<p>@Cue7 I don’t really know where you are getting the number. I think it’s a good question. You can definitely ask UCIHP and they will answer the question. They are pretty honest with their answers. If your number is true, my take is that every school is different. A lot of my friends who came to the school thinking that they will be pre-meds changed their mind because they found something else more appealing to them.</p>
<p>It’s kind of hard to impose one school characteristic to another. I think UChicago is definitely trying to be more friendly to students thinking of doing pre-professional tracks.</p>
<p>fbtkdrbs:</p>
<p>Look at the first post in this thread. The OP presents information from the new UChicago head pre-med adviser, who notes that, each year, “95-100” UChicago kids apply, and there is about a “70-75 percent” acceptance rate. </p>
<p>The rest of the thread reveals that both in terms of raw numbers and percentage accepted, UChicago trails the rest of the pack. Yale has around a 90% accept rate and about 150 students applying each year, and Brown and Dartmouth are in the 80-85% accept range, with comparable numbers of students applying each year. </p>
<p>From the raw numbers presented by the pre-med adviser, it looks like only 5% of a UChicago class goes on to med school, compared with ~10% at other top schools. UChicago’s pre-med climate may be improving, but I’m not sure why the numbers are half what they are at other top schools, as the number of students interested in pre-med is probably comparable. </p>
<p>Others hypothesize that this is because maybe UChicago just has lesser numbers of students interested in medical school, but both the poster JHS and I doubt this. There’s probably enough interest at UChicago to merit ~10% of the class (rather than 5%) heading to med school.</p>
<p>@cue7</p>
<p>I get that. I read through the whole thread before. I do not know either. Look, I go here. The pre-med track is not hard at all. It is easier than what people say. They really watered it down for the pre-professional students. I cannot speak for everyone in the school. But remember that our school is heavily dominated with econ major students and also students who like the idea of the “core”. Also, a lot of students take gap years…that might has to do with it. So actually, UChicago might just have lesser number of students interested in medical school. </p>
<p>Again, that’s my take on it. again, if this number really bothers, I really think you should ask UCIHP and post their answer on it here.</p>
<p>fbtkdrbs - thanks but one of my questions is about 3rd year directly to med school. They are not supposed to be part of the med school admission process.</p>
<p>fbtkdrbs:</p>
<p>From all I can tell, the UChicago pre-med adviser was forthright about UChicago’s pre-med stats with the OP, and presented whatever numbers she thought were accurate. It looks like ~5% of a UChicago class goes on to med school, with roughly a 70-75% accept rate for UChicago applicants. </p>
<p>I’m glad you’re having a good experience, and that your peers are as well. The school seems to have improved on this front. Nevertheless, for those interested in pre-med, it’s worth noting that UChicago’s numbers (whatever the reason may be) lag behind most of its peers. </p>
<p>UChicago’s 70-75% accept rate for ~100 students applying a year is not quite up to par with its peers. These stats are certainly good, but they’re not leading the pack by any means.</p>
<p>@texaspg </p>
<p>I only know of one person who did direct enrollment from undergrad to pritzker. From what I have seen, I don’t think a lot of people choose to go with that path. Part of the reason is that premed track is designed to be finished in 3 yrs so applying in your 3rd year requires some scheduling changes/planning. Also, some people choose to get a real degree before they go to med school. It’s just their preference.</p>
<p>@cue7</p>
<p>Right I understand that UChicago lags behind in number. Could it be reasoned that UChicago just has a different culture than other schools? Maybe it’s the liberal arts tradition… a lot of my friends eventually found out that medicine wasn’t really their thing. they eventually did something very different because they found out that their social science or english class was more interesting. Anyway, I think school is doing well and heading toward the right direction.</p>
<p>The reason I used Yale’s numbers when I raised this questions is that Chicago and Yale have very similar cultures in most respects. If anything, Yale is more tilted to the Humanities than Chicago. In the NCES data, Yale graduated 464 people with Humanities majors (including history), vs. 324 for Chicago, with virtually the same number of overall graduates. Yale had 105 Biology majors (plus 13 in BME), vs. Chicago’s 150. So it’s a little hard to understand why someone would believe that Yale has twice as many people interested in medical school as Chicago.</p>
