<p>I heard a 40% washout rate is not unusual for college freshman in a "premed" curriculum. Does this sound right? What is the stumbling block? Presumably these are bright kids. What goes wrong?</p>
<p>The curves and tests in intro and prereq courses (at least that's the reason in my experience so far). The way I see it... students that eventually end up applying to med school are not just bright. They are the best of the bright.</p>
<p>A 40% attrition rate is probably optimistic. It's much higher at most schools. The way I look at it, there are STILL too many students applying. There are simply not enough medical school spots to accomodate so many premeds. If anything, premed needs to be tougher so that not as many people waste their time applying only to be rejected by every medical school they apply to.</p>
<p>Don't forget, of course, that most premeds decide to be premeds when they're six years old playing with Fisher Price toys -- long before they've heard of venture capital, management consulting, chemical engineering, etc. A lot of premeds drop out because the path isn't very desirable to them -- not because they can't handle it.</p>
<p>quite alot of people want to become doctors because they watched "House, Scrubs, ER, or Grey's Anatomy" So there is a false allusion that the path to med school and life as a doctor is grandeur and easy.</p>
<p>Another thing is the willingness to invest alot of time and effort. Many of the bright kids got away with not much studying and procrastination in hs. College actually requires time, effort, and staying on top of things. The vast majority of college students (even the neurotic nerds) would rather party/play video games/watch movies over study for that crappy General Chem. test. I picked studying over relaxing yesterday and it was really painful, but I did very well on the test so I am still pretty pleased.</p>
<p>I think everybody is making good points. Some do in fact find the row tougher to hoe than they want. The average grades in my daughter's bio and chem freshman classes were 75's. That would be very disheartening to some. Others as bdm suggested suddenly realize that their heart is elsewhere. Usually it's not a case of failure but more one of recognition that "this ain't where I need to be ". And then there are those that do fail, but IMO that is a minority of those who give up the game.</p>
<p>40% for freshman sounds about right to me. Most people at my school stopped being pre-med after taking that first Chem 109 exam or at some point when they were sick of writing lab reports for Bio 101. Organic chem was the #3 cause of washing out of pre-med, but that was a distant 3rd to the other two.</p>
<p>But BDM is right, one of the reason so many people come in as pre-med or pre-law is not because it's the right path for them, but because they have no idea of the number of possible careers available to them. Seriously, think about how many people wanted to be doctors, lawyers, or teachers in your HS class. After those careers, what's next? "Some type of engineering", journalist, nurse, and then...</p>
<p>From my own personal experience, I can say this applies even to those of us looking for backup careers - I know that I didn't "discover" (I use that term loosely since I knew it existed in principle) what I'd be doing if not in medical school until my junior year of college. I didn't recognize that I'd really love doing it until my senior year...</p>
<p>40% seems low- for every pre-med student I know, I know two who used to be pre-med. From what I have observed and heard from profs, most wash out after experiencing the harsh grading in the science classes.</p>
<p>Pretty much the same as Bigred. First year curves. Everyone gets their first Chem 1310 exam back and sees that only 5 people made above a 50%. Half of them drop right there. Then they get sick of the memorization and right ups for Bio 1510, there goes some more. Finally, once they get past all that, they have to take O chem, although a much smaller percentage seems to give up because of that class seeing as they already made it through the weed-outs.</p>
<p>I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that the wash-out rate was a lot higher than 40%</p>
<p>Anyway, I do think that a lot of people start out as pre-meds because they believe they can make a lot of money that way. It's easy to succumb to. But when they realize that there are a lot of other, more convenient/thrifty ways to get a high-paying job, they drop pre-med like it was some foul-smelling object they picked up off the sidewalk on a hot day.</p>
<p>The OP specifically commented on freshman year, which is usually before organic chemistry and physics. 40% sounds about right.</p>
<p>BDM: Consider the curve in Bonkistry. About 400 kids, with an average SAT around 1500, including engineers and probably at least 150 pre-meds who scored a 5 on AP Chem and are taking the course because they think it will help their GPA. A lot of very bright students experience their first C before they even get to orgo.</p>
<p>As mentioned, I think 40% during freshman year sounds like it's the right ballpark.</p>
<p>Some Preparatory schools offer intensive electives in Molecular Biology, Anatomy, and Medical Physiology primarily to allow kids to make an informed decision about their majors prior to College.</p>
<p>The teachers in these prep/Science Magnet schools were completely frank about the difficulty of these courses and mentioned that they were structured toward giving a 'realistic idea' to kids prior to College so that kids don't spend their parents' money pursuing unsuitable majors (exa- Bergen County Academies in NJ, couple other academies in NY city and in CT).</p>
<p>If more public schools adopted this strategy, perhaps you will have a more focused premed pool and less attrition in College.</p>
<p>But as I recall from Grad school years, the attrition continues through first year med's intensive Biochemistry too (which was a course common with first year Pharmcology grad students).......</p>
<p>I remember only a very low dropout rate among medical students. Some did not much enjoy their med school science classes, but nearly everyone passed.</p>
<p>The washout rate may vary widely among different colleges Those with high admissions standards and high rates of acceptance for those who apply might suffer relatively limited attrition. Some of these may be people who really did discover that they did not actually want to be doctors. </p>
<p>I suspect that a very high proportion of high school students with, say, 1500 on their SAT's would get into medical school if they entered the premed program and made a serious effort. At colleges where this is a typical SAT score, the academic washout rate from premed might be rather low.</p>
<p>As an example, at the one college for which I have the data, the number of people applying to medical school each year is a bit more than 5/6 the number who take organic chemistry. Some of the 1/6 who take organic, but do not apply to med school are majors in chemistry or chem engineering who genuinely want to pursue those fields rather than medical school. So, at this place, it looks like far less than 40% seem to drop due to bad grades or being discouraged by the grind.</p>
<p>If you are interested in the washout rate, the numbers enrolled in organic chem vs applying to med school may be a good metric. Of course, this does not include those who are bumped out by intro chem, but a large portion of intro chem students were never premeds.</p>
<p>Afan: A brilliant solution to a crucial measurement problem in premedical statistics. Insightful and clever. Bravo.</p>