<p>Well,
I want to study for premed in college and wondering which route I should take. I know that UCB and UCLA are more competitive schools, but UCD and UCSD are not as competitive. Would it be wiser to go to an easier school and not face the pressure of the competitive schools and have a easier time to get a high GPA and study for MCATS. or would it be wiser to go to UCLA or UCB because they are such good schools and have lots of research oppurtunities. I find that it may be easier to stand out in the lower schools compared to those cut throat schools. I feel really lost... The lower schools have the prestige as well, but then higher schools have its pros too.</p>
<p>heres advice from my cousin who graduated from a a city college in NYC...basically one step up from a community college...went on to mt sinai medical school and is now a nationally known vascular surgeon.</p>
<p>Go to whatever school you'll do best at.</p>
<p>dont get pulled in by the name of a school...thats a big mistake, you'll end up struggling to get by because they try to weed out so many students that wanna be doctors. So many go to schools like Johns Hopkins b.c they wanna be doctors. BAD MOVE! Not all those kids r gonna get accepted, therefore to keep Hopkins rep up, they weed you out over the years and end up with a top notch application pool, which keeps their name solid. </p>
<p>In any case....dont even worry about going to a big name school for medicine, the cousin said half these kids have silver spoons in their mouths and couldnt cut their way out of a paper bag.</p>
<p>I completely agree with Doogie311...I got too stuck in the name of the "University of Michigan" cause I loved it so much with its prestige and great sports and what not...but really...im struggling like nuts here and will probably transfer to my local university...</p>
<p>my advice...at the end of the day, no one cares where u went to college if ur an MD, its how good of a doctor you are</p>
<p>go for the school that maximizes ur ability to get into medical school....unless ur a high flyer and u KNOW u will succeed at top universities, dont take a risk</p>
<p>Most prestigious private schools do NOT weed out their premeds*. Most med students do NOT come from city colleges.</p>
<p>And most students from the nation's top few universities are NOT idiots and ARE perfectly competent with a pair of scissors.</p>
<p>Doogie has given you a story - a nice story, in fact - but it is just that: one story. If you look at the generalizations he's trying to pull from that one story, I think it becomes clear that he's overstepping his evidence.</p>
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<p>I don't know how to maximize your chances of getting into medical school. Obviously, an A at Berkeley is better than an A at Davis, while a C at Berkeley is worse than an A at Davis. All this is obvious. What isn't obvious is what kind of pool you belong in.</p>
<p>There's only one constant out there: the education you will receive.</p>
<p>You're still young. You might not turn out to be a premed. You might. Those of us who have completed the premed track will tell you that it's a challenge no matter where you go, and it's my personal opinion that it's harder at larger state schools and easier at prestigious, smaller private schools.</p>
<p>But what doesn't change - what nobody will ever take away from you - is two things. The first is that no matter what happens to your future, no matter what career you settle into, you carry your undergraduate education with you. If you believe - and it isn't always true - that you will get a better education at UCB, then that's the school you owe your future patients to attend.</p>
<p>The second thing that you always carry with you is the decisions that make you who you are. If you plan on becoming a doctor, it is not a path for people who seek shortcuts. It's not a path for people who want the same quantity of personal time they would get if they chose to become a surfing instructor.</p>
<p>Being a doctor is hard. Being a medical student is hard. Do you want to develop a pattern of running away from challenges?</p>
<p>There are careers that make much more money for much fewer hours. Those premeds out there that are advocating shortcuts are probably better suited for those careers.</p>
<p>*Hopkins takes your GPA into consideration when writing your letter, and a GPA less than a 3.0 - which is hysterically low anyway - reflects poorly in the letter.</p>
<p>yeaa im sure my cousin whos also on the admissions board at mt sinai school of medicine isnt giving me correct facts...</p>
<p>also i never said "Most prestigious private schools do NOT weed out their premeds*. Most med students do NOT come from city colleges."</p>
<p>as for your next statement...you missed that joke entirely...but thats ok cause im sure your duke sense of humor is much too complex for me and my cousin who graduated from a city college.</p>
<p>yea and btw....you are correct with your statement about hopkins...however, go investigate the premed drop rate at hopkins...you will be shocked.</p>
<p>buddy...you are one of these big name guys and thats cool...you do wutever you want. Im just letting him not that its not the only way to go...and in fact its a HUGE misconception that in order to be number 1 out there, you have to go to a high power school. This is sooooooo wrong!</p>
<p>I may have given you one story...but you cant argue with the facts...go check out the avg starting salaries of some of these ivies...they are pretty sad, and to be honest if i came out of Harvard making 50 grand, id be kindve ****ed off. However go look at the avg starting salary of a Pace University grad....75 grand, not too shabby for a 3rd tier school if you ask me. </p>
<p>Btw, another cousin of mine graduated from Pace because he failed out of St Bonaventure, did well...went to University of Chicago for his MBA, now works for Goldman as a broker. He has many famous clients and is doing quite well as he continues to make close to 500 grand a year (god knows how much now because of the amazing bonuses that company is giving their employees for the holidays!!!)</p>
