So pre-med at MIT is pretty much impossible?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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However, most at MIT get such a great education and do so well on the MCAT that many good/elite medical schools feel its a no brainer to admit them.

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<p>Ha! Tell that to the 26% of MIT premeds who got rejected from every single med school they applied to. That's not just the good/elite med schools, but every med school they applied to. </p>

<p>Preprofessional</a> Stats - MIT Careers Office</p>

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Realistically, premed does not seem like one of the harder things you can do at MIT. In past years, the MIT Careers Office has listed the GPA of the average applicant to med school from MIT, and it was around a 3.6(/4.0). That's much higher than the average GPA of an MIT senior (3.2). So on average, premeds are doing much better than the average MIT student GPA-wise.

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<p>Uh, actually I don't see the logic. You say that premed does not seem like one of the harder things to do at MIT. Yet your data seems to belie that assertion. You said it yourself: to get admitted, MIT premeds have to get a significantly higher GPA than the average MIT student does. If anything, that would seem to highlight the fact that it is really hard to be a successful MIT premed. After all, if you have to do much better than average, doesn't that indicate just how difficult it is to be a successful premed? </p>

<p>Contrast that with other schools where you only have to be slightly above average in order to be a successful premed. I would argue that means that that school is easier.</p>

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You say that premed does not seem like one of the harder things to do at MIT. Yet your data seems to belie that assertion. You said it yourself: to get admitted, MIT premeds have to get a significantly higher GPA than the average MIT student does.

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No, I didn't -- I said the average premed applicant has a higher GPA than the average MIT student. Not the average premed admit. Of course, the average premed admit ends up having a higher than average GPA, but that's just because that's already a quality of the applicant pool.</p>

<p>The average GPA says to me that premed is easier than other things you can do at MIT. For example, my husband's aero-astro cohort was about 70 people, about the same as the number of undergraduate medical school applicants, and I will guarantee you that his cohort didn't have an average 3.6 GPA at graduation. And I don't think it's because the aero-astro kids are stupid.</p>

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molliebatmit has freely admitted that she didn't get straight A's in all of her basic MIT science courses that would have comprised the premed core. In fact, I think she may have even said she once got a C. She has also freely admitted that she probably would have gotten better grades had she gone to another school.

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I definitely didn't get straight A's in my basic science courses, and I did get a C in 8.02. (My fault. Didn't do the homework.)</p>

<p>I do not contend, though, that I would have done better somewhere else. I was very happy at MIT, and very successful for me. Marginally better, perhaps. But I am not personally motivated by grades and getting a high GPA was not a goal of mine at MIT anyway. </p>

<p>Actually, an interesting case is that after first semester of my junior year, a professor told me I needed to get my GPA up for graduate school, and I managed to raise my GPA from a 4.2 to a 4.5 in two semesters flat. So when I was interested in getting good grades, I was able to get them.</p>

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And, yeah, to get there, they have to place more emphasis on grades than the average student, but blame the system for demanding that, don't blame the pre-meds.

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<p>I do blame the system. That doesn't make the behavior less irritating. And it has consequences for the other people in their classes - it changes the dynamic of the class tremendously in ways that I found very negative, not to mention the effect on the curve. If it didn't, I wouldn't really have cared. Their goals and priorities are their own business if they aren't affecting me.</p>

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Let's be serious! No MIT student is going to be struggling with the basic pre-med requirements of calc, physics, chem or bio.

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<p>Baloney. They might not struggle with it if they were taking it somewhere else, but I've certainly seen plenty of MIT students trip up on MIT's organic chemistry. Actually, I've seen MIT students trip up on every single one of these subjects (I think around 15% of my classmates in the standard freshman classical mechanics class failed). Being an MIT student doesn't mean that you are awesome in all areas of math and science (though premeds be warned, you really should be a decent science generalist if med school is the route you want to go).</p>

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<p>I think the general student stereotype of premeds at MIT is a defensive mechanism. Academic-ish types understand that the premed approach is a very bad idea for them, so they start building up a loathing of it so that they will never be tempted by it. </p>

<p>My experience at MIT? I don't blame premeds for being at the butt end of many jokes! They just are! :)</p>

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<p>thanks for all the help! Also, just clarifying, the mit gpa is out of 5? And there seems to be a bad stereotype of premeds?? Please feel free to laugh at my ignorance.</p>

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<p>^ Yes and yes. I count quite a number of posts above that particularly support the answer of "yes" to your second question.</p>

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I remember reading this tidbit somewhere else in CC, and I haven't the interest to question its validity, but I heard that that is almost completely explainable by how MIT doesn't make the pre-med "approvals" those other schools do, such that anyone who wants to apply to medical school from MIT (even those who really have no chance) can apply to medical school.</p>

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Also, just clarifying, the mit gpa is out of 5?

