First I wish to say thank you for everyone’s input in this forum. I have been reading the various comments, and have found the majority of the information to be very useful. My daughter is an OOS high school senior, and was accepted into the UMKC 6 yr med. She is very excited, and will most likely be attending. One of our concerns is the apparently high attrition rate. Is there any correlation between the students that drop out and their SAT/ACT scores, GPA, or OOS vs regional or IS? Trying to gauge if the reason for a person leaving the BA/MD program is due to academic preparedness as opposed to other less objective factors.
Great question @QwertyX22! Here are publicly available statistics with regards to attrition in the UMKC BA/MD program:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19494705/#Comment_19494705
I think the reasons for attrition (meaning that they leave the UMKC BA/MD program completely, and not just extend in the BA/MD program to 7/8 years, although there are people who end up doing both) are varied, complex, and multifactorial and I don’t think it’s something that can be 100% predicted beforehand by high school academics like standardized test scores/GPA or applicant geography pool status, like you might initially think. I realize this is a legitimate concern, especially for out-of-state students who pay double the in-state tuition rate and don’t get much university financial support/aid.
The UMKC BA/MD program is one in which (unlike other programs) students start the program and do coursework year round (w/no summer breaks) beginning in the fall. We also skip a lot of foundational undergraduate coursework that regular UMKC undergrads and even students in other BA/MD programs do, & are limited in the available majors we’re allowed to do w/in the confines of the 6 year program. There isn’t a clear off-ramp for the program, depending on when you leave, unlike other Bachelor/MD programs where the undergrad & med school portions have a clear separation.
I’ve known people who were in-state who left the program, and I know people who were out-of-state who have extended and/or left the program as well and not just at the Year 1 & 2 level, and it’s not always due to academic reasons. UMKC BA/MD students don’t have the traditional undergraduate experience that their normal UMKC undergraduate counterparts have or that their friends from high school may have at their own undergraduate campuses outside of UMKC. The rigor of the program at certain points can sometimes overwhelm even the most academically high caliber students. I think this is where talking to current students at different points in the program, is key to getting a better idea of it. Here is my post on that here:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19465274#Comment_19465274
I hope this answers your question, if not, let me know. One thing I would do is ask the UMKC School of Medicine admissions office by email whether if a student leaves the BA/MD program, and decides to apply to medical school through the normal route, whether that student would be classified as a re-applicant or not. The answer may be different for Years 1-2 vs. Years 3-6.
I’ve heard varied answers on this. The people I know who left the program & went the normal route when I was in the program didn’t do this & just applied normally as first-time applicants to med school. However, There was a poster in this thread who said he was told by the deans that he would have to be reclassified as a reapplicant, and yet on the AMCAS website (the normal traditional premed application process), it only talks about that being true if you previously sent an AMCAS application: https://students-residents.aamc.org/applying-medical-school/faq/amcas-faq/. So I would email to get a clear answer to that.
Thank you @Roentgen! Your always comprehensive and thoughtful responses are very much appreciated.
Do you know how aggressively the faculty and staff works with and assists the students to prevent them from dropping out? One would think that UMKC would wish to keep their attrition rate as low as possible, since it is typically a metric utilized in evaluating programs and colleges overall. However this may not be a priority, if the philosophy is such that UMKC can compensate for the loss of a 6 yr BA-MD in the first 2 years, with a new traditional medical student in Yr 3, aka 1st year med school. Perhaps the retention numbers have improved more recently since the most recent publicly available data is from 10+ years ago. Overall, it still appears to be a wonderful program with an excellent and well planned curriculum.
My son has been accepted into the program. How much time is there to participate in intramural or club sports while in the 6 year program. He really enjoys sports and would not be happy if there is no time to participate in such activities.
So when I was in the program, I really didn’t think the faculty & administration were as proactive as they could have been when it came to helping BA/MD students when their performance was slipping (and all BA/MD students personally will reach that point in the program in some way, whether that’s early on or later in coursework, that their current study skills/regimen are no longer going to cut it & they need some external help for course correction). If anything, I felt that the response was more reactive, for example, unduly pressuring students to select to extend (meaning do another year in the program), which isn’t exactly constructive. With as much tuition as we were paying (since you pay the School of Medicine tuition rate from Day 1) and in which BA/MD students are made to skip much of foundational undergraduate coursework before immediately hopping into medical school level coursework (our first course being medical Biochemistry), I believe students rightfully expected more from the medical school in terms of resources & help, to at least be on par with other traditional 4 year medical schools.