<p>Yea you know what...i may be giving you two stories, but lets be realistic..these are two stories of AVERAGE people who worked hard with the hand they were dealt, and yea you know wut they may have been laughed at by you people with a Yale sweatshirt who think those who dont go a tier 1 school arent good enough for the world, but LOOK WHOS LAUGHING NOW!</p>
<p>Wanna know whats also funny...theres nothing special about either of my cousins aside from their work ethic...both of them grew up with immigrant parents who didnt have a college education and who spoke little to no english. They got the grades and went on to success...</p>
<p>I had a business teacher once who used to always tell me "the only limitations placed on you are the ones you place on yourself". And how right he was. The name of your school isnt gonna make you succeed, your motivation is gonna make you succeed. If you have an amazing trancript/resume, no medical school in their right mind would reject you...why would they?!</p>
<p>Consider this....</p>
<p>Ivies are becoming rediculous now, it has become more politics then anything else to get accepted to them. You have thousands of kids with the saaame 4.0 GPA and the same 1600 SAT score applying to them, what does it all come down to in the end? Who knows who and what connections do you have? Now this isnt in every case, but i think we are starting to see it more and more nowadays.</p>
<p>Now what these small, lower then tier 1 schools? You arent gonna have alums pushing their kids into these schools, not as much as ivies anyway. The kids that are at these schools and that end up applying to medical schools are kids that are there because they may have not had the SAT score or GPA for a better school, or maybe it was financial.</p>
<p>When it comes time to apply to medical school, an adcom may look at these two applications and have to make a decision between one or the other. Yes granted one has fancy ass name next to their name, and the other one doesnt...however the other kid has a 30 on the MCAT vs the 29 that the Ivy kid has, maybe they have the same GPA. I had this conversation with my cousin, and he asked me who id choose....ill admit i chose the ivy kid because of the school he went to. But my cousin told me that in making the decision, you consider more then that...you look for the kid who isnt cocky as hell about where hes at and u look for the kid who had to claw his way to the top. What my cuz has found is that 9 times outta 10, the kid from the so so college who wants to go to medical school has done just that. THINK ABOUT IT...ITS TRUE!</p>
<p>You arent gonna get an incompetant, stupid kid gettng passed the premeds with a reputable GPA...so any1 from a "so so" school is gonna obviously have a certain motivation. As for the kid from the ivy....yea him and all 400 of his classmates have applied to the same medical school. What are his intentions, why does he wanna be a doctor...are his parents doctors and hes getting pushed into it? There are things that med school adcoms as themselves about big name premed program applicants and if you really think about the people you know at hopkins premed...figure out why they are doing premed, when i did it, i found all the reasons to be complete crap, and i wouldnt trust them as my doctors if i was the patient and knew why they wanna be a doctor. Id ask more questions be4 admitting a buncha big name school kids then i would be4 admitting kids from so so schools with top notch scores...those kids worked up from the bottom and have ruthless personalities
Consider that</p>
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However go look at the avg starting salary of a Pace University grad....75 grand, not too shabby for a 3rd tier school if you ask me.
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<p>I would like to see the data that shows that Pace grads are getting an average of 75k a year. Do you have a link that shows this?</p>
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Ivies are becoming rediculous now, it has become more politics then anything else to get accepted to them. You have thousands of kids with the saaame 4.0 GPA and the same 1600 SAT score applying to them, what does it all come down to in the end? Who knows who and what connections do you have? Now this isnt in every case, but i think we are starting to see it more and more nowadays.
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<p>Let's not paint with too broad of a brush, shall we? While I'm not saying that Ivies are the greatest thing since sliced bread, they are pretty darn good schools.</p>
<p>Furthermore, Ivy education is clearly available to those who work hard, not just to politicians. I happen to know several Asian-American immigrant families who arrived in the country in poverty, speaking little English, yet their kids managed to go to the Ivies. One family I know has 3 daughters. One daughter went to Harvard, one went to Yale, and the last went to Princeton. The family nabbed the entire HYP troika. That deserves respect. They had no 'political advantage' or wealth advantage. The daughters just simply worked very hard and achieved great academic success. That success deserves respect. </p>
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Yes granted one has fancy ass name next to their name, and the other one doesnt...however the other kid has a 30 on the MCAT vs the 29 that the Ivy kid has, maybe they have the same GPA. I had this conversation with my cousin, and he asked me who id choose....ill admit i chose the ivy kid because of the school he went to. But my cousin told me that in making the decision, you consider more then that...you look for the kid who isnt cocky as hell about where hes at and u look for the kid who had to claw his way to the top. What my cuz has found is that 9 times outta 10, the kid from the so so college who wants to go to medical school has done just that. THINK ABOUT IT...ITS TRUE!