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Yes, but unfortunately in a few places in this thread, we are talking about GPAs out of 4.0. Sorry for the confusion.</p>

<p>MIT GPAs can be translated to a four-point scale by subtracting 1.0, so long as the GPA in question doesn't contain any F's.</p>

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<p>Comparisons to HYPS aside, MIT's med school admit rate is still far higher than the national average. :)</p>

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<p>Even compared to HYPS, it's still not that bad. I mean, 90% (undergrad w/ advisor - not talking about grad students here) is not that far from 100. A few percentages less doesn't mean that MIT premeds are significantly disadvantaged.</p>

<p>This was actually a factor that I had to consider when I was applying to college. Going to med school had always been a strong possibility for me, so I did a lot of premed research prior to college (ie. whether to go to a more liberal-artsy school (esp Ivies) which favor premeds, rather than MIT). At the end, I figured the few percentage points didn't really matter - I think the rigor of MIT training would make up for that.</p>

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anyone who wants to apply to medical school from MIT (even those who really have no chance) can apply to medical school.

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<p>This is not entirely true. I've heard of the Career Office refusing to assign pre-med advisors to students with very bad GPA / apply too late in the process (you should apply end of soph year). Generally, they attribute this to the lack of available advisors. I mean, they probably can't stop you from applying, but not having a premed advisor to write your advisor rec might lower your chances for med school.</p>

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And there seems to be a bad stereotype of premeds??

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<p>Yes, but you can overcome it for yourself pretty easily by simply not acting according to stereotype. All the people who "hate premeds" also have individual premed friends (or at least, I've never known one who didn't). In fact, they tend to have a lot of respect for premeds who cope with the demands that the med school admissions system makes without turning cutthroat and obnoxious. I certainly do - to me, it shows a lot of strength of character. Note that if you're a non-stereotypical premed, you may have to put up with a lot of "You're a <em>premed</em>? Really?". It's generally a compliment. :)</p>

<p>I had been planning to bow out of this thread, and will do so after this post, but I didn't want to leave you with the impression that if you're a premed and you come to MIT everyone will hate you. I was a premed as a frosh, before I realized that I was only doing it because I didn't know what else to do with my life, and people didn't hold it against me. If you come to MIT and you're obnoxious in certain ways that are anathema to the community, you won't be well-liked (premed or not). Sadly (and yes, like I said earlier, I do put a lot of blame on the med school admissions system for it), there's a strong correlation between people who are obnoxious in those ways and premed status, so it's the premed stereotype.</p>

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I've heard of the Career Office refusing to assign pre-med advisors to students with very bad GPA

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<p>I have never heard that to be true. Students have at most two semesters of grades by the time they apply for an advisor, spring sophomore year (first semester is P/NR). GPA tends to rise for upperclassmen, so it would be very difficult to predict final GPA anyway. </p>

<p>The application process is fairly complex, requires many pieces and an advisor is certainly an advantage. They write a separate letter of recommendation, review the personal statement, train the premed student for interviews, advise on volunteering and medical careers, help with physician shadowing, review curriculum and timing of application...
Prehealth</a> Advisors - MIT Careers Office</p>

<p>Most elite schools have a fairly strict premed advising system. I don't believe believe Harvard for instance even lets you apply to medical schools as an undergrad unless you use their House-based premed advising system. MIT is fairly liberal in that regard, although you reduce your chances of admission by failing to get an advisor in time.</p>

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GPA tends to rise for upperclassmen

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<p>Whoa, really?</p>

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<p>Makes sense. The majority of your classes as an upperclassman are for your major, which you (hopefully) will enjoy and/or be better at.</p>

