Do meds schools accept more students that got their undergraduate degree in that state? Based on what I’ve found it seems like meds schools accept way more instate students, but what does that mean? If I live in state X and go to college in State Y, but want to go back to State X for med school, am I considered in-state then? Also, I was wondering if meds schools just accept more in state because they have more apply from that state?
Certain states have required resident admission requirements while other states are a little bit looser in terms of the instate percentage required. Texas state schools are required to have 90% residents while schools in Pennsylvania and California have a much lower requirement.
Every medical school has its own definition of what “in-state” is. (Different public med schools in the same state may have different definitions so you need to check each school.)
In general, a student cannot establish an independent domicile while attending college as a full time dependent student. It’s assumed that a college student’s home state will be the state in which the student’s parent(s) live and/ or the state where the student’s high school of record is located.
Most public med schools have a list of requirements an applicant must meet to be considered in-state. (Google name of school + residency requirements.)
Truthfully, an applicant can list any state they want as their home state on AMCAS, AMCAS doesn’t verify that information. Each medical school’s admission office will determine if a student qualifies as instate.
It’s quite possible for a recent college grad not to qualify for in-state status in any state.
In-state for admission consideration may not be the same thing as qualifying for in-state tuition rates.
As @texaspg mentioned, some states have statutory requirements for what percentage of in-state applicants a publicly funded medical school must accept. Most state med schools give very strong preference to in-state applicants and accept state residents at MUCH higher rates than out of state applicants, even though most state med school get more OOS applicants than in-state ones.
US New Grad Compass has data about the number of in-state vs OOS applicants, the number of in-state vs OOS interviews granted, and the number of in-state vs OOS applicants accepted.
AAMC has several tables about the numbers of applicants applying & matriculating instate vs OOS
This one is probably the most useful–
[Applicants to U.S. Medical Schools by In or Out-of-State Matriculation Status, 2018-2019](https://www.aamc.org/download/321466/data/factstablea5.pdf)
Good question - your in-state residency is typically determined by your home address (not your college dorm address), your driver licence address, your voting registration, … but ultimately it is determined by the state law and med school admission office.
For example, assuming you’re a CA resident (your family resides in CA, you attended high school in CA…) now attending Cornell in NY, you’re still CA resident not a NY resident. The 4 SUNY med schools give in-state preference, so when you apply to the 4 SUNY’s, you won’t get in-state preference, you’ll be counted as OOS applicants hence you’ll be held to a “higher” standard (higher GPA/MCAT) than NY resident applicants. So as a CA resident but currently attending a out-of-state college in NY, your best bet with average stats are the private med schools in NY (Albany, NYMC) not the 4 SUNY’s. Of course, if you have high stats (3.9+ GPA/520+ MCAT) you won’t even ask this question here.
With that being said, once you get past the admission hurdle and assume you get into a state med school in NY/TX (with higher stats than the in-state applicants), you might be able to pay in-state tuition after 1-2 years paying out-of-state tuition (that’s what I heard).