<p>Hi. Rising senior here who is interested in UChicago and has a question. How strong is UChicago in the sciences esp. in Biology and Chemistry? I definitely want to go to med school and I am curious how the program is compared to other schools know for producing premeds? </p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>Chicago is very good in both, and it also produces its number of premeds. But don't come here unless you really want to. The premed course is one of the most intense at the school. Check out the [url=<a href="http://pre-med.uchicago.edu/%5DPMSA%5B/url">http://pre-med.uchicago.edu/]PMSA[/url</a>] page for more information.</p>
<p>Chicago is very strong in physics (ranked 7 in usnews, 4.7 peer rating I think) and fairly strong in chemistry and biology (both in 15-20 range, something like 4.2 peer rating). Even if your back-up plan is graduate school in the sciences, Chicago will be an excellent place to go. I turned down the Berkeley School of Chemistry, which is #1 in that field. </p>
<p>I'm pre-med as well and I'll be going to Chicago this fall. The college is very much oriented away from pre-professional pursuits such as pre-med. We do get advisers as one would at any other college. From my own research into pre-med, I would heavily advise against going to a strong pre-med school like WUSTL or JHU. These places will not make it easier for you to get into a good med school, as the competition is said to be intense. They will go out out of their way to try to weed you out of pre-med. DO NOT go to a school based on its strong pre-med program unless you are very, very confident in your ability to compete with extremely driven individuals. </p>
<p>That said, Chicago is not a great place to go if your primary motivation is getting into med school. GPA is extremely important in the medical admissions process. Schools like Chicago, MIT, Caltech, Cornell, Swarthmore, Reed, etc. that are known for demanding academics and harsh grading may well hurt your chances. Chicago's success rate is 65% for all who apply to med school. Another great schools with a shockingly low acceptance rate is MIT (75%). Chicago and MIT are difficult schools, and this can EASILY hurt you.</p>
<p>Your best bet to maximize your chance of admission is to go to an HYP, Stanford, Brown, UPenn, Duke, Williams, etc. type school. These are well known and respected schools at which it is much easier to get a high GPA. IF you don't like this type of school, the next best bet would be an honors college at a great public like NCarolina-Chapel Hill, Michigan, Virginia, Wisconsin, etc.</p>
<p>Are you dedicated to a science major? Chemistry in particular is not a great choice for a pre-med major from the point of view of gaining admission to med school unless you want to go the MD/Ph.D track and bio majors who don't get into med school are a dime a dozen. (Science majors will help you handle the first two years of med school and the first board exam, but almost no one actually fails at med school once accepted.) Unrelated majors like Economics (my major) and Philosophy (I would double major in this if it were logically possible with pre-med at chicago, which it is not) actually have higher acceptance rates to med school than bio/chem majors, If I'm not mistaken.</p>
<p>I would say that you should only go to Chicago if you are really into a certain category of school. If you're the type of person who loves places like Chicago, Swarthmore, Caltech, Reed, the St. John's Colleges, etc. and you are confident that you can get a high GPA at a very tough school, I would thoroughly recommend Chicago. If you want to maximize your chances, Chicago is definitely not the place to be.</p>
<p>"Chicago's success rate is 65% for all who apply to med school. Another great schools with a shockingly low acceptance rate is MIT (75%)."</p>
<p>Where did you get these statistics?</p>
<p>From the MIT pre-health website:
Total MIT Acceptance Rate 73.5% </p>
<p>from the Chicago health professions handbook online:
In 1999, students from Chicago who scored the national average (~8) or higher on each section of the MCAT and had a GPA equal to or greater than the College Deans List (3.25) had a 67% rate of acceptance. With a GPA of 3.30 the acceptance rate was 75%.</p>
<p>Obviously the Chicago info is seven years outdated. Also, I infer that the total acceptance rate was less than 67%. My error.</p>
<p>National average is 48%.</p>
<p>I heard that the U. of C. has a 65% med school acceptance rate from a current bio major. It is true.</p>
<p>I don't know much about premed, since I don't want to be a doctor...
