UMich RANK #30???

<p>This is from Wall Street Journal in 2003, regarding percent success in entrance to top professional programs.</p>

<p><a href="http://wsjclassroom.com/pdfs/wsj_college_092503.pdf%5B/url%5D%5B/B%5D"&gt;http://wsjclassroom.com/pdfs/wsj_college_092503.pdf</a></p>

<p>Ranking the Colleges...
Wall Street Journal 25 September 2003. Web. 25 March 2010.

[quote]
...for getting into Yale Med, Chicago Business and all those other elite business, medical and law schools.

[/quote]

WHY RANK #30??? I never doubted UMich's reputation, but I always thought it was one of the best for pre-professional; people always say we have the most med school grads and the like... turns out that's because we have a big in-state advantage: 111/344 UMich med matriculates (2007) went to Wayne, 23 to MSU and 37 back to UM.</p>

<p>Is it harder to get close relations/recs from professors? Is there more grade deflation? Can freshmen see each class's average grade when we register for courses? Would it be possible to live in a dorm this summer and work in a lab? Can we meet with professors before the term starts?</p>

<p>I'm still glad to be a Wolverine this fall... I just want to help myself and and my friends to hit the ground running freshman year.</p>

<p>Peace be with you,</p>

<p>Soy Sauce</p>

<p>More recent data for your perusal:
UM</a> :: The Career Center :: Students :: Pre-Law :: Applying to Law School :: UM Graduates’ Application Statistics
UM</a> :: The Career Center :: Students :: Pre-Medicine :: Medical School Application :: UM Application Statistics</p>

<p>Do you have better options? Sorry that Michigan can’t compete with HYPSM, but it holds it’s own pretty well.</p>

<p>No need to apologize, I love UMich as it is, but do you have any advice on how to keep up a high GPA?</p>

<p>Michigan performed best of all the big Public schools, and it outperformed what USNews would have predicted (as this list included liberal arts colleges) and it outperformed WashU, Emory, and ND, all smaller private schools ranked higher.</p>

<p>“No need to apologize, I love UMich as it is, but do you have any advice on how to keep up a high GPA?”</p>

<p>There’s not much to say. Do the best you can, and you’ll get the best grades you possibly can. </p>

<p>There are things you can do… Fill up to 18 credits with mini-courses, take the easiest possible electives, everything else bearcats does, but I think grad schools will look at relevant courses. Plus your GRE scores will be a big issue (or GMAT, or whatever you take).</p>

<p>so many people slave over rankings, its pathetic. U of M is a great school with a great reputation, most employers know that.</p>

<p>SoySauce, among universities, Michigan was #18, outperfoming (albeit by an insignificant margins) schools like Cal, UVa, Notre Dame, Emory, Vanderbilt, WUSTL. Remember that LACs are much smaller and will, on average, place a higher percentage of their alums into graduate professional programs.</p>

<p>Overall, only 4 universities (HYPS) did significantly better than Michigan in that survey and only another 5 or 6 universities (Dartmouth, Duke, Columbia, MIT, Brown and perhaps Chicago), most of which are significantly more pre-professional than Michigan.</p>

<p>Besides, although Michigan isrelatively pre-professional,many universities on that list are significantly more so. Only a third of students at Michigan are preprofessional compared to over 50%+ at schools like Harvards and Stanford.</p>

<p>Finally, the WSJ survey only looked at 5 MBA programs, 5 Law Schols and 5 Medical schools, 12 of those being located in the Northeast. If that survey were extended to 10MBA programs, 10 Law Schools and 10 Medical schools and also included top Engineering programs, schools like Michigan and Northwestern would have done much better.</p>

<p>“Finally, the WSJ survey only looked at 5 MBA programs, 5 Law Schols and 5 Medical schools, 12 of those being located in the Northeast. If that survey were extended to 10MBA programs, 10 Law Schools and 10 Medical schools and also included top Engineering programs, schools like Michigan and Northwestern would have done much better.”</p>

<p>It seems like the WSJ, similiar to USNWR, has a tendency to insert criteria which gives unfair advantages to certain types of schools.</p>

<p>Thanks everyone. Is the mentorship program helpful? (academically?) How easy/difficult is it to impress and build close rapport with professors and researchers at UMich (i.e. eventually asking for career-deciding recs), but avoid brown nosing? Thanks again.</p>

<p>[Office</a> of New Student Programs | Incoming Freshmen | Mentorship - University of Michigan](<a href=“http://www.onsp.umich.edu/incoming_freshmen/mentorship.html]Office”>http://www.onsp.umich.edu/incoming_freshmen/mentorship.html)</p>

<p>Soy Sauce, Economics is quite possibly the most popular major on most campuses. that is certainly the case at all five universities you are considering. Few universities will have fewer than 200 Econ majors per graduating class. </p>

<p>For example, 15%-20% of Harvard students major in Economics. Harvard’s graduating class has 1,700 students. As such, Harvard has roughly 250-300 Economics majors graduating each year (1,000-1,200 undergrads majoring in Economics at any one point in time).</p>

<p>Another example is Northwestern. Roughly 10% of NU undegrads major in Economics. NU’s graduating class has 2,000 students. As such, NU has roughly 200 Economics majors graduating each year (800 or so undergrads majoring in Economics at any one point in time).</p>

<p>On top of all those students majoring on Economics, many other students majoring in different fields take classes in Economics either as an elective or out of genuine interest. </p>

<p>Now that’s just undergrads interested in taking Econ classes. In addition to that, Economics faculty at schools such as Chicago, Harvard, Michigan, MIT, Northwestern, NYU, UCLA etc…spend much of their time publishing papers and books, researching and working closely with a handful of PhD candidates. In other words, those professors are very busy with responsibilites other than instructing undergrads. </p>

<p>In all, Econ faculties seldom have more than 50 or 60 members. With literally thousands of students vying for their “personal” attention, and with their commitment to research and their graduate students, Economics (along with other very popular majors such as Political Science and Psychology) is one of those fields where getting to know the professors is not easy. </p>

<p>This said, if a student tries hard and majors an effort, faculty will be accessible. However, don’t expect to impress them unless you really have a gift for Economics and a desire to pursue graduate students in their field.</p>