Title says it all. I would consider myself a good student, but in no way shape or form am i one that’s rather competitive on academics or need a 4.0 to be proud of myself. I understand that pre-meds at UCLA are competitive, but does that mean I have to be? Can I just take the required classes and get out alive? I AM worried that I’m going to not do so well at UCLA considering it’s not easy to have a great GPA there (then ultimately not get into medical school) but i plan on going to a historically black school and i don’t need to have a fabulous gpa to get into there.
Also, what’s the environment like? Are the people in the pre-med classes friendly, or do they all look at each other as their competition? In other words is it friendly competition haha.
I really wish I would just go/want to go to a less competitive college, but I don’t want to… UCLA is literally perfect to me. It’s just the pre-med classes that I’m pretty worried about.
Generally, you have to be a “A” student to get admitted to UCLA. Large public schools like UCLA, UC Berkeley (even harder), grade on a “bell curve” to weed out many students. Not everyone can be “doctors” or even lawyers, engineers, pharmacists, etc. If you do well at UCLA or UC Berkeley, you should be competitive enough to get into a good name medical school or other good professional schools like pharmacy, etc. Also, it is assumed that if you do well at UCLA or UC Berkeley, you should also do well in the MCAT, LSAT, GMAT, PCAT, etc.
Some students might go to a lessor name and less competitive college (some college that most people may never have heard of). For those, for example, if they have aspiration for medical school, they need to score very high on the MCAT. Even that might not get them into a prestigious top medical school like Stanford, UCLA, UCSF, etc. or even USC, UCD, UCSD, etc. In this instance, you also might research into a specific college and how many got into medical school, etc. and which medical school, etc.
Yeah, but the thing is, i don’t necessarily care about going to a top name medical school. Probably will (and would rather go to) a historically black medical school which isn’t as competitive. So does that mean I have to be an A student at UCLA?
Since you are not interested in a top medical school and you are interested in the lower tier of medical schools, you should look at the average GPA and MCAT scores of admitted students for that particular medical school you are interested in. You should probably try to achieve a GPA and MCAT score that is a little higher than that average.
You should evaluate whether you can attend that desired GPA in a very competitive school like UCLA/UC Berkeley or if it is easier to attain that GPA in a less competitive school. Then you’ll have to decide whether a highly competitive school can help you get a better MCAT score (I suspect not much difference).
I know of people who choose to attend a less competitive school to get the GPA to get into a lessor name medical school or get a near perfect GPA to get in a top ranked medical school. All they have to do is to concentrate on getting a MCAT score to get admitted to the medical school of their choice. I know of someone who got a 3.6 GPA from UC Berkeley and was recently admitted to UC Davis’ medical school. I think UCD is aware of the rigors of UC Berkeley and a 3.6 GPA at UC Berkeley is considered good.
Another thing you can do is to research the college you want to enroll in and how many or percentage of pre-med students actually get admitted to medical schools and which ones. There are other health profession options, such as pharmacy, optometry, dental, physical/occupation therapy, nursing etc., if you fall short.
You’ll have to research and evaluate for yourself.
I feel like I can answer this question well because I’m a UCLA student and I’m in pre-med classes. I’m not going to lie; they’re difficult. The curve ensures that if you didn’t study a lot and you’re not naturally gifted you won’t be getting an A. Even getting a B is pretty hard. Getting a C requires a lot of work as well. People are nice, but in pre-med classes there is a competitive atmosphere. You’ll be able to study with people and make friends who will help you and you’ll help them; but I’ve found as a whole the classes are competitive. Ucla is a great school and I’m happy I went here but getting a good GPA for med school at UCLA requires hours and hours of work as well as being naturally very bright. In the end though it’s your choice, good luck!
@UCLAstudent007: well said and I agree. Also, the same to some extent for other majors that are competitive.
Where 1/3 of students never had anything but “A” grades in their entire high-school, should not the competition be very fierce when only 1/5 of students in each course could get “A” grades?
Yes, because generally the high school students admitted to UCLA are “A” students and not everyone can be doctors. UCLA grades on a bell curve to weed out students. UC Berkeley has a reputation to be a little harder and in weeding out students. Btw, the 1/5 or 20% mentioned above getting “A’s” might be around 10% in reality in the high competitive freshman classes like biology, chemistry, physics, calculus, etc. It is more like 20% getting “A’s and B’s” and the other 80% get C’s, D’s and F’s (most will get C’s in that group).