I think as you mentioned, the school is more on top of their attrition when it gets to the last 4 years of the program as that is what is looked at by the LCME, which is the regulatory body that evaluates allopathic medical schools in the United States. So when the MD only students come into the program (Spring of Year 2), they essentially replace the attrition that has happened from Year 1 and up until the end of Fall of Year 2. But as you can see from that previous post link above, even the attrition from the last 4 years of the program (6-8%) was still a little higher than the AAMC average (4%) for traditional 4 year medical schools.
They have brought in additional resources:
[ul][]Supplemental Instruction/Private Tutoring Network (they’ve always had the Supplemental Instruction program, but I believe it is much more organized at the medical school level now)
[]https://med.umkc.edu/sa/academic-support/
[li]https://med.umkc.edu/sa/wellness/[/ul][/li]So I would definitely try to find out from current BA/MD students across the years, especially in Years 2/3/4, whether they have felt these resources were indeed helpful to the student body (vs. just being a box to check off) and to them personally. From current students, I’ve heard great things about the Wellness program (which seems to be a function of the person currently running it who is able to relate better to students, who I think started the program about 10 years ago). Supplemental Instruction seems to be hit or miss as this is highly dependent on which upperclassmen students (if at all) are voluntarily willing to do SI sessions for courses that they’ve already taken.
Keep in mind that the attrition number statistic from the prior post is an average from the 1970s up until 2009. I would ask the UMKC School of Medicine Admissions office what current statistics both for attrition & for extension are.
In terms of an official sport like basketball, soccer, track, etc. That’s probably not realistic in terms of being able to do it w/in the confines of the 6 year BA/MD program just because of the credit hour course loads that BA/MD students take. In the past I’ve seen some do it w/respect to tennis but they really did have to make an effort to make time for it along with their BA/MD obligations. If it’s something informal put together in terms of intramural sports, that’s something students can do & have done in the past although I don’t know how often.
It gets harder to do just from a time crunch perspective, especially once you reach the Human Structure Function series in Year 2 which is several traditional basic science subjects running at once but approached by organ systems.
You can see the layout of the 6 year BA/MD program here:
https://med.umkc.edu/docs/curriculum/UMKC_SOM_6Yr_Curriculum.pdf
Thank you @Roentgen .
Hello All, Does anyone know if the accepted student need to send in their High School Senior Year Transcript (Final transcript) to UMKC admission’s office?
Yes, your final transcript that verifies that you’ve graduated from high school does have to eventually be sent & received:
https://med.umkc.edu/bamd/apply/
https://www.umkc.edu/admissions/apply/freshman-application-process.html
Super awesome! Thanks as always @Roentgen
Thank you @Roentgen!
If a student gets a 5 in AP chem, they are able to get out of chem 211 and 212 for the first year. In that case, can they take cell biology in the fall and organic chem in spring of first year so that they have more time to study these subjects instead of compressing it in the summer. Is that too difficult to do in the first year.
So for Cell Biology 202, the prerequisites are BIOLOGY 108, BIOLOGY 109, CHEM 212R (or CHEM 212R, LS-ANATO 119, LS-ANATO 119L, LS-MCRB 121): https://catalog.umkc.edu/course-offerings/undergraduate/biology/
So besides Chem 212R having to be completed, you’d probably have to at least complete Biology 108 beforehand too (since BA/MD students don’t take Biology 109) either at UMKC or in the UM-system, for even the possibility of taking it earlier than Year 2 summer (I would discuss this with your ETC though on how to feasibly go about doing that).
I definitely know BA/MD students (who came in w/the appropriate credit) in the past who have taken Cell Biology (Biology 202) or Genetics (Biology 206) earlier than the assigned spot in the major map. Whether that’s allowed anymore is another story & something you’d have to check with your ETC. Both are undergraduate courses that BA/MD students and UMKC undergraduates enroll in together.
