools in your stats range that have reasonable admissions percentages. Luckily for you, your stats are in range anywhere you apply. If I were in your shoes, I’d probably go for any mix of private schools outside the top 25.</p>

<p>4) Finally, finish it off with some elite programs that are challenging to get into no matter what your stats are. I believe the reasons for this are that there are so few seats and so many qualified applicants–every year, many kids with great stats and great profiles are rejected because there’s just not space for them.</p>

<p>When deciding which schools from each of those categories to add, keep the following in mind:</p>

<p>a) Program size. How big do you want your class to be? Do you have lots of friends, or a small close-knit group? Do you like to be a face in a crowd, or know everyone you see? I’d somewhat arbitrarily say there’s a collection of schools <100, ~150, and >200. </p>

<p>b) Program type. What kind of classes do you enjoy most? Do you like lectures? Small group sessions? Working together, collaborating? Competing for the top grades? Constant checks on your knowledge with frequent quizzes and tests, or final exams for all the marbles?</p>

<p>c) Community. This one was the most important thing for me. I value building community and maintaining close relationships with peers and mentors. I wanted to be in a supportive place that would challenge and nurture me. My roommate overheard the applicant we’re hosting on the way back to the office from his interview, and he mentioned that he was so impressed at the strong feeling of community here based on the experience he had with us and our friends–made my day. You might not care about community per se, but there’s probably one element of medical education that is more important to you than others. Place that one here.</p>

<p>d) Cost. You’ve already mentioned that this is important to you, and the thing is, it’s probably going to be expensive no matter where you go. Check out average indebtedness of graduates (available in MSAR and probably on finaid websites). It’s weird to put a monetary value on your future, but the way I’ve convinced myself I’m not totally insane for throwing six figures at this SOM is that right now, I can’t think of anything better to invest in than myself and my future. (Note: right now I’m single and have a car that’s paid off and live in a cheap apartment in the midwest, so maybe my financial viewpoint is a little…short-sighted.)</p>

<p>e) Think about the type of physician you want to be, and find a place that matches it. Eg I want to be a compassionate clinician with a solid understanding of the context of health care. To me, it makes sense that I would choose a school that’s focused on compassion, collaboration, community, etc. On the other hand, if I were jonesin to be some hot shot “physician scientist” ala iwannabebrown, I’d pick his school and not mine, hands down (note: that doesn’t mean his school is incapable of training compassionate clinicians or that mine would be terrible for budding scientists, just that ours are better at different things in my opinion). </p>

<p>*I think it’s worth pointing out that I didn’t say “I want to be a world-class pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon, so I’m going to choose a school that has an impressive match list for surgery and that also has impressive peds CT surgeons.” For the vast majority of students, I think it’s way way way too early in your training to have a specialty in mind before you even apply to med school.</p>

<p>And finally, where the heck do you find this information?! I’d recommend MSAR and USNWR for stats, individual school websites for information about curricula, “recent news”/press releases from the past, say, year for info about what the school values, bios or current student profiles to get a feel for the type of students there, etc. And if there’s something you’re just dying to know but can’t find online, call or email the admissions dept and ask to email a student–I’m convinced they give much better/no-nonsense answers than administrators anyway ;)</p>

<p>Good luck! I think you’re setting yourself up nicely and I for one would be shocked if you didn’t pick up an acceptance after crafting a thoughtful list and marketing yourself well.</p>

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<p>"Also, Miami, how could you be sure I’m in at Case or Feinberg? Aren’t they (and all med schools) unpredictable in admissions like Pritzker?–definitely less so though ’

  • I can only use my experience with my D’s acceptances. She did not have your MCAT, but her GPA was 3.98 (for your reference). Everythihng else was more than needed (according to her pre-med advisory). We are also very close to you, but not in Michigan. She will be MS3 in March. Not all are unpredictable like Pritzker, not at all. And most have Merit scholarships for some. In fact, D’s current Med. School adcom actually called D’s pre-med advisor and expressed their hope that she would choose this school despite of fact that they could not offer her Merit award because of unbelievably high caliber of applicants in the year my D. applied. So, here you go with the proof that Merits are out there for the very top.</p>
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<p>Miami,</p>

<p>we don’t know anything about OP’s app other than MCAT/GPA. While those scores are good enough to get a look at ANY school, that’s all their good for: a look. The rest of the app is what gets your daughter or OP in.</p>

<p>Kristin,
Rule #76: No excuses, play like a champion.</p>

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<p>OP will be in. 4.0 / 40 people are not stupid, they take care of all other requirements and have time to live normal life too. I agree that it is just an assumption, but it is not poking into the sky, it is based on many examples of kids around my D who are currently at various Medical Schools.</p>

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<p>kristin,
Thank you so much for that info! I can’t thank you enough for that–especially since it probably took you some time to write that monster of a post. :)</p>

<p>I’m definitely buying the MSAR, but right now I’m sort of strapped for cash since the money I have being used right now is to fly for some research conferences. I’ll probably buy the MSAR and one other book. I have been looking at med school sites, but your idea of looking at press releases is very smart! </p>

