<p>
I wouldn’t say that. For a public school, Berkeley’s average GPA of 3.24 (as of 2007) is not bad at all. Compare that with Princeton’s 3.28 - it will look even better 
Remember, the average GPA at public schools tend to be lower than that of private schools, mainly because there is a much broader spectrum of students at pubic schools dragging the averages down.</p>
<p>I thought Berkeley had a reputation for grade deflation. </p>
<p><a href=“https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/oimg?key=0AtOnwy1pwZDldG1LNXpoTG5WOG1JNXNJajJfNld3SlE&oid=1&zx=td8wlciwny86[/url]”>https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/oimg?key=0AtOnwy1pwZDldG1LNXpoTG5WOG1JNXNJajJfNld3SlE&oid=1&zx=td8wlciwny86</a></p>
<p><a href=“Reports | Office of Educational Assessment”>Reports | Office of Educational Assessment;
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/uc-transfers/900945-average-gpa-graduating-students-major.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/uc-transfers/900945-average-gpa-graduating-students-major.html</a></p>
<p>I think the grade deflation probably depends on the classes you plan to take. </p>
<p>And med schools probably do consider prestige to a certain extent, but it would probably be a deciding factor when the candidates have relatively close stats.</p>
<p>Besides that, if I’d still opt for UW-Madison. I think Bluedevilmike and others kept repeating in the forum that success is the panacea for everything (or something along those lines).</p>
<p>Edit: I’m sorry my cousin went to UW-Seattle. My bad.</p>
<p>MODERATOR NOTE: </p>
<p>This thread is intended to give GENERAL information about premed studies. If you have contributions to this topic, please post. </p>
<p>However, if you want to ask a SPECIFIC question about your premed situation, please use the New Thread button to ask your question.</p>
<p>Wow
Totally bad advice
I wanna, are you a doc?</p>
<p>Your undergrad years are the MOST important of your life. Unless you want to do high powered research, your med school makes NO differance. I know several chairman and “best docs” who got their license in Mexico and Carribean after being rejected US med school</p>
<p>Your undergrad is where you will separate from your parents and become an adult, it is the last time in your life where you can do something fun and non- medical</p>
<p>It means more to your zlIFE than whatever embed school you go yo</p>
<p>Several schools have premed majors
But, why would you want to</p>
<p>Pdad,</p>
<p>I am an MD/PhD student. Not sure I understand your post. My post implies that the brand name of the school is not important, not that “the school” in terms of its fit and what you learn there is not. I would find my advice perfectly in line with yours.</p>
<p>Sure, there are success stories of people from caribbean med schools but when the MAJORITY of caribbean grads don’t even get into residency why would you shoot yourself in the foot like that? Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg dropped out of college - do you advocate such a strategy for most students? </p>
<p>Do you need to go to Harvard or JHU to be successful? No, but again, much like UG, while where you go to med school can play a role, what you actually do in med school is going to matter far more.</p>
<p>Yes, there are some schools with “pre-med majors” but the vast, vast, vast, majority of schools, particularly the ones people in this section are looking at, do not.</p>
<p>CookieMonster,
As we have been advised to answer in general terms, here is my general advice to your question. You sould not be asking others to point to right schoo for YOU. You should not be thinking about Med. School when choosing your UG. You should choose the palce that personally fits YOU the best and matches to the most of your personal interests, current as well as potential. To get UG education as cheaply (free?) as possible while still going to the place of your personal preference is a very good idea if Med. School is in your plan. Keep in mind that no UG will really prepare you academically for the Med. School. However, if you are happy for the 4 very important years of your life, than you are free to focus on your academics (resulting in high college GPA), your personal growth, developing social and communication skills to your fullest potential and as an ice on the cake finally focus on preparation for the MCAT. Person who feels miserably and out of place will not be able to accomplish that. It takes much longer to do research yourself, visit numerous times, talk to current students, their programs, get info about pre-med committee…etc. than simply ask somebody else to choose a certain school for you. But this somebody else msot likely would not be correct shoosing school for you, you are the one who should steer your wheel, you should be in full control.</p>
<p>Cookie, to attend an UG that you like with the least amount of debt is very important. At 6 or 7 percent interest for unsubsidized loans the compounding effect will make it a house payment in short order. Miami should sing from the rooftops about cheaply or free!</p>
<p>I would also avoid grade deflation schools and ones that are know to be meat grinders with the outrageous stress levels.</p>
<p>If you can apply to the BS/MD programs since many give great merit aid and the 15 or 20 kids really help each other study together and work on joint projects. Also the ones without the MCATs remove even more stress. You will have enough stress with organic and Biochem so you don’t need to add any additional.</p>
<p>Ryacmr,
Would you please advise which schools are considered ‘grade deflation’ schools for pre-med?
Also, please list the BS/MS programs that give merit scholarships (not financial aids.)
Thanks</p>
<p>glad to see we’re ignoring point number 2 in my original post.</p>
<p>Yeah, and ignoring my Mod Note from post #23 as well. Seems members are intent on responding to a poster who hasn’t been around since April or asking their own personal questions.</p>
<p>If anyone wants to post their general premed advice or ask specific questions, they can do so on a new thread.</p>
<p>I’m calling this one, TOD 19:06.</p>