<p>A few comments on the premed aspect. I’m familiar with WashU and Michigan. </p>
<p>WUST has excellent premed advising, with easy access to shadowing and other opportunities at the hospital (look up Med Prep class). They do mock interviews and carefully walk you through the whole process. Michigan, like any big state school, has much less advising and personal attention. (My son once went to an office to ask a question about a course he was taking in London and was told to look on the web site.)</p>
<p>However, WashU, on average, has a higher caliber of student, and a lot of very smart premeds, so getting the good grades in the curved premed classes will be harder at WashU than at Michigan. </p>
<p>That said, premed is a hard track, and the absolute most important factor should be finding an envirnment where you will thrive. Every other consideration is a far second. If, for example, you would love to have a football game with 100,000 people to use to blow off steam, then Michign is the choice. If you’d thrive is a smaller envirnment where you can get to know professors and get more advising and personal attention, WashU can’t be beat. </p>
<p>So my advice is forget premed; go to the place where you think you have the best chance of thriving as a person.</p>