<p>Is there a link that lists this info?</p>
<p>I wouldn’t trust the data even if you could find it…</p>
<p>You’ll never see how many started out in pre med and switched, how many failed to get committee letters of recommendation or were “advised” against applying. The schools that do report such info have highly scrubbed the data.</p>
<p>Statistics can me made to tell whatever story you want to tell…in the case of med school acceptances it is often highly suspect or at least very open to interpretation.</p>
<p>^ And some schools only let students declare pre-med in their Jr year, and are admitted only if they have a minimum GPA in the core courses. So their placement data is skewed very highly.</p>
<p>*And some schools only let students declare pre-med in their Jr year, and are admitted only if they have a minimum GPA in the core courses. So their placement data is skewed very highly. *</p>
<p>Actually, I don’t mind such a process. Not much different than students who apply to - say - a school’s nursing program (which begins junior year) and then the school posts it’s national exam pass rate. Or, schools who boast what their placement rates are for various majors…they aren’t including the kids who started in that major, and then changed.</p>
<p>I don’t blame a school for not wanting to include every Tom, Dick, and Jane who declares to be “pre-med” coming into college (some with lowish ACTs) who then soon realize that college science courses are not their strengths. </p>
<p>Frankly, since schools typically can’t control which kids say that they’re going to be pre-med, it makes sense to really only provide stats for those who are still pre-med junior year and who apply to med school. </p>
<p>If I could just get the stats for those who applied and were accepted for each school, that would be fine with me.</p>
<p>
From this statement, it appears you imply that one of the biggest hurdle for most premeds are they are not good enough in sciences as compared to other peer premeds. This could be true even if we likely agree that non-science majors (who are good at introductory sciences for natural science majors) could be successful as premeds.</p>
<p>The other two hurdles, I would imagine, 1) they are good enough at an essentially reading-comprehension test like MCAT. 2) they are able to allocate time for ECs while doing all the above.</p>
<p>M2CK: The problem is twofold. (1) Since different schools implement different screening practices, you’re not getting an apples-to-apples comparison. For example, Christopher Newport (where?) brags that it has a 100% success rate. Harvard is around 90%. Does anybody really think CNU is better than Harvard? Of course not – but in some cases where you don’t know too much about either program, it can be misleading. If memory serves, UCLA is slightly higher than Berkeley – maybe something like 50% vs. 55%. Is that a real difference? Maybe – but who knows?</p>
<p>(2) In any case, there’s no central data clearinghouse that I know of. Most of what we know is pieced together from websites.</p>
<p>*I don’t blame a school for not wanting to include every Tom, Dick, and Jane who declares to be “pre-med” coming into college (some with lowish ACTs) who then soon realize that college science courses are not their strengths. </p>
<p>From this statement, it appears you imply that one of the biggest hurdle for most premeds are they are not good enough in sciences as compared to other peer premeds. This could be true even if we likely agree that non-science majors (who are good at introductory sciences for natural science majors) could be successful as premeds.</p>
<p>The other two hurdles, I would imagine, 1) they are good enough at an essentially reading-comprehension test like MCAT. 2) they are able to allocate time for ECs while doing all the above.*</p>
<p>Yes…true…</p>
<p>But, from what I’ve noticed…many of those who start as pre-med (or pre-vet or whatever) seem to fall by the wayside shortly after having to take those pre-reqs. They quickly find out that their interest in medicine (or love of animals) is not enough to be competitive for admissions.</p>
<p>If I had a dollar for every animal-loving kid who has said to me that he/she was going to be a vet, but quickly changed their minds after taking some pre-reqs, I’d be a rich M2CK. ;)</p>
<p>there’s a reason why those classes are called weeders. Sometimes it’s not just Orgo…it can be Calculus or Gen Chem or Intro to Bio or Physics. When these kids see that they’re pulling Bs and Cs (or worse) in these classes, they fold. </p>
<p>I’ve never seen any numbers, but I imagine the biggest fallout as pre-med students comes between the 3rd and 5th semesters…before a MCAT is ever taken.</p>
<p>The higher the number, the more difficult it is to be considered pre-med or get recommendations from a pre-med committee at that school. Large U’s may not even track data. Some U’s and many LAC’s have a committee that reviews applicants. Those deemed worthy get a prepared rec from the committee that summarizes the rec’s from different members representing different disciplines. Those rec’s are often very detailed and med school are presented with quite of bit of information. Certain med schools know that if they get a glowing rec from a certain committee on a student, the committee “means” it and stands behind that student. </p>