However, Chicago just had their grand opening for the Integrated Sciences Center. It is AWESOME and I will be going as a potential biochem major. </p>
<p>I too turned down some schools that were more highly ranked because rankings are b u l l s h i t and Chicago is sooo much cooler than HYP if you aren't thinking premed. Maybe if you are, too.</p>
<p>You should be careful about drawing conclusions from such raw statistics as the percentage accepted. </p>
<p>Why?</p>
<p>Because reporting standards, and the approach to premed education vary greatly from college to college. As others have pointed out, some schools actively manage the med school application process, to the point of informally or formally screening candidates. Only candidates that pass a pre-screen have supported applications, and these are the only ones counted in the reported statistic, to use one example.</p>
<p>You folks would be a whole lot better off getting advice from students at U of C, especially successful med school applicants. </p>
<p>Keep in mind too, that the attrition rate from pre-med is high everywhere. IMHO, you would be better off focusing on finding a place for a good education in a variety of topics, rather than narrowly focusing on one possible career path that you may not stick to anway.</p>
<p>IF you were so committed to medicine already, you should be looking at one of the accelerated programs that chicago doesn't offer.</p>
<p>newmassdad,</p>
<p>Although Chicago doesn't offer a combined undergrad/medschool program like, say, Michigan, there is the [url=<a href="http://pre-health.uchicago.edu/handbook/eap.html%5DEAP%5B/url">http://pre-health.uchicago.edu/handbook/eap.html]EAP[/url</a> at Pritzker.</p>
<p>Here may be some helpful links: </p>
<p><a href="http://pre-med.uchicago.edu/index.html%5B/url%5D">http://pre-med.uchicago.edu/index.html</a>
<a href="http://maroon.uchicago.edu/o-issue/2005/the_unofficial_guide_to_being_a_u_of_c_premed.php%5B/url%5D">http://maroon.uchicago.edu/o-issue/2005/the_unofficial_guide_to_being_a_u_of_c_premed.php</a></p>
<p>(Notice that those Chicago pre-med acceptance rates are for 3.25 to 3.3 GPAs, if one can manage a 3.5 the results will improve as well. I would guess that most from other schools with a GPA in the 3.3 range do not have a 75% admit rate. A friend on a top med school admissions committee recently told my S that a 3.5 from Chicago was equivalent to a 3.8 or 3.9 from the local flagship state school.)</p>
<p>just wanted to add that studies have been done that show that your choice of major has no influence on whether you get into medical school or not (don't have any direct links right now, but it's been stated many times on the pre-med board)</p>
<p>would it be better, in ur opinion, to go to a school like Yale (bearable in terms of environment) and do premed with a high gpa or Uchic (which i Love) and not have such a high one to show? mebbe not other schools, but wouldn't pritzker recognize that UChic undergrads had it tougher but are more qualified? i dont doubt my ability to do well anywhere, but as a rising senior, i just want to maximize my chances at getting into med school in 4 yrs. </p>
<p>btw, my resume includes: 2310 sat, 5.4/3.8 gpa. Rank: val and IB diploma candidate at a VERY underpriviliged school in miami. state science fair & spanish competition winner, among numerous other book, local & regional awards. done research at UF and held internships/volunteer positions at hospitals. I run the Indian Students Association, the Science Club and the florida Youth Ethics initiative. I teach sunday school at my temple, and am a trained Indian classical dancer for 12 yrs. I'm also a little differently-minded. im the weird, nerdy but socially adept type of kid they like. What do u think are my chances at UChic!!???!!!???!</p>
<p>Pritzker does more than that. It has an early</a> acceptance program for students in the College.</p>
<p>As for getting accepted, well, look at the numbers above. They seem pretty promising to me. It's not hard to get above a 3.25 at Chicago if you're dedicated (that's the GPA for the Dean's List, incidentally).</p>
<p>The early admissions program has been discontinued, and replaced with another program.</p>
<p>"The Accelerated Medical Scholars Programreplaces the Early Admissions Programs for University of Chicago undergraduates. Modeled on pre-existing professional options programs in the Harris School of Public Policy and the Graduate School of Business, the Accelerated Medical Scholars Program provides exceptional students with the flexibility to move forward in their medical education during their fourth year in College and obtain credit for both their undergraduate and their medical degrees. The program will benefit the medical school by bringing those University of Chicago undergraduates, who have potential to make important future contributions in science and medicine, into our community of scholars. It will benefit the students by shortening their application cycle, reducing their years in school and reducing their overall educational debt."
<a href="http://pritzker.bsd.uchicago.edu/about/news/pritzkerpulse/2005spring/%5B/url%5D">http://pritzker.bsd.uchicago.edu/about/news/pritzkerpulse/2005spring/</a></p>
<p>A useful pre-med doc: <a href="http://collegeadmissions.uchicago.edu/pdfs/premed.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://collegeadmissions.uchicago.edu/pdfs/premed.pdf</a></p>
<p>Well, there you have it. I don't really stay abreast of med school happenings. God bless Google.</p>