I’m currently deciding between the University of Wisconsin and Cornell University. I am a biology major on the pre-med track. I received the Chancellors Scholarship from Wisconsin which covers tuition + books for all 4 years as long as I maintain a certain GPA. I am also considering Cornell and the cost would average out to about 42k a year which is perfectly doable for my family. The dilemma here is that all the money not used for undergrad will go to a med school fund, dramatically decreasing the amount of debt I will have after med school if I chose Wisconsin. Cornell has been my dream since forever but is the Wisconsin opportunity too good to pass up? I am fairly certain I would love either school but at Cornell I feel as though I wouldn’t be a number in the crowd because it is a much smaller school with more personal connections between the professors and the students. Please leave your input!!
I think you have to be realistic about this. UW is a great school. Med school is extremely expensive. Getting into med school depends on grades and MCAT scores. Both of your choices are excellent, but now you need to be realistic and think about how to achieve your goal and realize that a dream isn’t the same as reality.
Minimizing debt and preserving funds so that there is less medical school debt is a major priority for serious med school candidates. Cornell is about 15,000 full time undergrads, UW is about 30,000 full time undergrads. Both have many classes with more than 100 students, and will have small discussion sections, led by T.A., for small group discussion/labs.
This is not a comparison between a small liberal arts college of 1600 and a major public flagship – there are going to be more similarities than differences with Cornell and UW. The close relationships with faculty at UW are there for the asking for a motivated student (my student is a recent alum, and had close relationships with his professors).
At UW, take a look at the Undergraduate Research program, which requires an application.
I’m not familiar with the gpa required for the Chancellors – but make sure it is realistic.
Great options, congratulations. If you are serious about med school, follow the money.
@Midwestmomofboys I am fairly confident I will be able to maintain the GPA because I have a friend at Wisconsin with similar stats as me and the same major who obtained a 3.8 first semester.
It all depends how much you want to go to med school. If you can see yourself discovering another passion in college, Cornell. If not, UWI.
From the UW website below describing the Chancellor’s Scholarship, it seems that you’ll have many opportunities to have personal connections between professors and students. Your concern about UW appears unfounded.
https://cspks.wisc.edu/about/
According to above link, one has to maintain a cumulative and semester GPA above 3.0 to, in part, keep the scholarship. If you can’t do as premed and much more, then you’ll need to consider a new career pathway
Take the money. Why bio?
@Jugulator20 when I was applying I just chose bio because it was the “standard” pre med major but I am planning to switch my major to genetics and hopefully earn certificates in global health or mathematics