I guess we'll have to just disagree on this point. Or, put another way: Je suis en désaccord avec vous.
You can't lump all DO schools and all MD schools together. There are going to be some places in both categories that offer an overall better education.
This is exactly my point. You can't just say that because someone went to an MD school, but scored 30 points less on Steps 1 and 2, that they still must have had a good education. But that is what happens.
Is it fair for a playing field to be completely leveled after Step 1 when one group of students have been more academically accomplished up to that point? No. It is unfair to erase a student's past accomplishments.
The idiom for this is "resting on one's laurels." It smacks of laziness and entitlement. No, your MCAT shouldn't matter at this stage. And if you did something significant before medical school, you can still put it on your application (publications, etc), thereby obviating any need to account for the school you graduated from as a proxy for your past accomplishments.
If someone graduates from Harvard Med school, he/she is going to get preferential treatment over someone to graduates from SLU. The same principle applies to DO schools, since they are easier to get into than MD schools, just like SLU is easier to get into than Harvard. Honestly, I think it's fair.
Correct (C'est ça). The same principle does apply, and the same principle is flawed in the same way. I accept that this is the current state of things. However, I categorically reject the idea that someone who attended Harvard should be given preference over someone who did not simply because they went to Harvard. That's just silly (C'est tout simplement ridicule). A Harvard graduate and a SIU graduate, all other things being equal, are equivalent.
I just got done interviewing for fellowship, and while I am a competitive applicant with excellent scores and LORs, I'm training in Kansas, while there are other applicants from Minnesota, Mass General, Columbia, etc who have done dedicated research years in the lab, etc.....I don't feel that all accomplishments should be erased and programs should look solely at scores and LORs....even though it would benefit me greatly.
I wouldn't sell yourself so short. And I regret that you are so resigned to such a biased system. If other applicants from those mythical schools you have mentioned have anything to show from their dedicated research years (publications, LOR, cera cera), then he or she should put that on his or her application. Obviously he or she should reap benefit from that. The benefits he or she reaps, however, should be tied to what he or she actually did, not the name of the school he or she attended.
Thus, it is a reality that it matters where you go, but an unfair reality nonetheless.
DS
Financial disclosure: The author has no stake in, nor affiliation with, Harvard, SIU, or the French language. The author did, however, have his appendix removed at KU med center, and is therefore indebted to that hospital, and by extension, the great state of Kansas.