<p>Committee recs often are very descriptive about students, warts and all. But meds schools who get these committee recs year after year know them to be honest and consistent, and not just written in such a way as to get a student an acceptance.</p>
<p>Absolutely the fall out is before the MCAT. </p>
<p>I used to joke that at my State U, the three events that caused the most people to stop being premed were
[ul]
[li] The very first gen chem 1 test - for a lot of people this was their very first college exam since that class had 4 exams during the semester while most other classes had only 2 or 3. Lots and lots of people were suddenly no longer pre-med the Monday morning after that exam, a mere month into school…</p>[/li]
<p>[li] Midway through the semester of Biology 101 - specifically the lab portion, which had these ridiculous requirements for lab reports that often stretched 25 pages or more (I would have hated to be a Bio 101 Lab TA that had to grade them). After about the 4th report, a lot of people said “forget this” thinking that all science labs were like that (of course they weren’t). This was also a great example of actually reading the course bulletin and looking ahead to see what the pre-reqs for upper bio courses (and even the bio major/minor) actually were because - SURPRISE! Bio 101 was not a pre-req for anything and you could go right into Cell Structure and Function which was Bio 201 without any issue.</p>[/li]
<p>[li] First semester Organic - my school was plagued by 3 organic profs, 2 that were awful, awful teachers but with simple exams and the 3rd who was brilliant and an amazing teacher but had the most ridiculous tests I’ve ever taken (and hated pre-meds). People left classes with the first two with no clue what was going on, and if you took the 3rd, you knew your stuff but still might get awful grades.[/li][/ul]</p>
<p>It was amazing how many people I’d meet and they’d say “yeah I used to be pre-med…” and I could generally pick out what event they were going to say following “…but then I ran into ________”. </p>
<p>I’m sure other people here can point similar events at their schools that were similar breaking points.</p>
<p>I’m not that concerned about kids who drop out of premed. My main concern with such data is that it is very manipulable. First, some schools include osteopathic, carribbean, foreign medical schools in their data. Clearly this boosts their acceptance rates since those 3.3/29 students who couldn’t get into a US allopathic med school would still get into these other medical schools. The second thing is that some undergrads are very aggressive in pushing their students to take a year off. For a normal college, 50% of their med school applicants are seniors and 50% are alumni. Clearly, when only 6 of the 46 Swarthmore applicants to med school are seniors, there’s something fishy going on. Thus, I would take Swarthmore’s 100% undergrad senior acceptance rate to med school with a grain of salt.</p>
<p>*First semester Organic - my school was plagued by 3 organic profs, 2 that were awful, awful teachers but with simple exams and the 3rd who was brilliant and an amazing teacher but had the most ridiculous tests I’ve ever taken (and hated pre-meds). *</p>
<p>It is kind of sad that sometimes who you end up with for a prof can “make or break” you in certain subjects. </p>
<p>My nephew was thrilled to get the “good” orgo prof at Vandy, while his roomie got the “bad one.” My son purposely picked his orgo profs for their reps. For Orgo II, there was a substitution. Thankfully, it was a good one. His school had hired some prof from Italy who my son thoroughly enjoyed and learned from.</p>
<p>I think what the OP means (or, certainly, I would like to see), is not how many people who declare pre-med end up accepted at Medical School, but rather what percent of people who actually apply to medical school get accepted.</p>
<p>I wish all colleges would publish what Berkeley publishes with respect to its seniors (about 110) who applied to med school: <a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/MedStats/2009seniors.stm[/url]”>https://career.berkeley.edu/MedStats/2009seniors.stm</a></p>
<p>* My main concern with such data is that it is very manipulable. First, some schools include osteopathic, carribbean, foreign medical schools in their data. Clearly this boosts their acceptance rates since those 3.3/29 students who couldn’t get into a US allopathic med school would still get into these other medical schools.*</p>
<p>I agree that those instances can throw off data, but what’s a school to do? Refuse to let certain students even apply (that seems rather unamerican). Or, perhaps break out the date to include those details? Maybe.</p>
<p>I know a church friend’s son is at some osteopathic school in Florida. His stats weren’t that great…3.5 GPA and either a 28/29 MCAT (can’t remember which). Don’t know what his science GPA was. Could have been below a 3.5. He was a bio major. </p>