<p>(Separately, the ratio of medical school applications to Biology majors at Chicago seems way out of whack.)</p>
<p>I agree with JHS on this regarding Yale - and, I’d argue further, that Brown and Dartmouth are good comparators as well. All these schools have strong traditions in the humanities, and many students at all of these schools have interests that range far from science/pre-med. Dartmouth has a wall st/liberal arts culture that’s at least as strong as UChicago’s, and Brown has a strongly liberal arts/exploratory bent. </p>
<p>With due respect to the posters arguing that maybe there’s just “something about UChicago” that veers more students away from medical school, I’m unconvinced by these arguments. Yale, Brown, etc. actually have liberal arts cultures that are quite similar to what’s in Hyde Park.</p>
<p>Finally, as I’m not a stakeholder in this process (as an alum who concentrated in the humanities many years ago), I doubt I have any standing with the pre-med adviser. Consequently, I don’t think I could reach out to her.</p>
<p>If current (fbtkdrbs?) or prospective students want to reach out to her to inquire about this disparity, feel free. I’d like to know the information. I suspect, however, that the response will be quite wishy-washy. </p>
<p>Students should interpret the numbers as they see fit, but, from my vantage point, the pre-med results are quite underwhelming. Many have hinted that this is improving at UChicago, and I certainly hope so. For the time being, committed pre-meds may be better served by going to Yale or Brown, but the younger brothers/sisters of this cohort may need to look at UChicago more closely.</p>
<p>For now, a gap still seems to exist. Hopefully it’s closing, but that remains to be seen.</p>
<p>Interesting Thread</p>
<p>If one wanted to make comparable comparisons… I suggest looking at Columbia… Although different from UChicago, a core curriculum (unlike self-selected distribution reqs) could expose students to unanticipated disciplines and affect decisions about applying to med school.</p>
<p>With a child who’s an Eph, now alum, (who seriously considered UChicago) I’m most familiar with Williams. Although a double STEM major, not interested in med school, various friends were.</p>
<p>Glancing at Williams website, it looks as if its distribution is more like the Ivy examples above. Approx 70 applicants per class of ~525. Acceptance rate of 80-90%. It seems to have a very supportive advisory system that alumni are encouraged to use. </p>
<p>“Williams supports the applications of all students who choose to apply, regardless of grades or other factors. In recent years, eighty to ninety percent of Williams applicants with a GPA of B+ or better and an MCAT score of 32 or better have been admitted to at least one medical school. Students with lower numbers are also routinely admitted, but at a rate closer to fifty percent.” (from [Getting</a> Started | Career Center](<a href=“http://careers.williams.edu/students/advanced-study/pre-health-2/medical-school-overview/]Getting”>http://careers.williams.edu/students/advanced-study/pre-health-2/medical-school-overview/))</p>
<p>The various Williams webpages related to medical school could help any prospective applicant.</p>
<p>Tuppence:</p>
<p>Great info. The general standard, at the very top schools, seems to be about an 80% accept rate, and about 10% of any given class going to medical school.</p>
<p>UChicago, on the other hand, is at a 70-75% accept rate, with about 5% of any given class going to medical school.</p>
<p>Current/prospective students should feel free to contact the UChicago pre-med adviser with these statistics in hand. I’m curious to hear what the response to this will be. I anticipate it’ll be something wishy-washy, but it’s worth inquiring nonetheless. </p>
<p>The 70-75% accept rate really isn’t bad - I’m just curious why only 5% of a UChicago class (as opposed to the standard ~10% elsewhere) goes to medical school. I imagine this number will increase, but still, it’s so low. The “there’s just something about UChicago that drives down interested med school applicants” just doesn’t fly with me. Yale, Brown, Williams, etc. are all great liberal arts colleges too.</p>
<p>Ok I have a question. Everyone is throwing out this 5% matriculation to Medical School statistic. Seemingly this was obtained from UChicago? I’ve gone on their website and while this is true, it was for the class of 2009. The Class of 2010 had 10% of students go to medical school and the class of 2011 had 11% of its students matriculate. Maybe I’m reading this wrong or it was addressed earlier? </p>
