Data: Elite School Bias in MD/PhD Admissions

[Lucca]

Hey everyone,

About a year ago there was a thread over at the Physician Scientist forum about elite school bias in MD/PhD admissions. This post is a more in-depth continuation of the data discussed in that thread, this time posted in Pre-Allo for visibility and because of discussions in recent threads about the importance of undergraduate prestige for admissions to elite MD programs.

In that thread, @Maebea posted a table showing the undergraduate institutions of ~3100 MD/PhD matriculants from 2010 - 2014 (the data comes from internal documents at the user's MD/PhD program). In this post I will present some graphs I have made using those and other data as well.

Proportion of MD/PhD Matriculants Coming from Top 30, 20, and 10 Undergraduate Institutions
According to U.S. News and World Report

Top 5 Schools by Percentage of Class coming from Top 30 Undergrads
1. Harvard
2. U Chicago
3. Columbia
4. UCLA
5. UCSF

Top 5 Schools by Percentage of Class from Top 20 Undergrads
1. Harvard
2. Columbia
3. UCSF
4. U Penn
5. U Chicago

Top 5 Schools by Percentage of Class coming from Top 10 Undergrads

1. Harvard
2. Columbia
3. U Penn
4. UCSF
5. U Chicago

As is apparent, MSTPs (MD/PhD programs fully funded by the NIH) tend to have the most significant portion of their classes coming from top UG institutions. At least 24 programs admit half or more of their students from just the Top 30. Harvard is somewhat of an outlier with over 75% of its class coming from just the top 10 undergraduate institutions.

I thought it might also be interesting to see how "inbred" certain top programs were and how prevalent HYPSM grads are at each one. I wrote a script that reads in student directories from the program webpage and collects information on its students' undergrads. I used that to calculate the proportion of the program that comes from its own undergrad, as well as the proportion coming from just HYPSM alone. This data represents the past 8 years of matriculants at these programs. The top programs that do not appear either do not have a student directory or do not list their students' undergraduate institutions.

Using this same script and data I recalculated the proportion of the class coming from the top 30, 20 ,10 undergrads just for these schools (this time with data spanning 8 years as opposed to 4).

As you can see, the results do differ slightly from those in the 4 year matriculant data from the original elite school bias thread. When writing my script, the results for Harvard, JHU, and Stanford agreed with what I found tallying undergrads up by hand.

When I have time in the future I hope to correlate the inbreeding scores and proportions in each category to the USNWR ranking of the MD/PhD program.

Personally, I find it surprising how large the proportion of students just from HYPSM is at top MSTPs.

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[WedgeDawg]

gonna repost this here from another thread since it contributes to the OP

I have a source where I was able to determine the undergraduate institutions of ~500 MD-only interviewees (all were de-identified, I didn't have access to names or anything) for one of the past 3 cycles at Columbia (being intentionally vague). All of these were from the same cycle and sampling was 100% unbiased.

Here is the breakdown of interviews by category as well as percentage adjusted for the # of schools in each category

1. Columbia & Barnard - 5.2% (5.2% per school, counting Columbia and Barnard as a single institution)
2. HYPMS - 20.6% (4.1% per school)
3. Other top school (includes other Ivies, Duke, NYU, Northwestern, Amherst, etc) - 34.1% (1.5% per school)
4. Top Public (Michigan, UCLA, Berkeley, UNC, UVA, W&M) - 6.6% (1.1% per school)
5. Other Public - 18.1% (0.4% per school)
6. Other Private - 15.4% (0.4% per school)

Of the "Other top school" category, schools that contributed 10 or more students in order were Cornell, Dartmouth, Penn, Duke, WashU, Hopkins, Brown, and UChicago.

If we have an "Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago" category it would look like this:

1. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago - 21.4% (2.7% per school)
2. All other "other top school"s - 12.7% (0.85% per school) (n=15 schools such as NYU, Northwestern, Amherst, Caltech, McGill, Vanderbilt, Rice, etc)

So if we look at this all together:

1. Columbia & Barnard: 5.2% per school
2. HYPMS: 4.1% per school
3. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago: 2.7% per school
4. Top Public: 1.1% per school
5. Other Top Private: 0.9% per school
6. Other Public: 0.4% per school
7. Other Private: 0.4% per school

Finally, if we normalize the ratios we get

1. Columbia & Barnard: 13
2. HYPMS: 10.3
3. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago: 6.8
4. Top Public: 2.8
5. Other Top Private: 2.3
6. Other Public: 1
7. Other Private: 1

data is fun

 

[aldol16]

Well-done analysis. It is an interesting fact and not entirely surprising to me because I believe the PhD side of things complicates this kind of admissions. PhD programs are very much into pedigree.

