<p>Ok, this is all hypothetical but I wanted to know...</p>
<p>If I go to University of Texas at Austin and have a good GPA (~3.7) and an awesome score on the MCAT, Will I get accepted to an elite Medical School...</p>
<p>What if I go to say University of Texas at Dallas and have a stellar GPA (~3.9) and have the same MCAT score as UT Austin, Will I get accepted to an elite Medical School</p>
<p>Which one will give me a better chance to get into an elite Med School</p>
<p>(In essence, Should I go to UT Austin--Away from home-- or UT Dallas--Close to home)</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter where you go, you have to be at the top your class. One frequent poster on here, recently posted that most kids who go to “elite” (elite as in JHU, Harvard, Yale, Stanford) came from top ivy league schools (harvard, yale, stanford undergrad) and these students were able to maintain 3.8+ at their prestigious undergrad schools.</p>
<p>Take any coverage of people going to “elite” schools with a grain of salt.</p>
<p>I have personal friends at each of the “elite” medical schools and I graduated from a flagship StateU in a small population flyover state. However none of them set out from the beginning hoping and wishing for admission to these schools. They applied to one or two of those schools a piece on a whim, just to try and were shocked when they got accepted. Were they smart? Of course. Did they have good MCAT scores? Absolutely. Were they heavily involved on campus? Far and above the average pre-med.</p>
<p>So why are there so many more “elite” alumni at “elite” medical schools? Quite honestly, it’s sample bias. The people who in HS are interested in going to an elite school are, 4 years later, the same people who are going to be most interested in applying to “name” medical schools as an overall application strategy. There is also going to be a significant amount of peer pressure to apply to those schools, even if the applicant is less than stellar. </p>
<p>So while my friends only selected a few top schools to apply to, the undergrads at the HPYS of the world are going to apply to a lot more private and “name” medical schools.</p>
<p>The point is you can get to those places from anywhere, but you have to be a stellar candidate no matter what. At a bare minimum you need to be the sort of candidate that your home state medical school would never reject. That means grades, MCAT, campus and community involvement, research, glowing LOR’s and a great interview. Everything needs to be in a row.</p>
<p>Even with a stellar GPA (~3.9+) and an above average MCAT from an elite college, it is still not very likely that you will be admitted to an elite medical school. These elite medical schools look for the achievement much more than just the grades and MCAT. The only advantage you may have (this is a still big one though) is that it is a little bit easier for you to get an interview invite from some of these elite schools. But an interview invite is far from an acceptance. (Is it likely that 20% of interviewees will be accepted?)</p>
<p>You’d probably be a great applicant for PMS (Princeton Medical School) with those stats and it’s the toughest of all medical schools to get into. It’s practically impossible.</p>
<p>No and No, you need more than a GPA and a good MCAT to get into a top medical school. Ultimately, it was what you do outside of class that will get you into the “elites”. The grades and MCAT score are just the pre-reqs.</p>