<p><a href=“https://careeradvancement.uchicago.edu/about/outcomes-data[/url]”>https://careeradvancement.uchicago.edu/about/outcomes-data</a></p>
<p>The link above is kind of ambiguous in terms of real numbers. If you read it correctly, the percentage is a sub percentage of those who are going to be attending graduate school. So when they mention 10%, they are mentioning it as a percentage of 200 students going to graduate school and that sounds very low.</p>
<p>I have no idea how widespread the notion is that uchicago is a bad place to be a premed–but that sort of reputation could make a significant different in the number of students interetested in med school who matriculate.</p>
<p>And, if students who say they are interested in premed have a lower yield than other students, the admissions office might very well accept fewer of them in the first place.</p>
<p>motherbear332:</p>
<p>Even when read cynically, the actual subscription for science classes don’t back up your claims. As JHS mentioned, something like 400 students take chemistry and biology (not the core science classes, but the real, pre-med deal chem and bio). </p>
<p>I imagine the number of UChicago students taking these classes match UChicago’s peers quite closely. At the same time, on the other end, only 5% seem to go to med school, even though hundreds take many of the pre-med reqs.</p>
<p>You could argue that many students just take these hard science classes with no interest in going to med school, but I doubt that (especially because they could just take the core non-pre-med sequence to fulfill the core reqs). If you polled the ~400 students in one of these classes, I imagine more than the ~90 who actually apply to med school would say they are pre-med.</p>
<p>Has anyone mentioned anything about GPA deflation?</p>
<p>GPA deflation seems to have passed at UChicago, as described earlier in this thread.</p>
<p>My hypothesis is that there is now much more compression of bland grades now at UChicago. So, for example, whereas before there were more kids walking around with B-s and Cs, now more kids have Bs and B+s. On aggregate, though, lots of B+s don’t really make for a good med school application. If you have a 3.4 GPA, your cause isn’t really helped. </p>
<p>Otherwise, I’m sort of at a loss. If the pre-med advisor’s letter, posted by the OP as the first post of this thread, are accurate, the raw numbers of students from UChicago going on to med school are pretty underwhelming.</p>
<p>My general take so far is, if you’re a pre-med and deciding between a place like UChicago and Williams, Yale, etc., go to those other schools (provided fit is good). You can get a great liberal arts education there, and the pre-med climate seems healthier and more robust. I haven’t heard any convincing arguments thus far that suggest otherwise.</p>
<p>“As JHS mentioned, something like 400 students take chemistry and biology (not the core science classes, but the real, pre-med deal chem and bio).”</p>
<ul>
<li>How many students take these classes with the intention of majoring in Biology/Chemistry but not going to med school? I guess it’s not the majority, and there certainly are students in other schools who take these classes without the intention of going to medical school, but given that UChicago at least up until very recently had the reputation of being a factory of PhD bound students I wouldn’t be surprised if a slightly higher proportion took these courses with the intention of eventually getting a PhD in Biology or Chemistry. In that case, someone would have to compare the proportion of Biology/Chemistry PhD’s to med school students in these schools. U Chicago would probably still come out as a worse place for pre-med than Yale, Williams, etc., but it might paint a less bleak picture.</li>
</ul>
<p>Cue7:</p>
<p>My speculation is just as good as yours. </p>
<p>UChicago students are famous for not taking the easy way out. My S, for example, took honors physics to satisfy the core, even though he is neither a premed nor a even science major and it was somewhat of a struggle.</p>
<p>Hi everyone, thanks for the discussion so far. Quick question that is a little off-topic, but I can’t seem to find it on other threads:
High school culture for students competing to get into top tier schools usually is to “take as many AP/honors courses as possible.” This probably isn’t the same once you get into college, but if you are competing for let’s say the top 20 med schools in the country, would you most likely be competing against likely admits who have taken at least one honors science course? In short, should I try to take a couple honors courses during my undergrad and do med schools really care?</p>