Why do 60% of USF students get accepted to medical school over UCSD’s 30% when UCSD constantly is ranked higher and given more credit that USF? Am I completely missing something? Which would better prepare me for medical school?
University of South Florida does have some pre-meds in a 7-year BS+MD express program.
University of San Francisco has a pre-med committee which presumably informs the student how realistic medical school admission is, presumably causing students with no realistic chance of admission to decide not to apply.
So why is UCSD’s so low if they are apparently one of the best schools to go to for a student looking to prepare for medschool?
Do you know the number of student who apply to medical school from both colleges? (USF being San Francisco)
UCSD has over 4 times the number of undergrad students compared to USF, which means way more premeds. Not only does that potentially drive up competition, but it does increase the risk of students falling through the cracks just due to the sheer size of the premed population. USF, being a smaller school, may simply have a more manageable population of premeds, allowing them to pay more attention to them, and either successfully help out struggling premeds or successfully preventing unqualified applicants from applying.
@ErinLoflin You need to research and post how UCSD and USF arrived at the %. Have they shared the details about the data? What are the underlying assumptions. For example, did the % arrived using the number of students registered for pre-med or used only the number of students for whom the pre-med office gave the LOR.
Compare % only if both schools have used IDENTICAL method to do direct comparison.
https://www.aamc.org/download/321442/data/factstablea1.pdf
For the 2018-19 cycle, UCSD produced 578 applicants; USF not listed (so produced fewer than 50 applicants last cycle)
For comparison purposes, University of Rochester, a small private university the same size as USF, produced 170 applicants last year.
UCSD does not do pre-med committee letters (that effectively function as pre-application weed-out of pre-meds with no realistic chance of admission to medical school), so its pool of applicants to medical school has more of those with no realistic chance of admission who would have been weeded out at schools that do pre-med committee letters (either by refusal to write one, or by the committee making it clear to the pre-med that applying would be a waste of time and money).
I know a MD who went to UCSD. He once told a story about how his first day at UCSD he was sitting in the back of lecture hall in a premed req with several hundred other eager young minds. The prof walks in and asks how many taking this course are premeds. MD said it seemed like everyone’s hand went up.
The point to take from above is every premed req at UCSD will include hundreds of smart students, premed or not. Below is a link to Fall 2018 Biochem (BIBC102), a premed req. Although 3 profs taught this course in Fall 2018, look just at Prof Hampton’s course… 13 sections each with 32 students. Let’s be generous and say 25% get As, most will get less, probably Cs or lower. One C ((or even a couple of Cs/Bs sprinkled about)) may not be fatal to a premed’s chances. But you’ll be up against this type of competition every quarter in pretty much every course, especially premed reqs
https://act.ucsd.edu/scheduleOfClasses/scheduleOfClassesStudentResult.htm
In addition UCSD operates on a 10 week quarter. In some premed reqs, you could be facing a “midterm” in week 4, another “midterm” in week 7, and a final at end of quarter. The steady pressure to be “on” from day one with not only academic demands but also coupled with trying to fit in ECs, have a social life, etc, will be too much and end most premed chances at UCSD.
I’m not trying to deter you from UCSD or from pursing your dreams, but this is the type of reality you’ll face at UCSD, or wherever you go. I cant comment on USF, but I will say UCSD will offer the resources and opportunities you need to become a successful premed applicant. Whether you do so will be much more on you, less on UCSD or wherever you go. Good luck.
You can attend USF(San Francisco) and perhaps you might have an easier time to get better grade, but it all evens out with the Mcat. The med school will look at the grade AND the Mcat, if you are weak in either part, you will not be admitted.
https://as.ucsd.edu/Home/InstructorGradeArchive can help you with UCSD grade distributions.
I’m going to guess that the 30% rate for UCSD students is probably low for all who applied in whatever cycle you reference. Perhaps those releasing their data to the University were on the low side of qualification and were seeking greater guidance. The national average nationwide is ~ 40% and the rate of acceptance for California residents is about the same with much more being accepted at out-of-state SOMs, so I can’t imagine that SD students wouldn’t have the wherewithal to apply in great numbers outside of the state as they have in the past when the numbers were more representative at least nationally, when they had ~ 50% acceptance.
To answer your question, what you’re missing is the fact that each university decides, on its own, who qualifies as a pre-med student, and therefore decides how many of its pre-meds got accepted into medical school. There’s no standard definition, so schools massage the definition in order to make their numbers look better.
The numbers of pre-meds AMCAS reports are not based on a school’s self reporting, but on data culled from actual AMCAS applicants.
Your post indicated that USF numbers weren’t listed, so based on that, how does one get an accurate count on acceptances?
What the chart you posted reflects is the number of applications from a given school, and how many medical schoo attendees each school produced. It does not indicate how many started as pre-meds, and it doesn’t reflect any numbers for USF, so not sure how OP arrived at 60% v 30%.
