I agree with most of the things that @Roentgen says here, with a few exceptions, but I’ll cut him some slack for the few exceptions because there’s no way he would know the details/nuances of what he is saying without being here. Overall, he does a great service to the students here. However, the biggest thing I disagree with is him saying that if you can get into the 6 year BA/MD program then you can definitely get into MD school through the traditional route. I can say this is definitely false. Tons of kids, mostly in state get admitted that really shouldn’t be, eg. with mid-20s ACT scores, no shadowing experiences, doesn’t actually understand there’s residency after MD school, etc. Because UMKC has to take 2/3 students from MO, the standards are lower and after hearing from them about what they did to get into the program, their high school credentials, and ultimately them extending/separating, I can say that they would have had a low likelihood of getting accepted to a traditional MD school given how competitive it is. This year, looking at our match list, subtracting out the MD-onlys, 3 oral surgery residents, everyone who extended from the year above/took research years, we only had 71/116 6 year students who started with us first year. Granted there’s 5 students from our class who voluntarily took research years, but 76/116 is 65%. Interpret that as you will.
What is the estimate of students who get in here could have actually gotten into traditional MD school? Maybe 50-75% depending on the year.
Keep in mind the gen chem taught by Gounev (old exams available with only numbers changed between years, not sure how people fail this but a few do q1y) and orgo taught by Peng (joke compared to real orgo, tests involved multiple choice circling structures produced from a given reaction like hydroboration, multiple students would get 100s) are classes that people extend/separate off of. If some students can’t pass these low level classes at a commuter school like UMKC, there’s no way they would have been able to get through gen chem 1/2 and orgo 1/2 through the traditional route at a rigorous undergrad.
Yup, AOA is about 1/6th of the class. Is it an absolute requirement to be able to match into the more competitive specialties? No. But often other factors will then come much more into play. For example at Wash U in St. Louis (yes, I know it’s a top 10 medical school & it’s a more extreme example here, but the same overall concept in terms of what I’m getting at), just at baseline, the trajectory for that med student in the match is much different than the match trajectory for a UMKC Med student. It’s nowhere even necessary for Wash U med students to be AOA and still be in contention for a competitive specialty. Even in the less competitive specialties, non-AOA students there match into very solid middle, if not even higher middle tier and even top tier places. If it tells you anything, the UMKC AOA website bylaws haven’t been updated since 2009, when they transitioned to the Latin Honors system they have now. It would be nice if UMKC was much more proactive and transparent w/students on exactly how things work (not just in this area but other areas as well).
I’m actually not surprised at the higher unmatched rate which I alluded to in prior years’ match lists and a Year 6 mentioned last year in his/her experience at UMKC mentioned this as well, but I’ll go into greater detail in my analysis for this year when I finish it, as to the factors contributing to why this is likely happening.
Hopefully before you graduate you can give your take on your experience to help future applicants to the program. Here is one from last year which I thought was very well done in terms of format and I also happened to agree w/it:
So one caveat I will say (and I realize we’ll probably disagree here) is that my underlying statement w/regards to the traditional route is that the student is very much dedicated to going to medical school and is 100% sure that’s the pathway to take (vs. not being sure, or say wanting to pursue another healthcare career (NP, PA, DDS, PharmD, etc.), or a career outside of health care in general). Contrary to what a lot of advanced high schoolers believe, a normal undergraduate experience is supposed to be one somewhat of exploration and graduated difficulty. Also in a normal undergrad, you get a lot more time to be able to participate in the healthcare experiences to properly augment your CV. That’s why I think the proxy of healthcare experiences in high school vs. that of a premed during a 4 year undergrad can be misleading.
The comparison between the first 2 years of the UMKC BA/MD program and 2 years of an undergraduate (let’s say at the state public flagship at Mizzou in Columbia, MO) is a faulty one. For starters, in the UMKC BA/MD program, we never get a summer off and that includes in the first 2 years. Our organic chemistry course (although yes, it is a survey course, and not Organic Chemistry I & II w/labs) in an 8 week summer w/lab can be pretty hectic w/exams being every 2 weeks. And w/Cell Biology also that same semester, can really be hell on wheels for students. And I do think at some point (for everyone) in this program, there is a feeling of burnout, especially during the HSF series. Our BA/MD students start with medical school level Biochemistry as a sophomore in college. That’s unheard of in any undergraduate program in which coursework difficulty rises much more smoothly and students have 4 years to gain the study skills necessary to be successful. We also take Cell Biology & Genetics w/o having taken General Biology I and II (we take a lot of curricular shortcuts in this program that I think in the end doesn’t set up our students for success). And this is assuming that there aren’t any personal issues, as for many students (even those in Missouri), living in KC can be quite a culture shock, especially for out-of-staters.
So in past years, the decision has usually come through the portal on either Wednesday or Thursday at 5 pm or later (they try to not send it in the middle of a school day), but DON’T hold me to this, lol! It’s just what I noticed as a pattern looking at prior application cycle posts in this thread.
Congrats! Are you in state or OOS? I have a daughter that will be applying for fall 2022 and we are OOS. Just wondering if it’s worth it for people OOS. Thanks!
