Accepted to Cal Poly, UCLA, UCSD, UCSB, and UCD. Major: Bio. Goal: Med. School. Cal Poly is a great school, and the scholarship that’s been offered adds a huge financial incentive to attend Cal Poly. But if the goal is med. school, is it be better to go one of the UCs? Thanks for your feedback.
You need to ask each school what their placement stats are. I was surprised how low UCSDs are when this subject came up on another thread.
In a nutshell, med school admission is all about grades and MCAT. Cost should be a huge factor too, as there’s no aid at the next level other than loans.
As for Cal Poly per se, the school’s name won’t be any disadvantage.
My oldest son just went through this process and will be attending his first choice medical school this August. Years ago I was also member of a medical school admissions committee. So I have some insight into medical school admissions. Hang on, this is a long post. But, it is the distillation of lots real world experience and you will not find it anywhere else. Certainly not from some overpaid and clueless admissions consultant.
@eyemgh is partially correct. Without good grades and good MCAT forget about even applying. You will be screened out before they even see how wonderful you are are. A good GPA/MCAT gets you looked at. But, thousands of kids get rejected every year with high GPAs and MCATs above the 90th percentile. To get an interview and ultimately an acceptance you need much, much more: stellar letters of recommendation, research experience, clinical experience, volunteer experience with underserved communities, and a compelling personal statement built on accomplishments that demonstrate why you will become a great physician.
So, to answer your question is a UC better than Cal Poly if the goal is to get to med school? Absolutely NOT! The UCs are actually some of the worst places to do premed because of: grade deflation (there goes that GPA), large class sizes (tough to get good letters of rec), and tons of other premeds (harder to get research and clinical experiences). This is borne out by the medical school admissions stats which are horrific at UCSD, UCD, and UCI. UCLA is a bit better, but given the caliber of student accepted there it is still surprising how low they are there… FYI UCLA has more premeds than any school in the country.
Getting up to date statistic is hard as some schools try hard to hide their abysmal admissions rate. UCSD is well aware of crappy admit rate and apparently has hired some folks to try to fix it. But, I see now they have hidden their actual admit rate. The rate they used to publish was about 35%:
http://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/savvy-pre-med/2016/9/19/3-reasons-many-uc-pre-meds-regret-their-college-choice
UCI admit rate is 27%:
http://sites.bio.uci.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Student-Statistics-Summary-Analysis-Handout.pdf
UCLA is a around 50%:
http://career.ucla.edu/Portals/14/Documents/PDF/MedStats/2014_Medical_School_Admissions_Statistics.pdf_042516.pdf
UCD- last I heard it was around 35%, but I cannot find a link. Its nowhere to be found on their site. Very suspicious.
UCSB is 40%:
http://www.duels.ucsb.edu/professional/health/med
Cal Poly is 50%:
https://prehealth.calpoly.edu/frequently-asked-questions#1
https://content-calpoly-edu.s3.amazonaws.com/prehealth/1/images/Open%20House%20presentation%202017.pdf
Here are the national statistics put out by the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC):
https://www.aamc.org/data/facts/applicantmatriculant/157998/factstablea24.html
If your choices are as listed I personally would steer clear of UCSD, UCD, UCI and be wary of UCLA unless you really loved the place and are confident you could hang with a really competitive and giant premed class. If you were my kid I would advise you to go to Cal Poly or UCSB.
Points in favor of Cal Poly: small class size (taught by professors and not TAs), not that many premeds, lots of research opportunities, little competition for clinical experience in local hospitals, and a nice collegial atmosphere. Points not in favor of Cal Poly: grade deflation relative to private schools (but similar to UCs) and having to explain why you turned down to UCLA to relatives at cocktail parties.“But isn’t that the the place where they study cows”, “But UCLA is so much more prestigious…blah, blah, blah…”.
And with the Frost donation the opportunities for undergrad research experience at Cal Poly will rival any UC:
https://calpolynews.calpoly.edu/news_releases/2017/May/frost.html
Congrats! Take the scholarship money and run to Cal Poly!
