<p>So when you apply for residency, they don’t care whether you were in direct md or not. All they care about is your med school, grades, etc. My local direct md program, UCONN, is ranked ahead of Brown and it’s way easier to get into (only like 200 apps a year). So why shouldn’t I go there instead of Brown?
UCONN doesn’t require MCAT either.</p>
<p>UConn med (ranked 59) is not ranked ahead of Alpert (31).</p>
<p>That’s neither here nor there to be honest. Would you rather go to UConn or Brown for UG? How about med school (med schools are much more similar to each other than UGs but there can still be very big differences)? Would you rather spend 8 years in Providence or Farmington?</p>
<p>Cost is often a big factor as well. How does this affect you dell?</p>
<p>Which ranking should I use if I want to be a surgeon? I used NIH rankings and Brown was like 79 but I guess that is for research. Do you have link to rankings related to surgery?
UCONN would be $15,000 for the first 4 years and $30,00 for the med years. I can afford a super expensive one like Yale though. I know a doctor there who said he went there from a rich family and the tuition was $90,000 (4 years ago) but they give aid to 90% of students.</p>
<p>Also, to get into a top tier medical school (no direct md program), should one go to an Ivy and not get as good of a GPA and be in debt or go to say UCONN and have a near perfect GPA with good grades and then apply to med school? A friend went to uconn direct md and then during the 3rd year (she finished early), she applied to med schools and is at uni pittsburgh</p>
<p>How do you know what kind of GPA you’ll get at either school? The pre-meds at UConn are not your average UConn students. The name of the school is pretty low down on the list of things considered but most high school pre-meds never even apply to medical school (and yes, even people in the combined program drop out) so you have to also consider the fact that this is a school you’re spending 4 years at and you may not even end up wanting to go to med school so which school would you be happier at? Also, happy students tend to be successful students.</p>
<p>so what about rankings? which list should i use? primary care/research/etc?</p>
<p>they’re all BS anyway. Primary care is the most BS because the largest factor is just #of students who go into primary care (and while many choose to go into primary care, it’s also the least competitive specialties so if anything it could be rewarding generating less competitive students). Research is still BS because metrics relating to faculty research efforts don’t necessarily impact clinical teaching.</p>
<p>The real “metric” to evaluate this question is one that no ranking list etc. really will give you. That is: of students who started out as premed a a particular school, what percentage of them stayed premed because they really wanted to become doctors, did not drop out because they got discouraged by the grading system/ cut throat competition etc, but could have “stuck it out” at an “easier school” (some of these become MDs down the road, as it is still their passion. They make up a fair number of post-bac etc admits.) And then of the doctors to be “because they really want to be MDs”, how do they fare in getting into medical school at a school that really is a good fit for them? And do they go onto the specialty that they really fit best in, and enjoy their MD careers? Acceptance statistics are different for every school because they don’t measure the “discouragement” factor. Prestige ranks take into account things that often medical school adcoms know are less important in picking undergrad and post grad applicant’s future “doctor-ness”.
So how do you get some info? One thing I highly suggest, although it is very subjective, is to speak with MDs in a career path you think you might like, and see how much they can tell you about who starts and goes where/ ends up where?
Just remember that most high school students who think they want to go to medical school “want to be surgeons and want to go to the top programs in the US”. (and many kindergarteners want to be astronauts and firemen too.)</p>
<p>My retired physician father in law said his corporation had the best luck w/docs from large teaching universities like Michigan and Indiana. </p>
<p>They were much more practical and patient-engaged than their peers from schools like JHU, Harvard, Stanford & Yale. Having taught at Harvard, he said their med students’ educations were not as “hands-on” nor were they required to develop as many decision making skills while in med school vs. some of the larger med schools.</p>
<p>Brownalumparent,</p>
<p>I believe OP was asking about med school rankings but your points regarding UG are still valid.</p>