 

[Lucca]

gonna repost this here from another thread since it contributes to the OP

I have a source where I was able to determine the undergraduate institutions of ~500 MD-only interviewees (all were de-identified, I didn't have access to names or anything) for one of the past 3 cycles at Columbia (being intentionally vague). All of these were from the same cycle and sampling was 100% unbiased.

Here is the breakdown of interviews by category as well as percentage adjusted for the # of schools in each category

1. Columbia & Barnard - 5.2% (5.2% per school, counting Columbia and Barnard as a single institution)
2. HYPMS - 20.6% (4.1% per school)
3. Other top school (includes other Ivies, Duke, NYU, Northwestern, Amherst, etc) - 34.1% (1.5% per school)
4. Top Public (Michigan, UCLA, Berkeley, UNC, UVA, W&M) - 6.6% (1.1% per school)
5. Other Public - 18.1% (0.4% per school)
6. Other Private - 15.4% (0.4% per school)

Of the "Other top school" category, schools that contributed 10 or more students in order were Cornell, Dartmouth, Penn, Duke, WashU, Hopkins, Brown, and UChicago.

If we have an "Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago" category it would look like this:

1. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago - 21.4% (2.7% per school)
2. All other "other top school"s - 12.7% (0.85% per school) (n=15 schools such as NYU, Northwestern, Amherst, Caltech, McGill, Vanderbilt, Rice, etc)

So if we look at this all together:

1. Columbia & Barnard: 5.2% per school
2. HYPMS: 4.1% per school
3. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago: 2.7% per school
4. Top Public: 1.1% per school
5. Other Top Private: 0.9% per school
6. Other Public: 0.4% per school
7. Other Private: 0.4% per school

Finally, if we normalize the ratios we get

1. Columbia & Barnard: 13
2. HYPMS: 10.3
3. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago: 6.8
4. Top Public: 2.8
5. Other Top Private: 2.3
6. Other Public: 1
7. Other Private: 1

data is fun

U wouldn't also happen to have this info for the matriculating regular MD class would you?

 

[WedgeDawg]

U wouldn't also happen to have this info for the matriculating regular MD class would you?

Only interviews. I mean theoretically I could stalk every member of my class on Facebook and figure out where each person went to school but 1) that's kind of creepy and 2) that's a lot of effort for something that will probably just confirm what we already strongly suspect.

 

[MDPHDhopeful07]

Thanks for posting this data! On the MD/PhD interview trail one becomes aware of the bias ... But it's nice to confirm the n=1 experience and intuitions with some actual numbers.

It also would be interesting to see how many MD/PhD applicants (comparative to total class size/enrollment) "elite" undergraduate schools produce as compared to smaller, lesser known universities.

Personally, coming from a relatively "unknown" university, it's been interesting being the only applicant not from a "big name" school at 10+ MD/PhD interviews, lol. Also, some anecdotal information: I've had at least one interviewer/previous program director say that it has (in the past) been common practice for their school to "automatically reject" someone who isn't coming from a well-known university. But, hey, stellar students find a way.

 

[freak7]

Only interviews. I mean theoretically I could stalk every member of my class on Facebook and figure out where each person went to school but 1) that's kind of creepy and 2) that's a lot of effort for something that will probably just confirm what we already strongly suspect.

You'll never get this published with that attitude!

 

[Lucca]

Thanks for posting this data! On the MD/PhD interview trail one becomes aware of the bias ... But it's nice to confirm the n=1 experience and intuitions with some actual numbers.

It also would be interesting to see how many MD/PhD applicants (comparative to total class size/enrollment) "elite" undergraduate schools produce as compared to smaller, lesser known universities.

Personally, coming from a relatively "unknown" university, it's been interesting being the only applicant not from a "big name" school at 10+ MD/PhD interviews, lol. Also, some anecdotal information: I've had at least one interviewer/previous program director say that it has (in the past) been common practice for their school to "automatically reject" someone who isn't coming from a well-known university. But, hey, stellar students find a way.

