<p>Here is what I can come up with by my experience. I want to major in Biology(General, Microbio, BioChem, etc) and I will be in the pre-med path.
Which of the following schools that has a good Biology program?
1 U Michigan
2 George Washington University
3 Cornell
4 Johns Hopkins
5 U Chicago
6 CMU
7 U Wisconsin Madison
8 Boston U
9 Emory
10 Georgetown U
11 UVA
12 NYU
13 WUSt.L
If you can provide me some more schools, it will be great.
Thank you.</p>
<p>Athough, i'm not an expert myself, we do share the same interest, and from the people that i've talked to, all the schools that u mentioned are well qualified as a solid pre-med program school.</p>
<p>Thanks betterday55,</p>
<p>but can somebody name some more?</p>
<p>bumpbumpbump</p>
<p>That looks like a pretty dang good list. 13 colleges is not enough? I'd actually add just one more safety/match to make it 14 since 13 is a bad number and then you are set.</p>
<p>It's a nice list, but since your objective is med school I'd be concerned about a few things:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>BU is having some big-time grade deflation, which would be bad for med school admissions.</p></li>
<li><p>At NYU you'd have so many other things vying for your attention that I wouldn't think it would be a good place to buckle down and get a great GPA.</p></li>
<li><p>The Johns Hopkins pre-med thing is so...overdone.</p></li>
<li><p>There aren't any liberal arts colleges that interest you at all?</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Where do you live? Are you in-state at any of the publics? These schools are all very highly selective; do you have any safeties? Do you want big or small? Greek life? D1 sports? City? Rural? Is the West Coast okay, too?</p>
<p>Help us out here :) Biology definitely shouldn't be the ONLY thing you base your decision on.</p>
<p>First of all, thank you guys so much. Your warm suggestions and recommendations really encourage me.</p>
<p>AcceptedAlready: I'm considering if I can eliminate some schools and add a few safeties.</p>
<p>TourGuide446: So I should delete BU. NYU is actually my dream school coz it is inside a Big city, but now other than the concerns that you've made, I also have to consider the tuition too. What do you mean by overdone? I enjoy a big community so that I can meet a lot of people there. :)</p>
<p>Semiserious: I live in Virginia, and the public(and even private) schools here are not very ideal for biology major. I do have some safeties but I don't know if you guys know about it. I am interested in Virginia Tech and James Madison. I want a big school and Greek life doesn't matter. I want the schools in city, and that's why I came up with NYU. I had been searching for schools in West Coast, but my counselor told me that UCs are not easy for admission for OOS.</p>
<p>Thank you so much.</p>
<p>For eliminating schools: I'd take out BU and either Umich/Emory/Madison/GWU. They are very different in nature and you might want to visit some of them (Why Madison for out of state when Tech/UVA is at home?) Umich is also a bit of a weird choice when you have Tech and UVA at home as it is not especially known for pre-med either. Personally I'd get rid of Madison, Umich, and George Washington. George Washington (In my opinion) is overpriced for most of its majors including pre-med and you really want to save some of that money for later. Also remember the costs of living in D.C. are quite high. I know you love the city but GWU is an expensive and odd choice for pre-meds.</p>
<p>The thing is: If your stats are good enough for most of the colleges on your list, you'd probably get into NYU-CAS. Make sure you truly want to go there and then apply ED if it is your dream school. The reason I say this is because NYU is actually one of the easier colleges on your list to get into and if it is your dream school an ED can raise your chances AS well as elminate hundreds in application fees + many hours applying to others.</p>
<p>My only caveat: Make sure you love NYU and realize that their program is NOT as good as the other schools you have listed. It is also very expensive and you should look to save money for grad/med school.</p>
<p>hoganwan, it seems like everybody who thinks of pre-med thinks about going to Johns Hopkins at one time or another. It's probably great for that, but since a huge % of the students there are in pre-med, the competition is supposed to be great. Also, the students there are known to be a rather serious and not-very-fun bunch. Also, Baltimore is supposed to be a pretty rough place, with some nice aspects but nothing compared to, say, Chicago or Boston. It just seems to me like if you've got the grades and test scores to get in Hopkins, you've got the grades and test scores to get into dozens of places that are far more interesting and well-rounded.</p>
<p>Probably the biggest concern I have with the annual pre-med Hopkins rush is that these students who are supposed to be so bright don't seem to grasp that just because the university has a fabulous med school, it doesn't necessarily follow that the pre-med program is similarly great. Also, just because another college doesn't have a fabulous med school (or any med school at all) it doesn't necessarily follow that its pre-med program is good or bad. Also,the Hopkins med school isn't even on the the main campus (where the pre-med stuff would be taught). I'm sure some Hopkins people will get on here and rip my views apart, but I just want you to be aware of some of the things that make being pre-med there less than the perfection that it might seem at first glance.</p>
