@holychild …bs/md programs are highly, highly competitive. My daughter received a full tuition scholarship to Pitt with an invitation to apply to their guaranteed medical school acceptance program. Pitt was a safety for her…but the med school portion was far from a safety. The acceptance rate was under 5%.
The application was intense…especially the part where they asked for her high school research experience (and publications). She changed her mind and decided not to apply, and turned down Pitt for a different school.
If your D wants to apply to early acceptance medicine programs, her stats would be competitive for BS/DO programs/
LECOM has an early acceptance BS/DO program that is available at almost 50 affiliated undergrads. Some programs may not require a MCAT scores for a LECOM admission.
Your D wouldn’t qualify for the 3+4 program (requires an ACT 30 or higher for consideration), but she would for the 4+4 program.
I would have a talk with my child if he or she had such preconceived notions about academic and career path. You can probably imagine how many parents come on here with a child who wants to be a doctor. Often this is the result of a lack of knowledge of career options and a premature focus on security versus fit.
Just the fact that your child thought you have to be an MD to work in the ER is telling.
College should be a time for exploring. Going in with this preconceived plan may mean missing out on opportunities.
Why does he or she want to work in an ER? Was there some personal experience involved? Any time spent volunteering or working in that environment?
Many kids want to be doctors or lawyers . I would not base school choices OR college major on this ambition.
ps I once read that as a group, music majors have the highest admit rate to med school
^^Actually, it’s math/statistics majors who have the highest group acceptance rate to medical school. (47.58%) Humanities are a close second (47.1%)
Math majors, as a group, also had the highest sGPA and MCAT scores of all applicant groups.
But there is significant self-selection bias involved with those numbers. Of the ~53,000 med school applicants in 2018-19, only 343 were math majors and only 1689 were humanities majors.
A 30 is right in the middle of Binghamton’s 25-75% range. When D20 was at Bing’s info session the rep said if you are in the 28-32 range the odds are in your favor.
Also, Stony Brook is very strong in pre-med, and they have a hospital right next door. Their rep said the ACT range is 26-32, so a 31 is towards the top of their range. Good luck.
I read, and I could try to cite but it as a few years ago, that music majors had an admit rate of 62%. OP sorry for the tangent. Though it is related. Your child can major in anything as long as prereqs are done, and they can be done in a post-bacc program too.I just don’t think anyone should base college decisions on a desire to be an MD. Too many change their minds. And learning about other health professions is clearly in order. (Nursing is not for those who think they can’t make it as MD’s. It is a highly skilled profession with a different focus.)
Music majors are the most likely group of college grads to be admitted to medical school. Physician and biologist Lewis Thomas studied the undergraduate majors of medical school applicants. He found that 66% of music majors who applied to med school were admitted, the highest percentage of any group.
66% Med School Acceptance — College Confidential http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/music-major/876019-66-med-school-acceptance.html
Just an FYI…being a music major is hard…and being a music major AND fulfilling the prerequisite courses for medical school applications is even harder.
Music majors have tons of one and two credit courses many of which meet 4-5 hours a week. Sometimes the ensemble rehearsals and required music courses conflict with sciences and their required labs. Some colleges are very amenable to working with students to major in music and do the premed required coursework. Others…not so much so.
The total number of music majors applying to medical school isn’t huge. I think this is a very self selecting group when it comes to medical school accepted students.
But carry on…this is a little off topic.
Every student who thinks they want to be a doctor in high school…or even in college…needs a plan B.
The study you’re referring to is 20 years old! There’s been 3 new versions of the MCAT since then–including major changes in the content and structure of exam. (The current is more than twice as long [7.5 hours vs. 3 hours] and covers a greater breadth of topics–including social & behavioral sciences, biostatistics, biochemistry and research methodology.)
Music majors can and do go to med school. (D1 had a music composition major in her med school class. Along with a MD/PhD forestry major.) But it’s highly self-selecting group.
But @thumper1 brings up an important point–every pre-med needs a Plan B and a Plan C career in mind because most freshmen pre-meds will never actually get to the point of applying to med school and of those who do apply, 60% won’t get accepted anywhere.
Someone gave me that statistic recently so sorry if it is obsolete. Music majors described above are BM students. Many music majors are BA students with 10 classes in the liberal arts music major and 30 classes in other subjects.
My point was just that you can study what you want and basing college and major choices on a future med school possibility is probably unwise. The exact number of whatever majors apply who get accepted isn’t relevant so much as the changeability of young people’s goals.
If the young person does not know much about nursing, physicians assistants and other health care fields, the goal of being an MD may be based on lack of sophistication. We don’t know that this young person has had experiences that inspire or not.
I hear you about the plan B & plan C. We as parents have been saying that. I think she needs to do a little growing up and hopefully she will come to these realizations on her own.
I would also take bs/md off the table…her scores are too low.
This student may or may not end up in medical school. It’s a long haul…filled with twists and turns, hard work, possibly some doubt, gap years, etc.
I would encourage her to investigate DO programs, as well as PA and NP. In the event that her medical school (MD) aspirations do not pan out…these may be some realistic options.
The road to medical school is long. Step 1 is to get into college…establish herself…get involved…volunteer…and do well academically.
I also strongly recommend she gets some real life exposure to medicine, especially in the ER since that where she says she wants to be.
Once your D is 18, she can earn her CNA or EMT certification (classes are offered at nearly every CC in the US) and work or volunteer as an ER Tech. It’s a tough, stressful job and one that unfortunately comes with a good deal of exposure to workplace violence.
If she needs merit, she should add some others to her list and understand that the reach schools on her list are unlikely to give her enough merit aid. At GW, for example, room&board plus books is almost $16K. To meet your cost of $35K, she would need a tuition scholarship of almost $38000 ($33000 with the loan), not counting personal expenses. That is a very large award. What is her rank in her HS class? Is she one of the top students? Not trying to discourage you or her and there is no real harm in trying, but know that getting that much money may be tough at those schools.
How about Syracuse? Or U Rochester? May not get you to $30K but do give merit.
My D19 is a freshman at Miami OH right now. She is doing pre-med. Seems fine so far and she likes it. Your D would get merit from Miami. You might get the COA under $35K. Nice school overall. Good for undergrad research.