If you take a look at the original thread, there is a post that shows where MD/PhD applicants come from. I have not taken the time to graph that data but it would be interesting to use that information to see how overrepresented schools are in the matriculants pool compared to the applicant pool

 

[MDPHDhopeful07]

@Lucca - Ah, didn't see that, thanks!

 

[wizzed101]

Why is this even surprising? Just compare an average HS student from an prestigious institute and the others. It's like comparing peasants and kings. It absolutely makes no sense to wipe off all achievements every time one moves up the ladder. Yes, they can be diminished but not completely extinguished. One's hard work counts.

 

[freak7]

Why is this even surprising? Just compare an average HS student from an prestigious institute and the others. It's like comparing peasants and kings. It absolutely makes no sense to wipe off all achievements every time one moves up the ladder. Yes, they can be diminished but not completely extinguished. One's hard work counts.

Wut

 

[MDPHDhopeful07]

Why is this even surprising? Just compare an average HS student from an prestigious institute and the others. It's like comparing peasants and kings. It absolutely makes no sense to wipe off all achievements every time one moves up the ladder. Yes, they can be diminished but not completely extinguished. One's hard work counts.

This is laughable.

 

[RunawayGrape]

SUNY Upstate's really high up for top-20 UGs. Good school, but I can't say I expected that.

 

[Lucca]

SUNY Upstate's really high up for top-20 UGs. Good school, but I can't say I expected that.

The one that surprises me the most is Mayo which is both an MSTP and a brand name in medicine and research. Wish we could have more info on whether ppl from top UGs are just not being accepted their as frequently as other places or if they are not applying in the first place

 

[Mcatbot]

gonna repost this here from another thread since it contributes to the OP

I have a source where I was able to determine the undergraduate institutions of ~500 MD-only interviewees (all were de-identified, I didn't have access to names or anything) for one of the past 3 cycles at Columbia (being intentionally vague). All of these were from the same cycle and sampling was 100% unbiased.

Here is the breakdown of interviews by category as well as percentage adjusted for the # of schools in each category

1. Columbia & Barnard - 5.2% (5.2% per school, counting Columbia and Barnard as a single institution)
2. HYPMS - 20.6% (4.1% per school)
3. Other top school (includes other Ivies, Duke, NYU, Northwestern, Amherst, etc) - 34.1% (1.5% per school)
4. Top Public (Michigan, UCLA, Berkeley, UNC, UVA, W&M) - 6.6% (1.1% per school)
5. Other Public - 18.1% (0.4% per school)
6. Other Private - 15.4% (0.4% per school)

Of the "Other top school" category, schools that contributed 10 or more students in order were Cornell, Dartmouth, Penn, Duke, WashU, Hopkins, Brown, and UChicago.

If we have an "Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago" category it would look like this:

1. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago - 21.4% (2.7% per school)
2. All other "other top school"s - 12.7% (0.85% per school) (n=15 schools such as NYU, Northwestern, Amherst, Caltech, McGill, Vanderbilt, Rice, etc)

So if we look at this all together:

1. Columbia & Barnard: 5.2% per school
2. HYPMS: 4.1% per school
3. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago: 2.7% per school
4. Top Public: 1.1% per school
5. Other Top Private: 0.9% per school
6. Other Public: 0.4% per school
7. Other Private: 0.4% per school

Finally, if we normalize the ratios we get

1. Columbia & Barnard: 13
2. HYPMS: 10.3
3. Other Ivy + Duke, WashU, Hopkins, UChicago: 6.8
4. Top Public: 2.8
5. Other Top Private: 2.3
6. Other Public: 1
7. Other Private: 1

data is fun

Since Columbia interviews ~1000, do you know if the 500 sample you have is representative of the whole pool?


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

 

[WedgeDawg]

Since Columbia interviews ~1000, do you know if the 500 sample you have is representative of the whole pool?


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

As far as I can determine yes

 

[Dr.Sticks]

I would also like to see data about pre-med at elite schools vs pre-med at non elite schools.
I will Google to see if I can find any..
However I have a feeling that pre-med at top schools might have a better application overall compared to no name school pre meds. (Quality of advisors could be a factor)

 

[bromo]

If you want Penn's data for interviewed, accepted, and matriculated for both MD and MD/PhD, I can get it after the cycle is over.