<p>if ya want the school to be in the city why cornell?? its in the middle of nowhere....i mean if you like the outdoors and the atmosphere there than great but if you like the city like you say u do u might go nuts there cause its so far away from anywhere</p>
<p>also if u do decide to keep cornell on your list u might look into the campus they have in NYC....go here <a href="http://www.cornell.edu/visiting/nyc/%5B/url%5D">http://www.cornell.edu/visiting/nyc/</a> and check it out....u could do premed at cornell and spend some time at the NYC campus as opposed to bein at the ithaca campus....its worth a look at least</p>
<p>at Uchicago it's very hard to get a high GPA, and they don't have very good placement into medical schools, so you might not want to go there</p>
<p>The U of Chicago claims to send about 8% of students on to med school, along with 8% to law school and over 50% directly to graduate school of some kind. It seems to me that you are assuming that med school admissions personnel are profoundly stupid. "Let's see, I've got a kid from U Chicago with a 3.5 GPA and MCAT scores in the upper 2%, but that hardly compares with this other student from Bugtussle U with a 3.8 GPA and MCATs in the lower 50%." </p>
<p>"Yep. Since I'm stupid, I've just gotta admit the 3.8 GPA. Hyuck! Hyuck! Hyuck!</p>
<p>hoganwan:</p>
<p>To your issue, getting into med school depends to a large degree on your performance in a few key classes. The first weed out course you will take is organic chemistry. Since these are survey courses and are virtually always graded on a curve, med schools tend to care a great deal about how well you did against your peers and how tough the competition was. Basically, your major doesn't matter all that much. In fact, having an unusual major may actually be a plus. I have a good friend who got his BA in English from UNC and his medical degree from Harvard.</p>
<p>As for undergrad biology programs, for goodness sake, at the UNDERGRAD level, practically any school will do. You will, in no way, even begin to exhaust the expertise of professors at practically any US college while you are an undergrad. The things to ask yourself are what you actually want to do as a bio major. Do you want to become deeply engaged in research? You will find more opportunities for this at LACs and at universities with small bio undergrad and grad departments. Is there a special area of biology you want to pursue? Then some undergrad departments may not even offer particular specialites while others will be strong.</p>
<p>For the aspiring premed who wants an undergrad degree in general biology, take your pick, but UVA will be cheaper for you than most of the other schools on your list and I would definitely bump it to #1 just based on cost, alone. I'd also look into William and Mary, Mary Washington, James Madison, and Virginia Tech.</p>
<p>Look, if you want to be a physician, the formula is pretty simple. Do well in school, outperform most of your peers in the key premed classes, do well in your major. At the undergrad level, where you go to school might matter a great deal in certain areas. But it won't matter much in biology. What will matter is how well you did in the curved courses against various levels of competition.</p>
<p>UVA looks like your best bet given that your instate - consider yourself lucky - my son wanted in at UVA (OOS) but was waitlisted even though he had an excellent profile. If your numbers are really good, you might want to look at some of the combined undergrad/med school programs. Penn State has one with Jefferson Medical School (6 or 7 years) - only 30 students start this program each year (I think Umich has one too). Yes, PSU is in the middle of nowhere, but it seems like a small city and state college is a great college town. Plus honors programs at big schools are a good way to get extra research opportunities in science so check them out. You might qualify for UVA's program. Re Cornell: we have heard that the pre-med students are put through the ringer there...a very tough program to do well in.</p>
<p>If you think a good "biology program" is the ticket to pre-med you are mistaken. Go to the best school possible where you can get a good GPA and will have opportunities to do research. "unranked" for biology LACs like Amherst and Williams are some of the best med school feeders in the world.</p>
<p>Take Slipper's comments into great consideration.</p>
<p>Also, as has been said many times on CC, Biology is a quite common major and many, many schools have sound Biology Departments. That being said, you should concentrate on the other assets of a college and your comfort level. All the "elite" schools have solid Biology departments. Others, such as Michigan State University (The Lyman Briggs School of Natural Science) are superior and quite excellent.</p>
<p>In the case of a medical school applicant, your GPA will be quite critical, perhaps [for some applicants] more so that your alma mater. I hear that medical schools are now saying that you don't need to have a science BA/BS, but certainly should have a very good basic foundation in the sciences. Check out online the admissions requirements at medical schools with high reputations.</p>