In addition, the chart shows UCSD had 7237 applications submitted, with 134 medical school matriculants; even accounting for the footnote of 16 applications per indvidual, also not sure where OP’s 30% comes from, or how the chart posted even addresses that. It appears OP is basing his/her information on other sources.
USF uses a committee letter. Their acceptance rates only includes those pre-med who use this service. The acceptance rate is available thru the career placement office at USF.
A HP letter is strongly preferred by med schools (required if available by many med schools) so it’s unlikely that students would by-pass the HP committee.
<a href="https://www.aamc.org/download/321442/data/factstablea1.pdf">https://www.aamc.org/download/321442/data/factstablea1.pdf</a>
That chart ^^ you're referencing list is the number of application RECIEVED by each medical school--and has nothing to do the number of applicants each undergraduate school produces.
This chart lists every institution in the US that provided 50 or more applicants to med school.
<a href="https://www.aamc.org/download/321442/data/factstablea1.pdf">https://www.aamc.org/download/321442/data/factstablea1.pdf</a>
UCSD had 581 med school applicants in 2018-19. It does not list how many were successful. USF does not appear on the list and so one may assume that USF produced fewer than 50 med school applicants in the 2018-19 cycle. o how does the list answer OP’s question, as she’s asking about pre-med schools? She’s asking, as an undergraduate which school gives her a better shot at getting into medical school OP has clearly obtained information from another source, and it’s definitely not AAMC. There is no clear answer to OP’s question, as it’s up to each school to decide how many of its pre-meds successfully apply to medical school, because the schools define who is considered a pre-med.
Just a few days ago, it was insisted that 75% of premeds don’t go to medical school, for a variety of reasons. If that’s accurate, then both USF and UCSD are above average. And in this case, nobody knows-apparently-the number of USF applicants, so the 60% figure is suspect, at best. Does it mean 60% of freshmen pre-meds were accepted into medical school? Or that 60% of those who got committee letters were accepted?
Any medical school applicant ought to take pre-med success rates with a grain of salt. There’s no agreed definition, so in this case it would be in the prospective student’s best interest to review how those percentages-60% v. 30%-were obtaine
–the 75% number references FRESHMEN pre-med—and is an estimate made by several med school adcomms based on observational data about the number of undergrads who apply to med school at their university associated undergrad, and on academic studies on STEM major attrition rates.
–Objectively 67% of those who take the MCAT fail to gain an acceptance. (So a 33% success rate for those who persist to this point)). Of those who actually submit and AMCAS application, about 40% gain an acceptance to med school. (Which, though low, is still higher than the acceptance rate was back in the late 70s-early 80s when applicant stats were significantly lower than they are today.)
The USF acceptance rates are based ONLY on those students who are vetted by health profession committee and found acceptable. (HP committees require a student’s full medical school application packet–including GPA. calculations, transcript, MCAT scores, LORs, list of ECs,plus an in-person interview.) So the acceptance rate is skewed because HP committee only approves students who are most likely to be accepted to med school.
The UCSD acceptance rate is self-reported–which automatically makes it suspect since unsuccessful students are less likely to report their failures.
So the stats being thrown around reference a bunch of different populations that can’t be compared.
I am always the first one to tell pre-meds that any college acceptance data must be viewed with a metric ton of salt because you have no idea how they we’re. calculated.
***I’m not even going to mention that some schools only report MD acceptance rates, while others report MD & DO acceptances combined, and still others include any health professional school in their acceptance rates; some even include Caribbean and other foreign medical schools in their acceptance rates.
A CA Adcomm on that other pre med discussion board posted USF’s med school admission data for 2018–
MCAT Scores and GPAs by Undergraduate Institution 2018 (MCAT scores and GPAs shown only where n>=5)
The data is from AMCAS but is behind a paywall and available only to academic faculty.
Notwithstanding your use of capital letters, the 75% number is still unsupported by objective data. It’s become urban legend here on CC. And since only a very small number of colleges-perhaps only 2 or 3-have a major of “pre-med” it is almost impossible to quantify who actually qualifies as possessing that status, at until actual applications are submitted…
And the OP is asking which undergraduate school is better to prepare her, so whether it’s applied to freshmen only or not is irrelevant. The simple fact is before giving admissions numbers any credence, you need to know exactly to whom those numbers apply. But as we keep going back and forth, it’s clear we’re never going to agree.
This happened to my brother as a Premed at USC (Calif). And after virtually every hand went up in the biology class, the prof said look to your left, and look to your right. Only one of you will still be premed in a year.
And that’s an old story that happens at many, many undergrads.
When my niece was premed at UCSD she found that there was a lot of sabotaging going on because the competition was so intense. Likely similar gunners exist at the UCB, UCLA, UCI, UCDavis. Perhaps less so at the other UCs?
Erin…go to the school where you think you’ll get the best GPA?