Good luck!
2 Likes
@choroidal, great post!
“Without good grades and good MCAT forget about even applying.” This is what I was trying to say. I typically elaborate on the rest, but got lazy. 
@choroidal What Are your thoughts between UC Riverside and Cal Poly SLO?
@interesteddad :
If Cal poly SLO, can you switch out of biology for, say, biochemistry or neuroscience? Because there are so many Bio majors who can’t get into med school, the market is oversaturated with them and they have the worst ROI/job placement.
Email Cal Poly to ask, specifying the majors you’re thinking of and listing a major in the same college as the one you got into. If that’s possible, I’d recommend Cal poly.
@eyemgh the least I can do after getting so much info on this board, particularly from you, the last few years!
@Twinmma I do not know much about UCR undergrad, but for me the location is so miserable, especially compared to SLO, that I would not even consider it. One thing I would keep in mind, as @MYOS1634 points out, is that not everybody gets into medical school and having a college with lots of other opportunities is important. In fact if you take 100 kids who at the beginning of Freshman year say they are going to medical school I would guess by the time of graduation only 5 end up matriculating. A huge percent of kids drop out of pre-med after the first quarter of gen. chem!
If you can get into bio, which is a tough admit, and you keep your grades up you can transfer to other majors. Transferring into the COE may be tough, but I know lots of kids that have done it. I agree the market is saturated in bio, but if you can make opportunities there if you are hardworking and personable. My younger brother graduated with a bio degree, did not get into medical school, and went on to have a very successful career in biotech. And now he has a net worth 500x mine! The injustice of it all!
I would never advise seeing college as a means to an end in regards to med school. I counted it as a blessing that my son was not even interested in medical school til after he graduated from college. He just loved biology and dove head first into research and his classes. He did well as a natural byproduct of his enthusiasm for the subject and not because he had the specter of med school hanging over his head.
Good luck!
Choroidal, thank you very much for the detailed and informative reply. I really appreciate it. Any thank you, too, eyemph, for your reply, and everyone else, too.
I would not recommend Chem or BioChem at CP for a premed. I was privy to grade breakdown by major at Cal Poly for every major in the engineering department, and a few notables outside. The variability department to department is stunning. ME is graded the hardest in the CENG, by a wide margin, with just over 60% of letter grades be awarded A or B and just over 10% F. Contrast that to over 90% A or B for BME, General and Materials and right at 90% A or B for Aerospace.
Long story short, Chemistry and Biochemistry are even worse than ME, with 56.4% of grades awarded A or B. It’s probably a more useful degree, but might be at the cost of the bigger objective.
@eyemgh, What are your thoughts on a straight Biology major re: grading?
@Twinmma, I was only privy to the engineering majors, Chem/Biochem and Philosophy, also surprisingly hard.
@choroidal @eyemgh What about UC Berkeley for getting into medical schools, or the college overall for the sciences.
In terms of earning grades that will not get you auto-rejected by medical schools…
From looking around http://www.berkeleytime.com , here are the percentages of students earning A- or better in some common pre-med courses at UCB:
22% in Biology 1A
31% in Biology 1AL
22% in Biology 1B
27% in Chemistry 1A
69% in Chemistry 1AL
23% in Chemistry 3A
88% in Chemistry 3AL
27% in Chemistry 3B
76% in Chemistry 3BL
23% in MCB 102
28% in Physics 8A
28% in Physics 8B
31% in Math 10A
35% in Math 10B
Whether that is better or worse than at other schools may not be obvious if grade distributions are not available. (But take into account admission selectivity as it affects how strong your competition is.)
@GarpRules The info posted above by @ucbalumnus is invaluable. And I commend Cal for being one of the few schools to post grade distributions for their classes. As a general rule you want to maintain at least an A- average not to get auto-screened out of medical school admissions. As you can see that is not an easy feat at Berkeley. Looks like there are around 25%-30% A or A- grades given out in the typical premed classes. Interestingly the course numbers are the exact same as when I went to Cal some years ago! As an aside at Stanford and many other elite private schools the A, A- percentage is close to 75%! If it makes you feel any better the grade deflation when I went to Cal was even worse and somehow I snuck into medical school.