<p>IWBB,
I don’t wish to reveal too much info about myself for privacy reasons. Like Miami said, I’m not “stupid” and have spent college life in the best way I could have ever thought of, taking all the opportunites I could to enrich myself as person, as a hopeful future doctor, as a student, and as a researcher–all the while having fun. I’m not a book nerd and I didn’t sacrifice my life to get an A as opposed to an A-. I’m pretty easygoing when it comes to grades, but I work hard in trying to succeed and learn. I’m definitely not one of those kids that grub for an extra point on a test or who spends life in the library. I came to college to learn and to achieve what I could and, so far, I feel like I’ve been doing it.</p>

<p>Sorry if that came across defensive, but I just want to explain that I have a life outside of school.</p>

<p>Christine,
Wow, I completely forgot about WMU. I thought it was going to have its first class in a couple of years from now! I’ll look more into it.</p>

<p>trapezius,
I love the list! Thank you! :D</p>

<p>mom2collegekids,
So are “safeties”, or backups, not essential in a med school list? Which med schools typically reject applicants with above average stats? </p>

<p>I’m sorry I can’t address all the posts, b/c I have some stuff to do now, but I appreciate all of your great answers!</p>

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<p>I’m sure you do have a life outside of school Mufid and was no way implying you don’t. I was more just clarifying that your GPA/MCAT alone would not get you in. While I’m sure both you and Miami know that, some random person reading this thread as they begin to understand this process might not and think that your GPA/MCAT is enough to guarantee acceptance into very pretty competitive schools.</p>

<p>Safeties are essential but they have to be chosen carefully. There needs to be something about the school/you that says you would come. With your stats, your state flagship is probably a safety but so would a low ranked private school near it, or a lower ranked school near where you go for undergrad.</p>

<p>I don’t know if any schools in particular are “known” for it, but for example I’m at a top 20 school and wasn’t even offered interviews to several of the schools I applied to that ranked outside the top 50 or so. The ones that were close to home/undergrad did offer me invites though.</p>

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<p>Just one more data point about potential ‘safety’ schools. </p>

<p>I was worried that most of the lower rank/MCAT schools that D1 was applying to this cycle were OOS publics that showed some degree of preference for IS applicants. We only have one IS school and it’s pretty well regarded, so I had her add to a private ranked about 50 to her list.</p>

<p>The schools where she didn’t get IIs were top 20 plus this school She did receive an II to a top 20 school that is also private and in the same city as this school, so location may not have been a major factor in the lack of love.</p>

<p>Like I said, nothing definitive, but another similar circumstance.</p>

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<p>I took into consideration everything that IWBB and Kristin mentioned, but I started with a very specific sample of med schools. My undergrad provided us with a list of the med schools where most of our students had been admitted to during previous years. It became clear to me that Med School X really liked students from my undergrad, while Med School Y would only accept very few. I made sure to apply to the top 10 on the list and then threw in my own criteria. I had a very successful cycle. </p>

<p>BTW, I just wanted to drop by and say hello to everyone. I started my Clinicals this semester and I can now really say that I am enjoying med school. Good luck to everyone!</p>

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<p>^^^</p>

<p>Glad to hear that things are going well. :)</p>

<p>*So are “safeties”, or backups, not essential in a med school list? Which med schools typically reject applicants with above average stats? *</p>

<p>Well, as you know, there really aren’t “safeties” for med schools. We’re just calling “maybe/likely” schools “safeties” for convenience sake. </p>

<p>That said, there are med schools that will assume that someone with your stats will get accepted elsewhere (better) and that you’d ultimately decline their acceptance. So, they may not bother to accept you.</p>

<p>Others can chime in, but this is how I see it with your stats (assuming good ECs and LORs, as well)… The “lowest” public med school(s) in your state may not bother with you since they’ll assume that you’ll get accepted and go elsewhere. However if the app is cheap and easy, then it may be worth the bother. </p>

<p>I would think that your “safeties” will be UMich and maybe the next two best public SOMs in your state. I would also think that middle ranked private SOMs might be your safeties. Maybe apply to a couple unranked SOMs, but again, they’ll likely think you’re never going to attend their school. </p>

<p>The reason that I don’t think you need to bother with the lowest ranking SOMs in your state (or elsewhere) is because those schools are likely accepting and enrolling the MCAT 28-34 students. They just won’t think you’d ever need to attend their school. </p>

<p>This is just my opinion…others may think differently. :)</p>

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<p>UMich can’t be considered a safety school for the OP.</p>

<p>The in-state preference at UMich isn’t as pronounced as it is at most state schools.
Only 98 accepted out of over 1000 in-state applicants. Not exactly “safety” numbers.</p>

<p>OP needs to apply to her other in-state publics. Just in case. </p>

<p>(BTW, D2’s Kaplan instructor’s dad is on the board of directors for Oakland. Oakland is very interested in recruiting strong applicants for its new incoming class. New school, eager to establish its reputation…There may be merit money there.)</p>