You emphasize that you want a city b/c your relatives won’t let you get a driver’s license, and I think that you are assuming that if you aren’t in a major city you have to be able to drive which is simply not true. Although it does vary by school, most college students don’t have cars: most large colleges have transportation systems, many colleges in smaller towns have all that you need within walking distance, and many colleges of all sizes have so much happening on campus that you rarely need to go off-campus. Even small colleges in isolated places have transportation options. So limiting yourself to cities is not necessary
More important for you is going to be paying for college: do you have any definite money for college at all? Every college search should start with the money: what can you afford? Almost any accredited university will give you the pre-med courses that you need for med school, and studying for the MCAT is up to you no matter where you go. As others have said, being a star at your undergrad (high GPA & superstrong recs) will do more to get you into medical school than a fancy name. In practice, unless you have money, that means looking at ‘meets full need’ schools and at schools that have full ride merit scholarships.
Meets full need schools are mostly very competitive academically. A few are both need-blind (that is, they figure out if they want you w/o thinking about how much financial aid you need) and meet full need (Columbia is one- with an acceptance rate of ~6%), but most will take into account how much financial aid you need before deciding whether to admit you. That means that you have to be at the top end of applicants to get an offer*. You can find lists on CC and elsewhere that list the schools that meet full need.
The full ride merit scholarships fall into 2 groups: the ones you qualify for automatically* based on SAT/GPA, and (highly) competitive named scholarships. You will find lots of threads about both over in the Financial Aid section of CC.
If your test scores are inline with your grades (and your grades continue to be high- be aware that junior year is often when the work gets a good level harder), and if (by senior year) you have shown commitment and leadership in your ECs (see post #20), you have a decent shot at a lot of ‘meets full need’ schools, the automatic merit scholarships, and named scholarships at colleges that are trying to move ‘up’ the prestige ladder*.
My suggestion is that you do some searching for lists of schools full-need, automatic and named full scholarship schools. Visit your college counselor (in May, after this year’s seniors are settled but before s/he gets stuck into next year’s seniors) and ask for where students from your school who need full financial aid have gone. Then spend the summer with a copy of the Fisk guide to colleges (available at your library if your budget doesn’t stretch), researching the places that will meet full need / will give you an automatic scholarship / are where people from your school have gone before. Bundle them first into 3 piles: Reach (any that accept under 20% of applicants); Possible (accept 20-50% of applicants) and Likely (accept 50%+) of applicants. Then subdivide each pile into “Love” “Like” “Last”. I suspect that you will have learnt a lot by the end of this!
Also do some serious SAT practice work over the summer. There are workbooks available in the library and a decent amount of practice stuff free online. Come autumn you will be taking the PSAT- if you do well that can open other financial aid doors, and will bode well for your actual SAT. During Junior year you may be given access to Naviance (or other admissions tracking system) for your school, and you can crosscheck admissions to places that you have in your piles to see how applicants from your school typically do. The goal is that - a year and a half from now!- you have a list of schools that you like/love, you can afford, and are likely/possible for you to get into- with a few reaches to keep things interesting!
*Remember that, as with all things financial, it’s a trade-off between what you have and what they want. The college that is willing to give you money is looking to improve itself by having you come.
ps, once you are 18 nobody can stop you from taking driving lessons and getting your own license- all you need is your birth cert.