Now you would think that medical schools adjust for schools that grade deflate. Guess, what? They do not! In fact most medical schools give a BOOST to those that graduate from the notorious grade inflators like Stanford and Duke. They cannot help themselves- just like the rest of America is in awe of these places so are the admissions people (many who are graduates of the same places). Is this fair? Absolutely not, but it is the reality.
My suspicion is that the grade distribution at Cal Poly in the pre-med classes would be quite similar to Cal. But, as @ucbalumnus noted you have to take account how strong the competition will be in these classes. And my belief is that it is stronger at Berkeley. There is a culture there that is extremely hard working- even more so than CP. And Cal has all the problems noted above with UCs- large impersonal lectures and tons of premeds- DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE THE IMPORTANCE OF THIS.
Outside of California Cal Poly is not that well known. And everyone in the medical school world knows Berkeley. So a Cal Poly graduate would probably get passed over by a Cal graduate if their application were otherwise identical. However, I think it is much easier to develop a strong application from Cal Poly than UC Berkeley and this more than makes up for the better national reputation of Cal.
And as I have said before, this is four years of your life. Do not think of college as a means to an end. Find something to study your passionate about in an environment where you will thrive and you will do well. And if you do well medical school will take care of itself AND you will have a great college experience.
Good luck!
2 Likes
My daughter has been accepted to both Cal Poly and Johns Hopkins for Bio Chem and wants to go on to medical school. I’ve read the above posts and am wondering how these two schools compare? Class size, grade deflation/inflation, classes taught by TAs versus professors are factors mentioned above that I now am wondering about. I believe both schools will provide opportunities for research, but I think JH will provide greater opportunities for community service thru various school clubs involved with the local community. JH has offered her a significant grant, making the high tuition no longer an issue. The only data I have found so far re admissions rates for JH grads to med schools stated that 80% applying to med school were accepted within 5 years. Any opinions are appreciated. Thank you.
Learning conditions will be better at JHU. More resources, more choices.
@MYOS1634, based on what evidence?
The one thing I will add is that grade deflation is pretty brutal in biochemistry at Poly. I wasn’t privy to every major, mostly the CENG majors, but a couple were added as standouts. You would certainly want to know statistics for medical school admissions from that major.
If biochemistry is especially brutal at Cal poly then don’t. It’s prospects aren’t aweoe but here are fewer of them at least.
Evidence is job reports by major for the past ten years. Better outlook currently for nearly everyone except bio majors.
@MYOS1634, the student in question was admitted to JHU and Cal Poly for Biochemistry.
The evidence I was asking for was based on this assertion by you: “Learning conditions will be better at JHU. More resources, more choices.” I don’t doubt it, but Cal Poly is well known for having good undergraduate resources and opportunities. I’m simply seeking clarification.
@ResrchMama Congratulations to your daughter on two great acceptances. As is probably obvious from my other posts, I am a huge fan of Cal Poly. But, in your daughter’s case I would seriously look at Hopkins- if she can stand living in Baltimore. Its one of the few colleges where being attached to a medical center makes a big difference in increasing ones chances for eventually obtaining med school admissions. Hopkins is the top of the top in medical training, not just in the US, but in the world. It is where much of modern medical education began. She will have amazing opportunities for research and clinical experience there. And when she applies to medical school a universal recognition of her undergraduate school. Unfortunately, and unfairly, a few undergraduate schools have such a cachet that medical school admissions are bowled over by them. Hopkins is one of them.
A word of caution. There are a lot of premeds at Hopkins. She will be competing with an elite set of students. And unlike other private schools Hopkins is known for tough grading. It is not Stanford where an A grade is the norm in every class. But, if you think she can cut it there she will have a lot of great opportunities. Good luck to her!