They currently give out who is interviewing/ugrad institution before every single interview date.
We get the MD/PhDs who are accepted. Then come Aug, we find out who matriculated.

I also have Penn's directory for last year's MD/PhD students (all 180+ of them, including undergrad institution).

 

[Dr.Sticks]

I found acceptance results for a top 20 public for med school
I will make a graph later of how many went to elite med schools,mid tiers, etc
http://www.prehealth.umd.edu/facts-and-figures/

 

[efle]

Awesome!

Some interesting surprises. What the heck are Wake Forest and SUNY doing way up there, for example. Really wish we could compare with MD-only admissions.

@aldol16 or others, why is pedigree so important for PhD admissions? I was under the impression that academics/grades mattered little compared to what you'd done with labs during undergrad, and that a nice high quality liberal arts education was worthless at the bench

 

[Lucca]

If you want Penn's data for interviewed, accepted, and matriculated for both MD and MD/PhD, I can get it after the cycle is over.

They currently give out who is interviewing/ugrad institution before every single interview date.
We get the MD/PhDs who are accepted. Then come Aug, we find out who matriculated.

I also have Penn's directory for last year's MD/PhD students (all 180+ of them, including undergrad institution).

That data would be nice as Penn's directory is not publicly available. If you are free to give it, it would be much appreciated and I can update the OP

 

[aldol16]

@aldol16 or others, why is pedigree so important for PhD admissions? I was under the impression that academics/grades mattered little compared to what you'd done with labs during undergrad, and that a nice high quality liberal arts education was worthless at the bench

Well, several reasons. You're correct in that your research during undergrad is more important than your grades for PhD admissions. PIs are hiring people who can work in research, not people who can take exams well. However, quality of research is also important. The top researchers produce the top research. That's indisputable. The top researchers are also concentrated at the top institutions. That's also indisputable. Researchers at lower-ranked institutions might produce a Nature or Science paper a couple of times in their careers. More often than not, they'll only publish in journals with low-to-medium impact factors in their fields or journals that are extremely field-specific (i.e. not something like Nature or Science or even Neuron or Cell). Pay attention to the people who publish in Nature and Science each week. You'll find that the names of their institutions are limited to a very small pool. As an undergraduate, the quality of your research is really tied to the quality of your adviser's research because very few undergraduates come up with their own proposals to test. Even if you're an undergrad with a not-so-good PI and have a great idea, that PI likely won't have the funding/resources to do the project unless you're really lucky.

So if you're at one of those lower-ranked institutions, the chance is high that the quality of the research you are doing is lower than that of undergraduates who are working with PIs at the top of their fields. So if you're not producing quality research, you're more likely to be passed over for someone else who worked with a well-known PI and thus has produced great research.

Now, you'll notice that there are exceptions depending on the field. For instance, there are great chemistry researchers at Wisconsin and Illinois. Those aren't top-ranked undergrad schools, but their students do quite well in getting into good chemistry grad schools. So the bottom line is that who you work with matters for grad school and the fact that top researchers are concentrated at the top universities makes this phenomenon possible.

 

[zuleika-d]

.

 

[Lucca]

Awesome!

Some interesting surprises. What the heck are Wake Forest and SUNY doing way up there, for example. Really wish we could compare with MD-only admissions.

@aldol16 or others, why is pedigree so important for PhD admissions? I was under the impression that academics/grades mattered little compared to what you'd done with labs during undergrad, and that a nice high quality liberal arts education was worthless at the bench

If it were true academics didn't matter, the 50%ile for MSTP wouldn't be a 3.8/515!

 

[Lucca]

Since successful MD/PhD applications require sustained research, it doesn't seem surprising that the majority of matriculants come from places where they had access to disproportionate opportunities to do productive research as undergrads. My totally personal, fuzzy experience at the interview level has been that while many fellow interviewees do come from "Top Schools," they are the schools that have tons of research-type students and environments (eg Johns Hopkins, MIT, Harvard, UCs), and fewer from the more traditionally liberal-artsy ones (eg Brown, Williams) than even flagship state universities that are lower ranked but where undergrads still have access to strong labs.

