<p>My S got accepted to UVA (Echols), JHU and Northwestern (and Swarthmore too). He is planning to do Premed. 4 years from now he would like to get accepted to a top medical school.
All these are great schools and we have visited all of them. As far as location is concerned, we feel very safe about Charlottesville and Evanston. But premed program at JHU is highly rated. Any comments on the same at UVA? I would appreciate your suggestions.</p>
<p>Your son will be fine at any of these universities. All have excellent medical schools, opportunities for undergrads to research (though I'm not sure of how accessible it is at Northwestern), and a strong track record with medical school admission.</p>
<p>There are many about medical school in this forum...you might be able to track some down with a search.</p>
<p>I honestly don't think your son can make a bad decision with these options. Where does he feel most comfortable? I'd suggest that even with the best professors in the world, an unhappy student isn't going to thrive academically in the same was that they would if they were in an environment they loved.</p>
<p>Dean J: </p>
<p>Our D in similar sit'n - only deciding between UVA, GT, and Duke. Her father is UVA grad; brother at Tufts (she's admitted there too but has pretty much decided no). I like your comment about "env they love" a lot - she is very tuned into that. What she now sees as biggest potential negative for UVA relative to the other two is size of univ and size of classes. She's been at a small pvt school - g class of 80 - and never had large classes. She's afraid she won't like a lot of large classes and does not know if she wants to be at a campus as sprawling and less "contained" as UVA. She worries about finding a "community" for her. What do you think about this poss negative - she loves your town and loves the history/grounds - knows academics are equal?</p>
<p>Just incidentally, her negatives for the other two are that Duke puts frosh on separate campus and Durham is not a great college town and that GT is a city school and has no frats/sororities so social life really means going out to dinner in small groups.</p>
<p>Given all these facts you can see why her first choice was Princeton and she was deferred then denied. Fortunately, she is well over it.</p>
<p>I personally wouldn't characterize UVa as having a sprawling campus. Granted, the amount of land the University owns is large, but the actual area that undergraduates occupy (Central Grounds) is fairly compact.</p>
<p>First year students live in two areas, which are basically separated by an intersection. Like most first year college students, ours seem to identify themselves by their residence area and hall.</p>
<p>The current students on this message board can probably chime in with their personal stories about making friends and finding their niche.</p>
<p>As for class sizes, intro biology classes will be large, as they're popular with students who want to fulfill the science/math area requirement. As the classes get more advanced, they often get a little smaller.</p>
<p>We're a medium sized school...a bit atypical for a flagship university. Overall, 47% of classes at UVa are less than 20 students and only 7% are over 100. Obviously, the more popular departments won't have as many super small classes, but there are plenty seminar style, discussion based classes here.</p>