Thank you.
I would never call it lottery. Itâs standard comment by ORMs about top programs. We donât know what program director looks for or what other candidates have. Lot of times LORs could be the difference.
Itâs good to have goals for anyone as long as you donât go into depression if you donât achieve. My Sâs goal was to get into UCSF but also knew that itâs very tough as an Asian. He showed more emotion with that outcome than any other ones.
My recommendation would be to still take up JHU full ride and see how it goes. Most likely your C will do just fine or even fantastic (have known two kids who went to BME there, did great and landed in their med school, one without and one with gap years).
If for any reason C has a change of mind about major, can switch to some related fields like Bio chemical/Molecular engineering, neuro science or public health which are relatively easier to maintain high gpa. As long as medicine is still on the radar.
The drawback though is if there were to be change of mind on not going to medicine altogether, donât think has any great alternatives there which can serve as great launching pads in fields like business, investment banking, law etc. That is the difference between Ivies, some of the schools you mentioned above and JHU.
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Around 150 hours each in clinical volunteering and around 50 hrs of shadowing and probably 400 hrs of research (one summer) are general guidelines. To get into T20s you need to show strong experiences, not necessarily number of hours.
My S had 2000 hrs of research, 100+ clinical, 150 hrs of public health project, 250 non-clinical hours but all those are very meaningful and got great LORs.
There are applicants with 1000+ clinical hours and schools like UChicago prefer those.
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Oh wow! For the T20s, you mention strong experiences. What do you mean by this? Can I throw in some non-medical experiences as well (for instance, joining a music ensemble for four years)?
Anything you show creativity or real leadership instead of simply raking up hours. For example my S came up with new STEM curriculum for youth mentoring program which lead to an award and strong LOR.
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Unfortunately there are curriculum discrepancies even in standardized curriculums. I have known schools that âhideâ kids in an AP class as they wouldnât have to take a state exam which affects school scores. (AP tests donât count and actually more kids in AP is seen as a positive). You just teach it as a very very watered down class.
I know for my son, the dual enrollment program was challenging but manageable. We are viewing it as basically honors versions of the courses and fully expect he will still have to hustle hard in college.
( I also am avoiding the rant about testing and school rating LOL. Itâs a hot button topic for my field)
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Depends on the teacher and school. When C had the first AP course ever in sophomore year, the chemistry teacher walks into the class on the first day and makes it clear to the kids to expect an average grade of C for the class and an average of 5 on the AP. As such the bars set for being able to enroll in the class were high enough, but he wouldnât care. End of the year about 2 students get an A and 5 getting A- and the rest in B and C ranges (about 18 of them). As promised, most of them had 5s on AP. No wonder the kids doing well in that class would never have to worry in any chemistry class ever in college.
Another teacher in the same school, with a Ph.D was far easier. He even lifted the overall year end class grades to As for anyone getting a 5 on the AP but were below an A in the class.
The reason it feels like a lottery is due to the number of variables involved - many of which are outside the control or influence of students/parents.
Also, the fact that most of the students are capable / worthy of admissions makes it very close.
My discussions with one of the ADCOMS of a BS/MD program revealed that they could not call deserving students for interviews as they had scored 0.5 points less than the ones they called for interview. The students had the stuff they expected from students but after their internal scoring, they were losing out for 0.5 points.
No wonder it feels like a lottery!
I understand it fees like lottery and I wonder same but my point is schools have their own process and even that changes. Just to say itâs lottery or pure luck is denial,. However we all need some luck to have success or happiness 
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I got into WISE and I believe they are calling for BSMDs in the next two weeks according to their little information on the stony website.
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Donât know what is going on at SBU, but luckily donât have to care as DD decided to attend Upstate program. DD applied to WISE in November along with other schools and do not even have UG admission at SBU, let alone WISE and BSMD. They keep replying your application is all complete and will be reviewed 
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How would we know if Câs high school is competitive / âhigh rigorâ or not?
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I have to say this again; I know Caltech! Comparing Harvey Mud to Caltech is like trying to compare apples to oranges. I might even want to stretch that no two schools are comparable! I came to this forum trying to learn how people think about college admissions. I learned a lot during my short time here. However, Iâm surprised that a lot of myths still persist. For the sake of young minds taking the things they read here to heart as they consider their future, I will make a few suggestions:
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If you want to be a physician, engineering is not the easiest undergraduate major although it is probably one of the best majors. The way an engineer is trained to think brings a unique perspective to medicine. The only caveat is that there are special talents needed to survive in Engineering. Battling Differential Equations and Thermodynamics while trying to understand Organic Chemistry is a tough balancing act!
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Regardless of undergraduate school attended (I see a lot of talk about rankings here) or major, your GPA and MCAT scores are important screening tools. Guess who administers these tools during the admission process? A couple of clerks in the admissions office who have no clue thereâs a difference between Calpoly and Caltech! So, your 3.6 from JHU automatically screens you out while screening in a guy with a 4.0 from an âunrankedâ school. Your JHU, Caltech, Harvard or MIT pedigree is only useful when it is time to choose between two students who have already been screened in!
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Although medicine is a profession, it is also a vocation! You still have a lot of skills to learn as you go on in your career. The first step is knowing that you want to be a doctor. You can never know what kind of doctor you want to be until you go through the process. It is a journey of self discovery. You will get to know yourself as you get to know the profession; as this continues, you will know where exactly you fit in. You will find your specialty because of that thing thatâs special about you as a person as you interact with the profession. So, your main goal as a High School graduate is to find the surest way to get into medical training if youâve decided at this stage that a physician is what youâve decided to become. Forget about medical school rankings for now! Many things go into rankings but, at the end of the day, the most important thing is taking a path that gives you the best chance to become a physician.
Finally, High School is different from College. Your life is going to change in the next 4 years. You will lose old friends and make new ones. These events will affect your life in significant ways. For the first time, you might come to realize that the difference between A+ and B- is simply about how you respond to failure on a test. The student who eventually gets A+ after failing the first test on the course has developed the skill to quickly ask for help during office hours. The straight A high school graduate who is still reluctant to ask for help is very smart but will get a B- because they are too cocky to ask for help or join a study group. By the time you know whatâs happening, it might already be too late because you now have a permanent record of your academic life called âTranscriptsâ and GPA. Your dream is over before it can even begin!
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There is no one size fit all here, but I think of it as how hard and what kind of rigor courses a student needs to take to be in some top percentage of the class (top 1%, top 3%, top 5% etc). In my D school (which I feel is very competitive), val/sal has like 22-25 AP courses (so corresponding high GPAs).
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received call from NJIT. ACCEPTED TO NJMS BSMD PROGRAM!!
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My D also got the call. Accepted into NJMS. His first acceptance into BSMD program. We are so happy for him.
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Congrats !!
Congratulations to you both!!