Mayo's data may be affected by the fact that their MSTP is tiny: only 6 students, right?, so my guess is that their numbers would vary a lot year to year if expressed as a percentage of matriculants. Mayo also gets about half as many applicants as schools like Harvard/Penn which have 2-3x as many slots (276 applicants for Mayo vs 583 for UCSF or 653 for Harvard).

Well lots of MD/PhD programs are small. I excluded any with less than 20 students in 4 years. One reason why I prefer the 8 year data as opposed to the 4 yr data. However, I did not anticipate the diversity and/or clunkin of MD/PhD web directories so doing my second method for every school would take up way too much of my vacation time lol

 

[Dr.Sticks]

Based on 2016 data from University Of Maryland College Park(the flagship, and top 20 public)
21.7% of pre-med matriculants from UMD got into a top school(private and public) for just M.D
42.4 of matriculants also got into a top school for M.D/Ph.D
I believe it was mostly top publics that accepted though, not much love from top privates

Altogether UMD claims that 84% of their competitive applicants got into medical school. (Students with a GPA above 3.5 and above 30 mcat for M.D)

 

[WedgeDawg]

Based on 2016 data from University Of Maryland College Park(the flagship, and top 20 public)
21.7% of pre-med matriculants from UMD got into a top school(private and public) for just M.D
42.4 of matriculants also got into a top school for M.D/Ph.D
I believe it was mostly top publics that accepted though, not much love from top privates

Altogether UMD claims that 84% of their competitive applicants got into medical school. (Students with a GPA above 3.5 and above 30 mcat for M.D)

I find that hard to believe because Princeton reports that 1/3 of their students go to top schools (i can find the link if you want). What is UMD's definition of a top school? It's very possible it differs from 1) Princeton's definition and 2) SDN's traditionally agreed-upon definition

 

[Dr.Sticks]

I find that hard to believe because Princeton reports that 1/3 of their students go to top schools (i can find the link if you want). What is UMD's definition of a top school? It's very possible it differs from 1) Princeton's definition and 2) SDN's traditionally agreed-upon definition

I went by what the general consensus for a top school is; for my calculation
I basically included
UNC
Vanderbuilt
Wash U
Pritzker(spell check)
Northwestern
Hopkins
Mayo
U Pitt
UCLA
UCSF
UVA
Duke

Yeah I could continue on,but I think you get the idea.
You could run through the chart I linked above and maybe you will arrive at a slightly different number

I do not go by the US News rankings at all

For example I would consider Mayo a top 5 but US News doesn't

Also those are for allopathic acceptees
If we add D.O to the acceptance amount the number might tank, but I didn't..
Also UMD just lists the schools, they do not differentiate,except by D.O/M.D

 

[WedgeDawg]

I went by what the general consensus for a top school is; for my calculation
I basically included
UNC
Vanderbuilt
Wash U
Pritzker(spell check)
Northwestern
Hopkins
Mayo
U Pitt
UCLA
UCSF
UVA
Duke

Yeah I could continue on,but I think you get the idea.
You could run through the chart I linked above and maybe you will arrive at a slightly different number

I do not go by the US News rankings at all

For example I would consider Mayo a top 5 but US News doesn't

Also those are for allopathic acceptees
If we add D.O to the acceptance amount the number might tank, but I didn't..
Also UMD just lists the schools, they do not differentiate,except by D.O/M.D

Do you have a link I can look at or is it internally sourced?

 

[Dr.Sticks]

Do you have a link I can look at or is it internally sourced?

http://www.prehealth.umd.edu/facts-and-figures/

You will click a 2nd link for a pdf
They separate Allo, D.O, M.D/Ph.D

 

[WedgeDawg]

http://www.prehealth.umd.edu/facts-and-figures/

You will click a 2nd link for a pdf
They separate Allo, D.O, M.D/Ph.D

Thanks, I'll take a look!

 

[WedgeDawg]

Regarding U Maryland:

I counted 52 acceptances to top schools out of 337 total acceptances

Schools I considered top where there were entering in 2016 acceptances: UCLA, UCSF, Stanford, Yale, UChicago, Northwestern, Hopkins, Michigan, Mayo, WashU, Duke, Cornell, Mt. Sinai, NYU, Penn, Pitt, Vanderbilt

So that's 15.4% which honestly for a non-Berkeley type public school is pretty good.

