The stats are interesting.
While the School of Medicine has 41% Asian-Americans, the School of Health Professions has only 9% Asian-Americans.
What explains the difference? Applicant pool or population?
While Schools can have multiple objectivs, they select students from the applicant pool at the end of the day.
One of my former students in the PMM program scored a 523 on MCAT. He completed his undergrad in 2 years and spent his 3rd year doing research.
He has no intention of applying out. He is happy to matriculate into SKMC.
His reason - he can achieve his specialty objectives while being at SKMC.
Every kid has their own reason to apply out or not.
Having a great MCAT score is one factor - not the only factor.
No, the BS degree is not given out after 3rd year itself, but rather completion of 1st year med school or 4th year of the program. However it is certainly possible to get BS after 3rd year if one decides to opt out of the program by a set predetermined date and inform the program director or administration. In such case they will be more flexible in giving as many as possible AP credits to facilitate any major or humanities requirements and the earlier graduation.
If any intentions of doing so check with your program. Each one have their own policy with some of them like UConn, VCU even open to applying out while still retaining the slot.
Congratulations to your D and family. I know how incredibly proud you must all be just as we were. What is amazing is that these kids accomplish these feats even without much breathing space or leg room for MCAT preparation doing it right after sophomore year. Till end of summer 1 of sophomore they are busy with the mandatory Bio course, giving them hardly month or two before the MCAT. I remember well how kid barely had time to take like 3 full length practice tests before heading for the exam. Also managed by studying only older edition materials handed over by someone in their senior batch almost for free.
Likewise heard of, through a common contact, kid in Penn State program finishing MCAT with a 525, finishing undergrad course requirements in 2 years and headed out for study abroad for a Masters somewhere in Europe. Not sure if any intentions of opting out later or continuing with the program upon returning but will share it if I find out in near future.
Unless they have nice medical school scholarships, there is a lot of money out there for scholarships for people with high stats.
They are pretty much forgoing that when they dont even try.
It sound like applyout isnāt for 7 year accelerated program, unless someone really want to do it. That explains why BU SMED students largely be in the program, besides some having near perfect stats (GPA and MCAT).
I dont know this specific case but generally a PMM kid CANNOT do a masters after 2 years because they DO NOT have a BS degree. They only complete 90 credits.
Most PMM kids (95% of them) cannot apply out because they do not have a BS degree. They get their BS degree after they complete the 1st year of med school.
@NoviceDad ā The person you are talking about would 99% not have qualified to apply out without a BS unless he did another major also. But doing a double major in PMM in 2 years is generally not possible.
Yes, more and more schools are offering merit scholarship and they have to keep up their rank and compete with NYU.
Again if you think your kid can achieve high stats then itās worth taking chance like my DS did. Finishing UG in 2 years is not an achievement for us and I encouraged my S to expand his horizon and do good liberal arts classes and at the same time have fun. If parents canāt afford 4 years of UG then only they should go for 2/3 years or they want a dedicated research year. My nephew finished UG in 2 and went for one year research at an Ivy (he is in 7 yr BSMD).
I am sure Penn State with itās vast international brand name recognition and connections has partnership programs and agreements with international peers which will allow such a flexibility for itās students. I did verify this studentās linked in profile and it does say pursuing masters at such and such, a rather well known one Internationally ( I am with holding for privacy reasons). His/her profile still says student at the Penn State 7 year program.
Yes, they have to forego their slot if they want to opt out. No free lunch there. From logistics perspective, BUSM will have to go through the paper work through interview process of an additional 100 applicants through the traditional route to fill for each single slot that just opens up if and when someone opts out. Thatās why they need well in advance notice like early fall of junior year or so for any such opt out requests.But they did allow if someone wanted to take a gap year before matriculating even beyond that early fall time frame, for whatever reason, personal, family, academic etc.
The real reason no one opted out is they all loved the whole experience, the undergrad, the city, the vibes, the med school and all bonded well with each other within this cohort, not viewing each other as a competitor but as a comrade. Thatās why it took my child a second to answer with an assertive no when I proposed to apply to our in state med school, even with the lure of being offered the cost savings by doing so.
Yes got the confirmation s/he continuing in the program having finished the study abroad masters at a well known institution in a year.
Interestingly, I was checking on another kid from Rice Baylor program and turned out they jumped ship to take a full tuition ride at Penn instead of going to Baylor 3 years ago.
My DS knows him. Thatās an achievement.
How well they mix with other MD students given the age gap?
Not much 10k/year, we didnāt expect any scholarship as it is a combined program. But it helps to reduce the loansš
Some of the combined program schools do have some nice scholarships in medical schools. Unfortunately, they use them to lure new students and not those already locked in.
I am guessing Brown PLME financial aid continues to work in medical school after adding on loan expected for med students. HPME didnāt continue and expected students to borrow all of it outside of a 5k grant from what one parent told me.
Yes, itās tough to get scholarships in combined programs medical schools. Congratulations for getting it.
In Europe, students can finish their BSc in 3 years and MSc in 1 year. They donāt require a bachelorās degree certificate and a complete transcript as a requirement for MSc admissions. All the kid had to show is that they have enough knowledge in the required subjects and write a personal statement in support of their candidature.
This is just one of the paths that students can choose to do in their 3rd year. There are other paths as well such as Research like @NoviceDad mentioned
Thanks for confirming that academic flexibility. Yes everywhere else in the world, as someone rightly stated in last yearās thread, it is so easy and straight forward for the kids to enter medicine or their chosen field as 17 or 18 year olds. It is only here that they are subjected through so many loops and hops that by the time they get to start they are half exhausted already.
Remember kid sitting in for this test during senior year HS for Oxford University medicine. Obviously not selected even though the test itself was apparently not too difficult. Students sit for that test from across the world for a handful of seats to outsiders so chances of getting called for interview was very slim. Had been successful with final selection, (including interview with actual subject(s) matter) would have started 6 year (I believe) medical course at Oxford University as a 17 year old. I think some valedictorian of their high school few batches earlier did just that.
By the way I asked my contact about the student at Penn State mentioned earlier, whether s/he ever considered opting out, and the answer given was, the student likes it there (so obviously never considered despite stellar MCAT, academics and a masters from a world renowned institution)
( I was on vacation so didnāt get time to respond)ā¦ so catching up with IM
@texaspg ā¦ agree that too in west coast and few states itās becoming very hard. Like @NoviceDad saidā¦ instead of population they should compare with the #applications and that really skews it more.
@Hardyhibiscus , if you are an ORM (baring few exceptions 33 will be tough to crack). Yes I do know someone who went to Cincy (though it is less discussed here itās good school). Toledo is "kind of like " EA (BACC2MD Program)ā¦ I would encourage your kid to give another shot at ACT. Please do note that some colleges may look holistically too (rather than by just numbers) but itās better to be prepped.
@srk2017 , IMO there are only 1 or 2 schools that have 7 years. My personal feeling is you should never choose the BSMD just bcoz you can finish it early (I think itās like doing 4 X100M speed instead of 400 M speed). Not everyone may be equipped to handle that much stuff. I do know kids who are hell bend or 100% made up of their path and itās good for them to choose that.