<p>Davis.</p>
<p>It boils down to simple numbers. How on earth will you handle 150K in student loans for your bachelors from JHU? Who on earth will loan you that kind of money? If you don't have realistic answers for those questions, then the answer is clear.</p>
<p>Annika</p>
<p>Obviously, my advice is that he should handle the first year at Hopkins, apply for various full tuition scholarships. If that doesn't work out, transfer for aid at UC Davis. Trust me, you really do not want to go to UC Davis if there is a remote possibilty of spending your undergraduate adcademic years at Hopkins. Pursue what you can and reach for the stars. Don't let anything hold you back if there is a possibily of getting a full ride is at stake.</p>
<p>Cybershot, weren't you planning on applying to Princeton as a URM with your father's help as an alumnus interviewer? How did that go?</p>
<p>UC Davis =)</p>
<p>Phead, I thought there was no real difference in education/experience, at least in undergrad, at schools like JHU and Davis.</p>
<p>kwu, yes, I unsurprisingly got rejected, though I still hold my head high and will look forward to applying to Harvard for graduate.</p>
<p>
[quote]
In 20 years, Davis might out rank JHU.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>No. College rankings simply don't change all that much over the years. 100 years from now, I can all but guarantee that Harvard will still be ranked in the top 10. There might be a little bit of restructuring, some upstart college might jump up to join the elite, and one of the top schools might decline, but it's not like the deck is going to get completely reshuffled. </p>
<p>A lot of a college's ranking is based on money, prestige, and recruiting power. Prestige doesn't change over night. Money differences will only grow, and recruiting power will come from prestige and money. </p>
<p>That said I'd go to UC Davis if I were in your shoes. Phead's suggestion that you should gamble ten of thousands of dollars on the possibility of winning one of a handful of full tuition scholarships is absurd (and I wouldn't ROTC just for the money. You should join the military because you want to be in the military, not because they'll let you go to a more competitive college). Rare best case scenario, you get to stay at Hopkins. Extremely likely worst case scenario, you end up at UC Davis in one year with less financial aid money then you started with, plus the debt from Hopkins.</p>
<p>I should add that you can always go to Hopkins for graduate school, and if anyone asks where you went to college, you can just say Hopkins (in such a case you'll get the prestige effect, and save tons of money, win-win).</p>
<p>this thread has been dead...why do people always bring them back</p>
<p>
[quote]
I should add that you can always go to Hopkins for graduate school, and if anyone asks where you went to college, you can just say Hopkins (in such a case you'll get the prestige effect, and save tons of money, win-win).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I totally agree. In retrospect, Go to UC Davis. Apply for those scholarships. If you can get those, transfer to Hopkins. If you love UC Davis, stay with those full tuition scholarships at UC Davis.</p>
<p>Either way, like al6200 said, its a win-win situation.</p>
<p>btw, why did you have to revive such an old thread :-p</p>
<p>As a current JHU premed student, I have to say that my experiences have been amazing. The opportunity to work with world class faculty on research, the kind of classes, and the campus environment in general cannot be surpassed by any Public School. Someone said earlier that they don't care about your Undergraduate institution, that is actually not true at all. Most of the elite medical schools, Ivy, JHU, Duke, Stanford, Wash U care a lot about your undergraduate institution. Your chances of getting into an upper tier medical school at JHU are a lot higher than your chances at UC Davis. As someone said before you might be a medium fish at Hopkins, but you can singularly beat out the biggest fish at any Public School applying for the same position. Putting it simply, the JHU premed advising department have very well relations with all of the top tier Medical Schools. No worries, come to JHU and you might die a little inside. But whenever you're away from campus you're gonna find yourself missing the place insanely. Good luck and hope you make the right choice.</p>
<p>^^ I totally agree. As a Hopkins premed student myself, I know the possibilites at Hopkins are great. Though if you can't afford it, I'm going to advise you to seek other options to fund an education at Hopkins or if you run out of options completely, go to UC Davis. If you can afford it, do come. If you can't, UC Davis is without a doubt a great choice for premed as well. So long as you know you can succeed as an individual, you will find success regardless of which school you go to.</p>
<p>EDIT: Just please don't break your parent's wallet. Save that for medical school. If the full cost of a education at Hopkins is too great, don't bother coming, its just a financially unsound situation to be in especially given the turbulent economic times we are in. Your better off just saving for medical school and become the top fish at UC Davis and still have at shot at Harvard, Hopkins, UCSF, WashU, Upenn medical schools.</p>
<p>EDIT2: You've probably made your decision already. Btw, You are going to consider those scholarships I mentioned right...?</p>
<p>EDIT3: User above mentioned something about medical school perception of which undergraduate school you come from. It is absolutely true. IF you look at the statistics of matriculating students who come from various institutes across the country, you will see that top medical schools are heavily populated with students from the Ivy league caliber schools with some notable exceptions such as brilliant students from University of Alabama with top notch MCAT scores and 4.0 GPA. Therefore if you are shooting for the top, undergraduate schools do matter. But I can see that its up to the individual to succeed, the school doesn't give you these tools for success. You have to find it yourself and use them to your own advantage.</p>