One thing I could caution is that these are # of offers not number of people, so it's possible they had like 10-20 superstar applicants who got into a bunch of top schools each and it's highly unlikely that they had 52 individual applicants who each got into a single top school. So that 15.4% diminishes to probably <10%. Again, still not bad at all. But not 1 out of 3.

 

[Dr.Sticks]

Regarding U Maryland:

I counted 52 acceptances to top schools out of 337 total acceptances

Schools I considered top where there were entering in 2016 acceptances: UCLA, UCSF, Stanford, Yale, UChicago, Northwestern, Hopkins, Michigan, Mayo, WashU, Duke, Cornell, Mt. Sinai, NYU, Penn, Pitt, Vanderbilt

So that's 15.4% which honestly for a non-Berkeley type public school is pretty good.

One thing I could caution is that these are # of offers not number of people, so it's possible they had like 10-20 superstar applicants who got into a bunch of top schools each and it's highly unlikely that they had 52 individual applicants who each got into a single top school. So that 15.4% diminishes to probably <10%. Again, still not bad at all. But not 1 out of 3.

Nope, but this is UMD not Princeton.
But yeah it is very good for the schools rank, and UMD it will probably be up there with UVA and Berkeley in the next decade or so.

I know many with 4.0 GPAs get rejected from there even in my former H.S(not a h.s student haha).. Yep..
Or they get accepted and get no love and 0 scholarship money.

 

[WedgeDawg]

Nope, but this is UMD not Princeton.
But yeah it is very good for the schools rank, and UMD it will probably be up there with UVA and Berkeley in the next decade or so.

I know many with 4.0 GPAs get rejected from there even in my former H.S(not a h.s student haha).. Yep..
Or they get accepted and get no love and 0 scholarship money.

UMD is a solid school (even though Maryland is an inferior state to Virginia ). We will see what happens in the upcoming decade. But thank you very much for providing a source link - it's very helpful for people to evaluate these types of things.

 

[Dr.Sticks]

UMD is a solid school (even though Maryland is an inferior state to Virginia ). We will see what happens in the upcoming decade. But thank you very much for providing a source link - it's very helpful for people to evaluate these types of things.

I don't consider N.VA real Virginia FYI! Lol
To me real V.A is Appalachia
I think I will shut up before I give away my location now... Lol

 

[WedgeDawg]

I don't consider N.VA real Virginia FYI! Lol
To me real V.A is Appalachia
I think I will shut up before I give away my location now... Lol

Having lived in multiple parts of VA and MD, I tend to agree... the DC suburbs are essentially all the same regardless of what side of the Potomac you're on

but I too will shut up

 

[Pepe18]

.

 

[aldol16]

If it were true academics didn't matter, the 50%ile for MSTP wouldn't be a 3.8/515!

We weren't talking about MSTP. We were talking specifically about PhD admissions if you read the post carefully.

MD/PhD combines the selectivity of both degree programs. MD programs like high stats (generally). Somebody with a 3.3 GPA isn't quite competitive for a good MD program whereas someone with a 3.3 GPA could be competitive for a top graduate program given phenomenal research experience. On the other hand, PhD programs like quality research. So therefore, MD/PhD programs like high stats and quality research - I believe it's the latter that contributes the most to the observed phenomenon of "bias" towards top undergrad schools at top MD/PhD programs.

 

[Lucca]

We weren't talking about MSTP. We were talking specifically about PhD admissions if you read the post carefully.

MD/PhD combines the selectivity of both degree programs. MD programs like high stats (generally). Somebody with a 3.3 GPA isn't quite competitive for a good MD program whereas someone with a 3.3 GPA could be competitive for a top graduate program given phenomenal research experience. On the other hand, PhD programs like quality research. So therefore, MD/PhD programs like high stats and quality research - I believe it's the latter that contributes the most to the observed phenomenon of "bias" towards top undergrad schools at top MD/PhD programs.