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<p>But again, your presumption here is that the Ivy kid didn't claw his way to the top. While some Ivy kids are surely cocky and got in through political advantage, I would say that most are not. In fact, many of them also clawed their way in. Again, I would point to the notable number of students in the Ivies who are first or second generation Asian immigrants. What political advantages did these kids have? Answer - almost none. They got in because they clawed. </p>
<p>It does also lead to the question of if that poor immigrant family can nevertheless send their 3 daughters to HYP, well, why can't other people do that? </p>
<p>My point is, you can't just dismiss all Ivy students as a bunch of trust-fund babies. Plenty of Ivy students were born with no advantages and worked hard to get to where they are.</p>
<p>and i 100% agree with you...but im providing proof against bluedevils assumption that its esentially better in everyway to go to a big name school as opposed to a tier 2, tier 3 school...its just not always the case.</p>
<p>and i dont wanna generalize about all ivy students, i have friends who are exactly what sakky described...however, what i described is becoming a more common sight as ivies become more and more competitive, its less and less about the carbon copy transcripts that ivy league applicants are submitting and more about $ and political connections, more so then it was in the past at least.</p>
<p>Doogie, my argument is simply this (and I think a careful rereading will confirm that this was my original argument):</p>
<p>Don't run away from a school just because it's hard.</p>
<p>Edit explanation: I edited the statement to qualify it slightly, then decided that it would be more relevant to the thread if I returned it to what I said originally, and what sakky responded to.</p>
<p>While I don't want to speak for bluedevil, I don't think he said that it is always better in every way to go to a bigname school. </p>
<p>From reviewing his posts, what I can tell is that he is advocating that it is a higher percentage play to go to a better ranked school. That doesn't mean that it is better in all cases. But it is better in the majority of cases. This, I agree with. </p>
<p>I would also dispute that money and political connections are becoming more important for Ivy admissions. If anything, they are becoming far less important. For example, a half-century ago there was almost nobody who was not a rich WASP who went to the Ivies. </p>
<p>For example, I just read a story about Levi Jackson, the first black captain of the Yale football team. When he went to Yale in 1946, he was one of only 3 blacks in the entire Yale undergrad student body. Thomas Sowell, a black man who was born in poverty in North Carolina but went to Harvard in the 1950's, recounts in his book "A Personal Odyssey" how he would go for days on end at Harvard without seeing a single minority. Often times, the only time he would see a non-white face during his whole day at Harvard was when he looked in the mirror to shave. Few blacks, Asians, Hispanics, or anybody else other than WASP's attended Harvard during those days. </p>
<p>This was also during the time of the Ivy "Numerus Clausus" or "Jewish quotas", which were policies enacted by the Ivies to deliberately restrict the number of Jewish students admitted, and also restrict other ethnic groups, such as Catholics. In fact, Columbia University used to run a "numerus null" policy targeted at blacks, where they deliberately and specifically would not admit you if you are black (hence the 'null' of numerus null). </p>
<p>The point is, I am fairly certain that the historical record will show that the Ivy student population is far far more meritocratic and diverse than it was in the past. Politics and money are far less prevalent in the admissions process than it was in the past. Do politics and money still play a role? Sure. But I don't think there can be any comparison to how it was in the old days.</p>
<p>you say not to run away from a school because its hard...</p>
<p>im gonna sound like a slacker but im gonna say it anyway because the road to becoming a doctor requires a strategy and we all know this.</p>
<p>I think you shouldnt go to schools that have a reputation of being particularly hard. Why put yourself through something thats gonna make it even harder and play more mind games then you really need during premed?</p>
<p>Yea if you want a personal challenge, go for the harder school thats fine...but i suggest you go for a school that you are gonna do better at</p>
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I think you shouldnt go to schools that have a reputation of being particularly hard. Why put yourself through something thats gonna make it even harder and play more mind games then you really need during premed?</p>
<p>Yea if you want a personal challenge, go for the harder school thats fine...but i suggest you go for a school that you are gonna do better at
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<p>But now the issues are getting mixed. Just because a school is more prestigious doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to be harder. These are 2 entirely different and distinct concepts. In fact, I would say that there are certain schools, notably a certain one in Palo Alto, California, that are known for being both extremely prestigious AND fairly easy, at least in the sense that practically nobody ever flunks out or gets truly bad grades. I personally think that's the jackpot. You can get a degree that's both prestigious AND relatively easy. That is, of course, if you can get admitted.</p>
<p>u have to look at the school curriculum...for example. UMs curriculum for premed is fairly tough and its acceptance rate is 56% (this is HS to undergrad)...i got into UM thinking that oh im cut out for this, but when i honestly looked at myself and thought to myself am i compatible with this school...i realized, and through 1 yr of turmoil unfortunately, i realzed my dad was right, Im not the tpye who does well in huge 36,000 student schools where premed is tough and there is BARELY ANY grade inflation at all...like i mean barely....it just doesnt make sense</p>
<p>go to the school which u think u will succeed in AND be happy in...dont take 1 over the other...bluedevil im not running away from the challenge cause UT will of course be the same material to be learned, but i know i can do better there. the only reason i rejected it my sr yr of high school was cause i wanted to go to a prestigious big name school and UM fit just that picture, and i realized i was wrong and shouldnt have thought that way I applied to UT actually my sr yr of HS and got a full ride + honors program and now i am startin back there as the underdog....i dunno i dont know if u even get what im saying lol</p>