Mandatory Pass Fail

Anyone have any idea if Med Schools will accept courses that people need to take pass/fail because of a university-wide rule related to the current crisis? One would think so, but just wondering if any of you guys heard anything.

Bowdoin is doing mandatory pass/fail too for this semester of remote learning…the administration communicated that Harvard Med School said they would accept pass/fail grades if they were mandatory. Administrators also said that they expect other med schools to follow Harvard’s lead.

But that all seems like speculation to me. How can they represent to students that P/F pre-med pre-reqs would still be allowed in the next 2-6 years or so…when current students apply to med school?

Even if med schools do say they will consider P/F grades, who’s to say that given the choice between two similar candidates, one with grades and one with P/F, the one with P/F grades wouldn’t be disadvantaged?

Thoughts @WayOutWestMom ?

I am concerned about this not only for med school, but law and MBA school and other grad school programs too. Not all schools are doing mandatory P/F. Some schools are giving students a choice between grades and P/F…including some of Bowdoin’s peers. Some schools are still giving only grades.

It seems kind of like the Wild West right now.

Everything is fluid right now.

It’s not even clear IF medical schools will be able to start classes in July. With clinical rotations cancelled for MS3-4 students, students may not have the LCME/AOA mandated number of clinical hours required for graduation. I can see med school suspending educational operations for a semester or even a year.

If there’s an option, you should take your classes for a grade.

If not, stay tuned.

Right now no one has any idea of what policies will be in place 2 or 6 years from now.

Yes, I understand that.

But we are talking for students who might just be college freshman now, with no choice but to take the class P/F.

Bowdoin directly said Harvard Med School will accept this…x years done the road.

That’s the issue…how can they reasonably state that to be so?

Look, generally, med school applicants have pretty stellar grades across the board. I don’t think a few pass/fail grades is going to be the separator between applicants, and med schools will know that most of those “grades” would’ve been As.

Bowdoin can’t. No policy-level decisions have made as of yet.