Ah my bad. Yes, I agree. I'm not sure if I'm right on this, but I *feel* like a lot of the summer research experiences that have a good chance of giving you a good/productive research experience are also biased towards people from top undergrads. It's the whole pipeline in science, certainly it's not a phenomenon only at the admissions level

 

[Jalby]

Shouldn't the top programs (MD/PHD) take the applicants from the top colleges?? I'm trying to figure out exactly what is wrong with this. If you didn't get into a top college coming out of High School, why should a program take a chance with one of their few MD/Phd spots on someone who wouldn't have the experiences and people vouching for them that the top college graduates would have?

 

[Pepe18]

.

 

[Maebea]

Here are the top feeder schools for MD-PhD programs for the period 2010-2014. Only undergrad schools with that sent 20 or more students to MD-PhD programs in this 5-year period are included.


Undergrad /2010-2014 Count / Change from 2005-2009
UC-Berkeley / 100 / 43%
Harvard / 95 / -7%
Johns Hopkins / 92 / 10%
Michigan / 80 / 129%
Yale / 80 / 10%
Cornell / 78 / 0%
Stanford / 78 / 1%
Wash U / 76 / 38%
Penn / 67 / 24%
UCLA / 66 / 10%
Duke 66 12%
MIT / 62 / -5%
Columbia / 44 / -10%
Princeton / 44 / 7%
Northwestern / 37 / 9%
UT-Austin / 37 / 48%
U Washington / 37 / 37%
UVA / 35 / 3%
Chicago / 34 / -24%
UCSD / 33 / -21%
Maryland-Baltimore County / 32 / 19%
Brown / 31 / -30%
Emory / 30 / 50%
Maryland-College Park / 30 / 25%
Illinois / 29 / -22%
Minnesota / 29 / 107%
Wisconsin / 29 / -3%
Case-Western / 27 / 0%
Pitt / 25 / 14%
BYU / 23 / -23%
UNC-Chapel Hill / 22 / -21%
Total of these Institutions / 1422 / 12%
Total of all institutions / 3160 / 9%
Percentage from these institutions / 45% / 2%

 

[Lucca]

Shouldn't the top programs (MD/PHD) take the applicants from the top colleges?? I'm trying to figure out exactly what is wrong with this. If you didn't get into a top college coming out of High School, why should a program take a chance with one of their few MD/Phd spots on someone who wouldn't have the experiences and people vouching for them that the top college graduates would have?

There's nothing wrong with it per se if it is true that students at top programs are 1) more likely to apply MD/PhD, and 2) more likely to have the qualifications which make them desirable to MD/PhD programs (high GPA, high MCAT, sustained research experience where they enjoyed a significant degree of independence).

I don't think those things are true as a given though. It is especially surprising such a large proportion of students at top programs come from just 5 schools alone. It is not as if the difference in student caliber or institutional resources for undergraduates at Harvard is going to be all that different from students at Duke. There might be more hand holding at smaller private schools and personalized mentorship/counseling to get people to the resources they need to achieve their goals, but in terms of research opportunities and productivity any Tier 1 research university is going to have plenty.

Maybe when you graduated high school the difference between the students who went to Harvard and those who went elsewhere was more significant, but at least in my generation I feel that top schools are practically a crap shoot if you are not well connected or "hooked" and more and more students with 99th percentile test scores and perfect GpAs are filling out the classes at the "lower rungs" of the academic ladder so to speak.

 

[Fijj]

If this hasn't already been done:
Maybe look into MCAT/GRE average scores at top schools vs others. Could mean that these top schools just have, on average, more competitive candidates. There isn't many standardized markers that can compare across schools, but MCAT may be informative.

Edit: also, average age of MD/PHDs is high - they usually are working after college to build resume. Postbacc research programs makes college research experience less relevant, it is more akin to what you will be doing as a PHD student/postdoc. So even if top schools give more research, there are plenty of opportunities outside of college that can lessen any advantages.

 

[JustAPhD]

Well, several reasons. You're correct in that your research during undergrad is more important than your grades for PhD admissions. PIs are hiring people who can work in research, not people who can take exams well. However, quality of research is also important. The top researchers produce the top research. That's indisputable. The top researchers are also concentrated at the top institutions. That's also indisputable. Researchers at lower-ranked institutions might produce a Nature or Science paper a couple of times in their careers. More often than not, they'll only publish in journals with low-to-medium impact factors in their fields or journals that are extremely field-specific (i.e. not something like Nature or Science or even Neuron or Cell). Pay attention to the people who publish in Nature and Science each week. You'll find that the names of their institutions are limited to a very small pool. As an undergraduate, the quality of your research is really tied to the quality of your adviser's research because very few undergraduates come up with their own proposals to test. Even if you're an undergrad with a not-so-good PI and have a great idea, that PI likely won't have the funding/resources to do the project unless you're really lucky.

