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OK mcat2. May have one home, was only looking online. when s’s mcat score comes out in a month, i will look more closely.</p>
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Actually, I find it hard to believe also that there’s a SOM that limits its students to coming from 6-10 undergrads. What is in discussion is that, for a given medical school, the students from a certain college may be given some boost given the same stats. Some guess there is some, some guess there is very little, and some guess there is none.</p>
<p>It is well known that medical schools, especially public ones, tend to give their in-state applicants some boost. This may be the only statement that few would dispute that it is likely true. (yea…there is another one that may have some “half-truth” in it: For some medical schools, there is likely an auto-invite policy where some colleges are indeed favored in ths policy: the same GPA from some college would not result in an auto-invite, but the student from the non-auto-invite list can still get an invite by other way. Also, this is not about admission; it is about the interview only.)</p>
<p>Regarding the respect accorded top schools, anecdotally, DD got into her top ranked public med school as a fall admit, IIR, they admit about 10% of their class in the fall, I would see those as priority kids. In the FB page started by that group, there were some very well respected top schools, there was also a private local LAC or two, so they were not only about prestigious undergrad, but the majority of alma maters would have been well recognized on CC. It was not a small group of 6, but probably top 20ish.</p>
<p>It’s just one story, but I did see it unfold and was impressed with the variety of students, especially given the strict in state preference as that meant most of these kids were state residents who left the state to pursue interesting undergrads. I don’t know that they mathematically adjusted grades, but perhaps it made the student stand out in the pile as worth a second look and that student subsequently proved interesting in the interview.</p>
<p>Regarding BBs point, there are a lot of gunners at top UCs, not sure how other state schools work, but I would imagine it would have been easier to get an A at a top private, even if the student was not in the top 25% based on SAT, than at Cal or UCLA. IF the student is a diligent worker who attends all classes.</p>
<p>At DDs UC, based on CC/SDN research she tossed out the UC advice and followed her own path, that decision was made certain when they began contradicting each other and criticizing classes taken in prior terms, “Why did you take that then? That’s all wrong!” I don’t know about the numbers overall, but DD and the handful of friends applying that year all got into medical schools.</p>
<p>Our medical clinic and hospitals list the doctor profiles. In viewing several of those in the discipline areas my 16 year old is interested in (and I KNOW that will change) NONE of them went to an Ivy+ undergrad…interesting. Most of them went to various state schools or LAC.</p>
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<p>Is underachiever saying that to fill the below median, they primarily recruit from the few top elite schools (who may have the below median gpa)? So, its is not the entire class, exclusively from the few elite UG colleges as mcat2 and m2ck make it sound like?</p>
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this list looks random. M’s premed prep should not be uniform, their STEM focus may, but not the student body or experiences. This is stereotype and a bad argument. The MIT grads with lower gpa do seem to make good medschools.</p>
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<p>I just want to clarify what I said in post #32, as I think that I may not have read underachievers comment closely enough when I posted.</p>
<p>What I recall BDM said, help me here mcat2, was that there are 10 or fewer UG colleges that can give applicants a boost in med school admissions, not that there are med schools that only accept from 10 or less UG colleges.</p>
<p>Sorry for any confusion.</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>Oh it wasn’t your post that I was referring to. :)</p>
<p>Yes, I do recall that BDM said that a student would only get a small bump for the top 10 or so schools. The rest of the schools will be viewed equally. Exception would be an unknown Podunk school that no one’s heard of…such a school could be a negative.</p>
<p>I was referring to THIS post:
"However, I can assure you that the top tier school list we try to recruit from includes mostly top private schools, even though the list has been adjusted periodically. The list includes no more than 5-6 schools. "</p>
<p>This person is suggesting that if you don’t come from those 5-6 schools, you’re pretty much out of luck. So, that’s why I created a list of top schools and questioned which weren’t on “the list”. I think the claim is false.</p>
<p>Ah, come on. lol We are all mis-reading the posts and most of us are mis-remembering what bdm said. </p>
<p>bdm said that there are (less than ten) schools that give you a bump on your GPA. That’s it. IIRC, he and I agreed that bump was certainly no more than .3. Not that you were SOL if you didn’t attend those schools. bdm is not an idiot. 
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Let’s don’t read more than what was written by underachiever. They said “try to recruit from”. I’d say that’s not far from “we prefer to recruit from”. </p>
<p>As a very long in the tooth poster (who should be put out to pasture) let me add that IMO there are clearly some schools that give their students a boost in admissions simply by attending. Which schools? HYPSD…uhh…uhh… well that’s 5. Other than that , y’all fight amongst yourselves. </p>
<p>And yeah. For the noobs who don’t know the story…my kid had to climb that mountain to get into YSM …and she did it as a first day admit, so it can be done. </p>
<p>Un-hooked by circumstance or ethnicity. (If she was hooked, it was by her own achievements.) From an LAC ranked around 50. With an MCAT below their average. And being a ordinary hillbilly kid. </p>
<p>So …keep your chin up. Not all hope is lost but you will have to be extra-ordinary if you are from an unknown but good school with a less than average MCAT or GPA. If you are from a total crap school and have a ding on either the MCAT or GPA? However small? And you are not hooked? You’re probably dead in the water. </p>
<p>Simply put: Go to the best school you can afford to attend, taking into consideration that the “best school” is a personal/family decision having to do with lots of factors other than rank/prestige. (Two biggies are fit and money.) Choose. And then don’t look back. </p>
<p>BTW, equal money? Go to Yale for UG. It’s a pretty amazing place…if you like that sorta thing. </p>
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<li>My D was accepted to Yale UG but made a (mostly) financial decision not to attend. Like entomom’s kid she was one year early on Yale FA’s “middle-class iniatitive”.</li>
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<p>Jeez. “Initiative”. See? Don’t post much and you forget how to spell. Or type. I edited that post 14 times. 
That pasture is looking better all the time.</p>
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This statement is from somebody who actually met bdm in person in New Haven. He must remember his viewpoint better than the rest of us here :)</p>
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<li>DS benefited from these schools’ “middle-class initiative” but only for the last two years. I think curm’s D is amazing as she went through the system in a more challenging way. If DS and she had switched places (It could happen, as he might have gone to a LAC back then, considering the fact that the majority of schools he had applied to and got accepted were LACs), I highly doubt he could have made it in the same way she had made it. But this is just my personal opinion.</li>
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<p>BTW, DS did enjoy his 4 years at his UG, especially for non-academic aspects of the life there. It is a good fit for him – with the exception of parent’s wallet 
(One of his comments in early college years – after he had been through some of those medical school prereqs: If it were not for the EC activities at his college, he could do the same at a state university as well. He really valued the evening activities there.)</p>
<p>This discussion is pretty futile. The only assured success is to have high GPA and decent MCAT score and other requirements covered. Calculating bumps of GPA,…etc. and rely in any aspect on the name of UG is not a good idea, IMO.<br>
If one is have to go to HYP, so be it, if another feels lucky to go to the lowest ranked state school, go ahead. Each of them will have to work very hard to get where they want to be. It is not honest to say that their effort would be second to their school name, not true at all.</p>