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<p>As long as you work hard and stay focused you should be able to get into medical school and most likely a good one at that. Check out this pdf file of where MIT premeds got accepted: <a href="http://web.mit.edu/career/www/preprof/2007top25.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://web.mit.edu/career/www/preprof/2007top25.pdf&lt;/a>. Harvard took a 3.2 from MIT.</p>

<p>Also, one can be premed and still want to do research as a career. I myself want to do a MD/PhD. and work as a researcher in biomed engineering. Medical school doesn't mean you'll be confined to a hospital for the rest of your life. There are MIT faculty who actually did the MD/PhD route and are now researchers. </p>

<p>Here are some more general stats of premeds at MIT:
Preprofessional</a> Stats - MIT Careers Office</p>

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I've heard of the Career Office refusing to assign pre-med advisors to students with very bad GPA</p>

<p>I have never heard that to be true.

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<p>I didn't think so either, but at a premed info session I went to last March, two ex-premeds (currently med students) said that not all who apply even at the right time (spring sophomore year) will get an adviser. They attributed this to a lack of advisers (which may or may not be true, but that's beside the point). Hence, the most logical reason I can think of distinguishing the ones that will get advisers and that won't will be on the basis of grades. I mean, I may be jumping the gun there by making the inference I did, but at the info session I did distinctly remember that they said not all premeds are guaranteed advisers even if you apply at the right time.</p>

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GPA tends to rise for upperclassmen

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Whoa, really?

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Yup -- I saw a PDF once (though I think it's no longer online) indicating that GPA rises steadily as students progress through MIT, from something like an average 3.8 for sophomores to a 4.2 for seniors.</p>

<p>Upper-division classes are, ideally, more tailored to your interests and therefore more interesting.</p>

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<p>I think the more important factors are that the upper level courses are smaller and therefore the curve is not so harsh and rigid as in the GIR courses with hundreds of freshmen. I took a math course with 7 people in it. A good half got A's, I think. It's not out of the ordinary for small classes. Compare that with, say 6.001 with 300 students where the cutoff for A is top 25% of the class. And in addition, that the student has hopefully learned from his/her mistakes and figured out how to study/manage their time.</p>

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<p>And of course, the junior/senior pass/fail option helps keep more uncomfortable classes from having an effect on your GPA. :p</p>

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No, I didn't -- I said the average premed applicant has a higher GPA than the average MIT student. Not the average premed admit. Of course, the average premed admit ends up having a higher than average GPA, but that's just because that's already a quality of the applicant pool.</p>

<p>The average GPA says to me that premed is easier than other things you can do at MIT. For example, my husband's aero-astro cohort was about 70 people, about the same as the number of undergraduate medical school applicants, and I will guarantee you that his cohort didn't have an average 3.6 GPA at graduation. And I don't think it's because the aero-astro kids are stupid.

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<p>I'm afraid I don't see the logic. Now, sure, being a premed at MIT is probably easier than certain other things you could do at MIT. But that's not the question. The question is whether you could do better at an entirely different school, and the answer is almost certainly 'yes'. </p>

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I definitely didn't get straight A's in my basic science courses, and I did get a C in 8.02. (My fault. Didn't do the homework.

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<p>Yes, but at other schools, you could have not done the homework and still have gotten a good (or at least better) grade. </p>

<p>See, that's the point I'm making. MIT is a tough school, relative to most. In fact, MIT's reputation is based on that fact. But that toughness has its price. Going to MIT probably means that you will have to work harder for worse grades than you would have at other schools. {After all, if that wasn't the case, then what exactly is MIT's tough reputation based on?}</p>

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I remember reading this tidbit somewhere else in CC, and I haven't the interest to question its validity, but I heard that that is almost completely explainable by how MIT doesn't make the pre-med "approvals" those other schools do, such that anyone who wants to apply to medical school from MIT (even those who really have no chance) can apply to medical school.

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<p>Uh, no, your logic is backwards. First off, MIT does not have the prescreening process that you have stated.</p>

<p>But if it did, then MIT's admit rate should be higher than the Ivies (who do not have prescreens). Not lower. After all, to prescreen means to simply not allow the mediocre students from even applying in the first place, which means that your ultimate admit rate should be higher than at comparable schools. Yet MIT's admit rate is lower.</p>