So if you're at one of those lower-ranked institutions, the chance is high that the quality of the research you are doing is lower than that of undergraduates who are working with PIs at the top of their fields. So if you're not producing quality research, you're more likely to be passed over for someone else who worked with a well-known PI and thus has produced great research.

Now, you'll notice that there are exceptions depending on the field. For instance, there are great chemistry researchers at Wisconsin and Illinois. Those aren't top-ranked undergrad schools, but their students do quite well in getting into good chemistry grad schools. So the bottom line is that who you work with matters for grad school and the fact that top researchers are concentrated at the top universities makes this phenomenon possible.

As usual I agree with aldol, especially his TL;DR. Academia is a web of who-you-know. Collaborations facilitate this, but it's also a function of who you compete with and who you interact with multiple times a year (conferences, meetings, etc). Of course if you have stellar grades you're going to get looked at regardless of where you're from/ which PI you worked under, but working under/training with a famous PI in the field you wish to get your PhD in is a huge advantage.

 

[Lucca]

If this hasn't already been done:
Maybe look into MCAT/GRE average scores at top schools vs others. Could mean that these top schools just have, on average, more competitive candidates. There isn't many standardized markers that can compare across schools, but MCAT may be informative.

Edit: also, average age of MD/PHDs is high - they usually are working after college to build resume. Postbacc research programs makes college research experience less relevant, it is more akin to what you will be doing as a PHD student/postdoc. So even if top schools give more research, there are plenty of opportunities outside of college that can lessen any advantages.

The nice thing about MD/PhD stats and especially MSTP is that stats at all programs fairly similar. All averages are in the 3.8-3.9/514-520 range.

If you meant from an applicant side, MD/PhD directors have that info but I do not

 

[aldol16]

Ah my bad. Yes, I agree. I'm not sure if I'm right on this, but I *feel* like a lot of the summer research experiences that have a good chance of giving you a good/productive research experience are also biased towards people from top undergrads. It's the whole pipeline in science, certainly it's not a phenomenon only at the admissions level

Yes, the fact that many prestigious summer programs (Amgen, etc.) take students from top undergraduate universities is true, although many of the REUs are designed for students who don't have substantial research at their home institutions. However, these programs really don't give you much "productive" research in the sense that anybody (for the most part) who does 3 months of work on a basic science project and have enough for a publication or national poster presentation aren't really doing most of the work. The point of summer experiences is to expose undergraduates to research and research methodology, not to give them publications. The fact that so many undergraduates go into these experiences demanding to be "productive" in the sense of getting a publication out of it reflects how out-of-tune undergrads are with research and how unrealistic their expectations are.

 

[Lucca]

Yes, the fact that many prestigious summer programs (Amgen, etc.) take students from top undergraduate universities is true, although many of the REUs are designed for students who don't have substantial research at their home institutions. However, these programs really don't give you much "productive" research in the sense that anybody (for the most part) who does 3 months of work on a basic science project and have enough for a publication or national poster presentation aren't really doing most of the work. The point of summer experiences is to expose undergraduates to research and research methodology, not to give them publications. The fact that so many undergraduates go into these experiences demanding to be "productive" in the sense of getting a publication out of it reflects how out-of-tune undergrads are with research and how unrealistic their expectations are.

What these experiences can also do, though, is give you some solid experience and training to get your foot in the door at a good lab at ur UG or for your postbacc research if you choose to do so.

 

[Fijj]

The nice thing about MD/PhD stats and especially MSTP is that stats at all programs fairly similar. All averages are in the 3.8-3.9/514-520 range.

If you meant from an applicant side, MD/PhD directors have that info but I do not

I see. I meant mostly from applicant side yes, but since all the averages are the same as you said, it is unlikely to matter.
This phenomenon makes sense though, those who chase the prestige of a "top" MDPHD are likely to be historic prestige chasers, going to these top colleges. In the end, any MDPHD will likely conduct amazing research regardless of where you go.

 

[Pepe18]

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