Hey guys, just wanted to post the UMKC School of Medicine match lists from previous years that you all can look over:
2009:
http://med.umkc.edu/docs/omc/PanoramaPDFs/09_SS-Panb.pdf
2010:
http://med.umkc.edu/docs/omc/PanoramaPDFs/PAN_SPR-SUM_2010b.pdf
2011:
http://med.umkc.edu/docs/omc/PanoramaPDFs/Pan_SS_2011b.pdf
2012:
http://web.archive.org/web/20120807012359/http://www.med.umkc.edu/sa/match.shtml
2013:
https://med.umkc.edu/sa/match-2013/
2014:
https://med.umkc.edu/sa/match-day-2014/
2015:
https://med.umkc.edu/sa/match-day-2015/
2016:
https://med.umkc.edu/sa/match-day-2016/
2017:
https://med.umkc.edu/sa/match-day-2017/
2018:
https://med.umkc.edu/sa/match-day-2018/
Hey everyone, In case you don’t know, there is a GroupMe chat open for the class of 2026. There are peer mentors in the chat as well for any questions!
@BzewdT How do we add ourselves to the groupme chat?
@staycalm123 The GroupMe link is on the BA/MD apply website. After you accept your offer, you can go to a tab called Pre-matriculation and then look for a tab that says peer mentors. You can find the GroupMe link there.
@BzewdT Thank you.
With the Coronavirus situation, the colleges may not go back to normal Classes yet. Would it be feasible for students to take intense course load online at UMKC?
So I’ve been getting this question about transfer credit (courses done at a community college, college, or university, NOT testing credit thru the AP/CLEP/IB program) a lot with respect to GPA & grade points, so I’ll clarify what the facts are:
If your courses were/are taken within the University of Missouri (UM) system (UM-Columbia, UM-St. Louis, UMKC, Missouri S&T) you get GPA & grade points awarded for it. If you take undergraduate coursework outside of those 4 schools to fulfill undergraduate degree requirements, then you get credit, but not the GPA & grade points that go with it: https://www.umkc.edu/registrar/transfer-credit/
Whether or not to take summer classes in the first place before starting up officially in Year 1 of the BA/MD program in the Fall of 2020 I think is an individual decision based on several factors:
- How much incoming credit you are coming with into the BA/MD program (both transfer credit & testing credit).
Keep in mind that outside of the AP/IB exams you all take in May of senior year of high school, you can also take CLEP tests which are available year round to knock off requirements that may apply to your degree major. Just keep in mind that only 30 hours total of testing credit can be applied towards your degree: https://www.umkc.edu/registrar/transfer-credit/test-credit.html
- Your energy level at the end of high school where many of you have worked really hard academically & extracurricular involvement for a full 4 years so you want some type of mental break, which is totally understandable because health & wellness are very important before entering a program like this.
Many of you have had things like AP summer reading assignments so finally having a summer where you have NOTHING to do feels pretty great and can help you to recharge your batteries.
- Whether it is feasible for you to actually take classes in the summer, as often families have plans for extended vacations during that time.
Many of you all are probably quarantined at home right now because of the COVID-19 pandemic & the school year may have even ended early for you, so #2 may not eveb apply as much by the time that it gets to June, like it has for previous entering Year 1 BA/MD classes.
The question that this transfer question most often comes up under is about the General Chemistry I & II + Labs sequence and whether or not incoming students should take it early (one semester or both semesters’ worth) or whether to wait until you get to UMKC in the fall to take it for the grade points & GPA, since the UMKC School of Medicine calculates a science GPA for promotion for BA/MD students.
I don’t think there is a right or wrong answer to this because I’ve seen it done both ways & I think there are indeed pros & cons to both.
I do think taking Cell Biology + Chem 320 + Chem 320 Lab can feel like quite a lot in a condensed 8 week summer semester, so if there is a way in which you can be eligible to take Chem 320 + Chem 320 Lab in a regular 16 week semester, in the Spring of Year 1, your summer in Year 2 won’t be as packed.
Again, I know some students who didn’t come in w/any Chem credit who felt it was just fine, but I think this can vary by individual.
Here is advice from current BA/MD students on this thread too:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19560536/#Comment_19560536
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19565284/#Comment_19565284