<p>I've read in multiple places that it doesn't matter where you go for your undergrad school, and that the major you do doesn't matter too much for med school either, but it's a great idea to go to a mediocre school and do an easy major than to go to a top tier school. Is this true? I want to be a neurologist, and I'm really determined, so I want to maximize my chances of going to med school at an Ivy League school. If I do go to a mediocre school like say UCLA or UCSD or University of Wisconsin-Madison, and do something like say biology for those 4 years after high school, and then apply to the likes of Stanford, Columbia or Yale, would they give preference to someone else who went to a more prestigious school? Sorry my thoughts are ALL over the place. Basically what I'm trying to say is IF I go to a cheaper, less prestigious school than say the John Hopkins/Rice/Brown route, for my undergrad major, will that affect the chances of me getting into a great school in the future?</p>
<p>^I know you two would have given great advice and great comments… Ditto to UCLA and UCSD not being Mediocre, and I would not count Univ of Wisc-Madison mediocre either…</p>
<p>Some medical schools do like certain undergraduate schools better than others. My medical school clearly loved the ivies and Notre Dame. Having said that many of my classmates were from state schools and small liberal arts schools. Mediocre is not how I would describe the schools you listed. When high school students ask me about colleges and medical schools I always tell them that the Big Ten schools are all excellent. I am not a Big Ten graduate.</p>
<p>“Mediocre” has a pretty specific definition, and no, UCLA, UCSD and UW-Madison are not mediocre even in comparison to the Ivy League universities.</p>
<p>Also, going to a top medical school doesn’t necessarily maximize your chances of being a neurologist. First of all, if you’re not even in college yet you may very well change your medical specialty preference (or your career goals altogether) in the next 8 years. Secondly…you don’t have to go to the very top medical schools to change your chances of being a neurologist, unless you want to be an academic professor.</p>
<p>Thirdly, though, the top medical schools may not be what you expect. Stanford, Yale, and Columbia have great med schools - but so do UCSF, UCLA, and UCSD. And if you are a CA resident, you will likely save thousands by going there.</p>
<p>@glee12, if you keep going on your line of thinking, why go to a prestigious medical school when you still have to choose where you’d go for residency? Not only do I agree that the schools you listed weren’t mediocre, but Biolgy is not a fluff major either.</p>
<p>Neurology is NOT a selective specialty.<br>
Just go to UG and Med. School where you personally feel you belong. Residency mostly is detemined by location. But you are so far from residency application. Thinking this far is way way overthinking and overlooking the criteria that is MUCH more important for your success in UG as well as in Med. School.</p>
<p>…just read something that is NOT very easy to achieve even for hte top of the top of the top college graduates. I am talking about getting into CA Med. Schools. That is why most CA applicants apply elsewhere and get accepted in a very large numbers at Med. Schools outsice of CA. In fact, CA is the most represented state at my D’s Med. School class. Also, during interviews, she noted that most out of state applicants were in fact from CA. D. applied to 7 schools, all in Midwest.</p>
<p>Your undergraduate school matters in the sense that you want to go to a school that will give you a good education, with the flexibility to get volunteering, clinical, and research experience that will all help your application to medical school. Going to a school that sends a decent number of students to medical schools is a good idea because it at least lets you know that they have the courses, support systems, and opportunities to get students to medical school, but all of the schools you listed would fulfill all of those considerations more than adequately. </p>
<p>Your undergraduate school does matter in the sense that if you go to Harvard or Yale you’ll get “bonus points” or anything. The name alone won’t get you anything extra, and it won’t make up for any deficiencies in your application.</p>
<p>I think where you go to College is important but not for the reasons you think are important. One should attend, IMHO the College that best fits you that you can afford. Some will perform better in a smaller institution like a Pomona or Haverford where the instruction is more personal and the testing more essay oriented while others will like the relative anonymity of a large University. Some will do fine at either. Cost is also a major issue unless you are well enough off so that it is not an issue. Since the total cost of undergraduate school and medical school will likely be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, money is usually a concern. I also think that one should not look at undergraduate school only in the context of medical school as most who enter College with ambitions for medicine never make it for a variety of reasons.
I do not however agree that it makes no difference as to where you go to College when applying to medical school. Your academic record will be evaluated by your grades, courses, course load and College.
Harvard and Brown among others have significant grade inflation so attending either can be advantageous. UCB, UCSD and UCLA are extremely competitive with a much lower average GPA than many privates. Perhaps one way to understand the quality issue when it comes to Colleges is to use one medical school’s admission procedures as an example. This medical school school grades it’s applicants by a point system and if one scores above a certain level one is given an interview. This point system includes a grade for undergraduate school quality and a score of 1 to 3 points is used. Given that a total score somewhere in the 20’s is needed for an interview gives you an idea as to the impact of one’s undergraduate College. Doing well at any of the schools you mention will be fine as they are all excellent.
I do agree that which allopathic medical you attend probably won’t matter if you wish to be a neurologist as it is not a competitive field. You may however change your mind as to specialty choice while in medical school in which case it might matter somewhat.</p>
<p>2 a-c are difficult to say with authority which is more important to who by how much, but I don’t think any doubt exists that a middle-of-the road MCAT from a Harvard undergrad is not going to medical school regardless of Major, GPA or research unless something really unusual is present.</p>
<p>I am a physician, and my daughter was a pre-med for her first two years at a good (not top tier) small liberal arts school. Her GPA was ~ 3.8 overall when she finished the O-chem gauntlet with I think an A-. I encouraged her to take a sample MCAT O-chem test, and when it became clear she would score in the 50-60 percentile I told her the chances of eventual admission to med school were poor or at best middling. She thought long and hard whether she was able and willing to put in the truly serious effort needed to improve her chances and decided to leave the pre-med track.</p>
<p>The moral ? Some physicians are geniuses, but most are just smart people (97 -99 percentile) who are extremely motivated and worked really, really, really hard from age 14 or so to age 30.</p>
<p>Have you served on admissions ericLG? Your rankings do not seem consistent with what I have seen (and I believe with what even the med school admissions survey of admissions deans says). Major and school are no where near MCAT, GPA and ECs on the importance pecking order from my experience.</p>