<p>What’s a school to do? Tell him that he can’t even apply because they don’t want to include him in their stats? Or…include him in their stats with an asterisk indicating that he’s at a osteopathic school? I’m not even sure if undergrads want to push that distinction much anymore…the lines have become more blurred in recent years… even though going the MD route will likely always be the preferred one. </p>
<p>My kids’ dermo is an OD. MY neighbor across the street is an OD. It’s not a big deal anymore.</p>
<p>You know, I have to wonder how valuable this data would even be since medical school admissions has so much to do with the individual student anyway. It’s not exactly like posting data for passing NCLEX because that’s based a lot on information recall, or so I’ve been told. With nursing and NCLEX, a high pass number might indicate that the classes at that school offer better preparation.</p>
<p>But with medical school, a lot more plays into it than just the numbers and the rigor of the science classes as I’m sure you know by now.</p>
<p>So maybe, if you’re looking for a school to be a premed, you should choose the most financially smart one that also offers the most resources. Resources that might be valuable to future premeds: big nearby medical centers for shadowing, a community that’s pretty engaged or offers lots of services/agencies for volunteering, a school with a research emphasis so it is possible to get in with a lab, and an environment that isn’t too stressful so the kiddo can really thrive. And there are academic ones too: small classes, lots of lab sections, accessible advisors, professors with good reputations, a robust honors program.</p>
<p>If I were starting over again with the knowledge I have now, I’d look for a school with superior auxillary services and plentiful resources with a warm environment and minimal competition–but lots of cooperation. And then I’d pick my school all over again :)</p>
<p>LOL at BRM’s list of pre-med drop-out events.</p>
<p>D2 made a similar observation at her own school. She said at least half of all her freshman year dorm-mates were pre-meds… until the first chem exam, then they all suddenly became econ majors overnight.</p>
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</p>
<p>Be explicit in what goes into their data. A school can pick and choose how it presents its data but it should let us know exactly what’s going into the data. Something like “medical school acceptance rate” is just not good enough. </p>
<p><a href=“Career Services | Student & Campus Life | Cornell University”>Career Services | Student & Campus Life | Cornell University;
<p>Cornell let’s you know that its data includes
- Allopathic medical students
- First-time applicants only
- Non-URMs only
- Junior and senior students only
- Only students using the HCEC</p>
<p>You may or may not find such restrictive data useful but at least you know what kind of applicants the data includes. When you see a low-end LAC advertising 100% med school acceptance rates, you know something fishy is going on.</p>
<p>^ In an ideal world, every college should publish such data like Cornell.</p>
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</p>
<p>At DS’s school, their Bio 101 consists of two parts: intro cellular/molecular bio, and intro evolution/ecology bio. The former is a prereq for all other cellular/molecular-related bios (unless you are on the evolution/ecology side – not many premeds are on that side.)</p>
<p>However, some students could use their Bio AP 5 to skip the lecture part (likely not the lab part) of the intro cellular/molecular bio.</p>
<p>I think DS took the first part of intro bio (cell/molecular bio) in the very first semester and the second part of intro bio in the very last semester of his college career. His academic advisor wonders why he took one half of the intro bio so late. It was by accident, not by design.</p>
<p>Also, after he had taken the first part of intro bio, he almost did not want to have anything to do with any bio class in college – and he did not for the next year or so. (This was why he was so busy taking bio classes/labs in his senior year, instead of studying MCAT. He never thought he would graduate with that major.) It was not because of the grade he got (He got an A on it.) It was just not a pleasant environment: a huge class, overworked TA, mindless work, questionable grading - i.e., your grade may be dependent on which TA you got – some TA, being on the PhD track, may not like these premeds even though they will likely not admit it.</p>
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<p>And until that happens, the data is not useful.</p>
<p>A research paper without a “methods” section is absolute garbage. You have no idea how to evaluate the data without knowing how the data was obtained and how the data was processed.</p>
<p>don’t laugh…</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.career.emory.edu/parents/pdf/Applicants_Emory_2009_Matrix.pdf[/url]”>http://www.career.emory.edu/parents/pdf/Applicants_Emory_2009_Matrix.pdf</a></p>
<p>Forty-six percent?!</p>