<p>I have questions about the rigor of Duke academics. I'm thinking about applying ED this fall, but i'm hesitant due to the grade deflation people have been talking about on the boards. I want to go to med-school, so I need to maintain a high GPA in pre-med (around a 3.7, 3.8) in order to get into some of the premiere med-schools. However, I'm unsure if I could pull that off at Duke while maintaining other aspects of the college experience such as extracurriculars and watching games and socializing, etc. Could any current Duke students or alumni clear that up for me? I really want to go to Duke, but if I end up going I don't want to shoot myself in the foot when med-school admissions come around. I was looking at some older forums but I want some current/more specific info. Thank you all in advance!</p>
<p>As with any university, the course rigor varies with major. The engineering courses tend to have more grade deflation. The social sciences and liberal arts not so much. So in the end it varies quite a bit depending onw hat you want to major in.</p>
<p>I’ll offer a few thoughts for your consideration:
This subject has been discussed several times in recent years on CC’s Duke Forum; accordingly, it might be wise to review this information.
Duke has a GREAT and multi-generational placement record for its undergraduates in the nation’s best medical schools (including Duke Med, as sgopal2 indicates). Therefore, countless Dukies have not been hurt by either the scholastic rigor or the alleged grading practices at Duke.
The better medical schools – similar to undergraduate schools – unquestionably index GPA by institution (and probably curriculum, too). Hence, 3.50 at Duke, Hopkins or Northwestern (etc.) may well be stronger acceptance credential than a 3.75 at some relatively-undistinguished state flagship university.
Most important, your enduring and CRITICAL undergraduate education – both in and beyond the classroom – is about LEARNING, preparing for your long future, developing/refining crucial values, teamwork and leadership abilities, ethical standards, and permanent intellectual enhancement. It is not – nor should it be – only about jobs, careers, potential income, and medical school admission. Consequently, shouldn’t you be more-concerned with a superior baccalaureate education than with medical school admission, per se? After all, an outstanding university (such as Duke) can certainly lead to careers of satisfaction and significance, but it is not a “trade school.” </p>
<p>On a totally unrelated but actually related note to TopTier’s comment: Duke GPAs are looked upon favorably in professional schools. It took some digging to find this but consider this controversial but once hot topic at UC Berkeley’s law school admissions:</p>
<p>You can see how favorably a high Duke GPA is looked upon at that particular elite law program–along with GPAs from other schools such as Swarthmore and Williams. I think if you do even “very good (>3.5 GPA)” here you would be very competitive for med or law schools across the nation.</p>
<p>@TopTier Sure! While I’d take the data with a grain of salt, I think it speaks somewhat of how much weight a Duke GPA holds in professional school admissions.</p>
<p>Also, although Duke was an excellent university in 1997 – when this data was accrued – clearly considerable progress has been made in the last (almost) two decades, so it’s possible (likely?) that our index might currently be even better. </p>
<p>The acceptance rate to medical schools is 80-90% for Duke students, compared to a national average of 45%. The average science GPA of Duke students accepted to med school was a 3.52, and the average overall GPA was a 3.63. 102 students applied at the end of their junior year (to go into med school right after college graduation). 350 Duke students applied in their senior year or as alums. The average age of the entering class at Duke med is 24; the average number of med schools a Duke student applied to was 22.</p>
Duke, like most universities, has had significant grade “inflation” over the past 30 years. The average GPA is about 3.4 which is typical of top universities (higher than MIT, Princeton, JHU and lower than Harvard, Brown and Yale).
If you want to attend a premiere med school you should look into a premier UG university.
There are only about 1,000 spots in premiere med schools. Do you want to apply from Duke or from an average university?
It’s hard to standout at Duke and there is risk of being weeded out. It will require excellent time management skills to maintain a high GPA and be able to attend games, socialize, and attend EC’s but it’s possible.<br>
At a non-rigorous U you will have little risk of being weeded out but it’s next to impossible to standout from the millions of students applying to med school from non-rigorous universities who all have high GPA’s.
Med schools aren’t dumb. They know most students from non-rigorous U’s with 4.0 GPA’s wouldn’t last a semester at a rigorous university full of brilliant students.<br>
If you plan to attend your state med school and you don’t live between DC-Boston or in CA, TX, IL, or FL your safest, easiest, and most socializing path to med school is your state flagship. If you plan to attend a top med school or live in a competitive state go to Duke. </p>
<p>“Med schools aren’t dumb. They know most students from non-rigorous U’s with 4.0 GPA’s wouldn’t last a semester at a rigorous university full of brilliant students.”</p>
<p>"* If you plan to attend your state med school and you don’t live between DC-Boston or in CA, TX, IL, or FL your safest, easiest, and most socializing path to med school is your state flagship. If you plan to attend a top med school or live in a competitive state go to Duke."</p>
<p>This is absolutely false and mind-numbingly elitist. Just because you went to a traditionally non-rigorous University doesn’t mean you can not create a rigorous academic course load (see honors colleges). More importantly, med schools care about your overall GPA and most especially how you performed in your science classes. Despite my Berkeley Law GPA post, med schools (outside of GPA) care mostly about the opportunities you’ve taken advantage of (volunteering at hospitals, leadership activities in pre-med extra-curricular, awards etc.) </p>
<p>Duke is great for the exposure and preparation it gives pre-meds to and for the healthcare world but a very savvy pre-med student can achieve the same at a less prestigious University.</p>
<p>Jwest, I entirely agree with you; however, I suspect – and I hope – that bud may have engaged just a bit of hyperbole(?). More important, the overriding facts in response to raddom’s original inquiry are clear: the additional academic competition, mentoring and rigor in pre-med programs such as Duke’s are worthwhile . . . in medical school admissions, in performance at med school, in residency selection, and in enduring professional stature. NONE of this suggests that a highly intelligent and especially motivated undergraduate can’t achieve identical outcomes attending an Ohio State or a University of Oklahoma – of course they can – but on a percentage basis such outstanding results are more likely if the undergraduate metricates at Hopkins, or Penn, or Stanford, or Duke, or Northwestern (and so forth). </p>
<p>“mentoring and rigor in pre-med programs such as Duke’s are worthwhile . . . in medical school admissions, in performance at med school, in residency selection, and in enduring professional stature.”</p>
<p>I’m not sure if I agree. I’d like to think this is largely true but the only programs that I’ve known your undergrad education to have substantial pull in is the Rhodes Scholarship, which we’ve seen HYP dominate year after year because of exceptional advising.</p>
<p>I have long seen highly successful Duke/top med school professor-to-prodessor contacts pay appreciable dividends (I specifically alluded to this, since this thread is med school focused). </p>
<p>Jwest, of course an elite student can excel at any university. I’m talking about putting the odds of success in your favor. The top feeder university for Duke’s med school is Duke. The number one feeder of your state flagship med school is your state flagship. My state med school admits 80% of its students from 7 universities. The Ivy med schools fill 30% of their spots with graduates of 8 universities and 50% with graduates from the top 1% of US universities.<br>
There are about 3,800 US colleges and universities. If you plan to attend med school you should limit your search to the top 400 universities (top 10%). If you want an IB job on Wall Street you should limit your search to about 20 universities.</p>