<p>Hi, I was wondering how much of an effect the prestige of the undergraduate school matters in med school admissions. Is it necessary to go to any ivy undergrad to make it into an ivy med school?</p>
<p>Absolutely not. Does it help? Absolutely. Check out the demographics of Harvard med matriculants. I believe the top 6-7 feeder schools into Harvard med are all Ivies.</p>
<p>Edit: Whoops, I think I may be thinking of the law school.</p>
<p>Like I said many times , I think that a big part of why the top 6-7 feeder schools into Harvard Med are Ivies has to do with grade inflation. You have to separate out the grade inflation from the prestige of the undergrad school.</p>
<p>Sakky, you are right about the grade inflation but do take into account the system that Ivies have set up. Ivy schools hold each others hands and support each other like brothers, the respective schools would much prefer a fellow ivy graduate rather than another X-school who may be just as great of a school but not part of the Ivy league.</p>
<p>Oh, I don't know about that. It seems to me that Stanford premeds are just as successful in getting into Ivy med-schools (in fact, more successful than many of the Ivy premeds in getting into Ivy med-schools), and yet, Stanford is not in the Ivy league. But of course, Stanford is another one of those grade-inflated schools. Hence, it seems to me that the grade inflation is a stronger influence than the Ivy/non-Ivy status.</p>
<p>Before you get too worked up over grade inflation, consider that it exists even at places that some claim are free of it. Like Chicago and Berkeley. Med schools care about how well you do. They are not so easily fooled by the small variations in grading across colleges. Unlike undergraduate, the bragging rights among medical schools are based on factors harder to game than admissions statistics- NIH funding, faculty membership in the IOM and NAS.</p>
<p>So you are now finally conceding that there is some gaming of admissions statistics going on?</p>
<p>No, how did you get that idea? The point is that medical schools are NOT trying to boost their US NEws rankings by selecting students with higher GPA's. Doing so would not change how they are perceived in the profession.</p>
<p>I got that idea from your last quote - "the bragging rights among medical schools are based on factors harder to game than admissions statistics", which implicitly concedes that the gaming of admissions statistics is possible. </p>
<p>At this point, we don't know whether the med-schools are trying to boost their rankings by selecting students with higher GPA's. They may or may not be. We have no information that would tell us what is really in the heads of the adcoms. I don't think that any comprehensive statements one way or the other can be made at this time.</p>
<p>Sakky, this is related but not directly on-topic.</p>
<p>Which one would you choose for pre-med: Penn or Columbia? I'm also looking to do engineering.</p>
<p>Go wherever YOU want to go. Don't go where someone tells you to go, at either one of those schools, or any school in general if you get high grades and do well, are well liked by professors and peers, and get a high MCAT score you will most likely get into med school. Don't worry about the school you are going to (unless its a CC or a bottom of the list school). No matter what school you go to you have pretty good odds at med school if you do well.</p>
<p>Grade inflation likely has something to do with it, but how would that explain Swarmore's med-school placement?</p>
<p>swarthmore restricts which applicants may apply to med school and who cannot. I believe this is why they have a 100% medical school placement rate.</p>
<p>where did you get that information? i have heard that swarthmore is a top-notch school with a great biology program and a strong student body.</p>
<p>Yea they are top notch, but many schools won't give you the necessary Dean certification to apply to med school if you don't have the grades to get in. That way they look better.</p>
<p>Top notch=70-85% acceptance rate</p>
<p>To get 99-100% acceptance rates you need to do some manuveuring...</p>
<p>HYPS have ~ 90% acceptance rates, and they don't do any maneuvering. </p>
<p>It is true that many undergraduate programs will prescreen their premeds and will not provide the necessary documentation if they don't think you will be a successful med-school candidate. Whether Swarthmore is one of those schools, I don't know at this time.</p>
<p>sakky: How do you know that no pre-screening is done?</p>
<p>I actually heard the Swarthmore pre-screening info on CC earlier.</p>
<p>Norcalguy, did I say that no prescreening is done at Swarthmore? If so, where and when? Please point to the quote where I specifically said that Swarthmore does not do prescreening. </p>
<p>What I said is that I do not know whether Swarthmore prescreens. I would like to see some documentation one way or the other about this.</p>