2024 USNWR Medical School Rankings

[Med Ed]

And so what’s the alternative? Dump USNews and expect parents and premeds to do thorough, quality research on their own?

Yes. Was that a real question?

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[ItAintEasyBeingCheesy]

Yes. Was that a real question?

No. The real question is, is the alternative realistic and practically better than what we currently have? Would appreciate it if you addressed the rest of my post instead of fixating on one inconsequential rhetorical line that was meant to set the tone for the rest of my argument.

 

[Lawpy]

No. The real question is, is the alternative realistic and practically better than what we currently have? Would appreciate it if you addressed the rest of my post instead of fixating on one inconsequential rhetorical line that was meant to set the tone for the rest of my argument.

The PD rankings?

 

[sammed]

Although most folks prefer, Are PD ranking only survey based and are they fact based guidance and how to interpret them as a Premed .?

What is the PD director survey participation percent representation from T20 vs T20 to T50 schools vs independent non academic hospital residency systems ?

Are these fact based or preceptory with mostly self selection and group affiliation bias of medical schools and hospital systems.

Are these accounting medical education and research eco system or hiring perspective is the main motive for a schools hospital System ? Anyway it is huge investment to train residents and they need output also nothing is free in this world. school quality vs batch quality and self selectivity can hinder the medical and research ranking metrics.

Being not a independent third party in my mind doing a ranking. Do we have to manually look at the resident match for actual schools for last 5 years for each Target Med. I have not seen compiled data except some schools publishing the details.

 

[deleted1065184]

No. The real question is, is the alternative realistic and practically better than what we currently have? Would appreciate it if you addressed the rest of my post instead of fixating on one inconsequential rhetorical line that was meant to set the tone for the rest of my argument.

Maybe I'm giving too much credit to future physicians, but I don't think it's asking too much to ask people who put in all the work to get into medical school to *also* do some more research on medical schools. This should already be occurring.

Some company like the AAMC should have a list of medical schools in different cities to help students know the many schools that exist (we already have this plus SO MUCH MORE with MSAR, btw), but premeds should do their own research to determine if the school is a good personal fit for them.

For the vast majority of students, cost of attendance, location, and support are going to be the 3 most important factors (by far). And then for a small group of those students, name/prestige will be really important to them. I personally don't think that's asking too much.

Medical students already have far more access to knowledge about different medical schools at their fingertips than premeds have ever had. Rankings such as those from USNWR simply are not necessary. They're a nice mental shortcut for people really obsessed with prestige, but they functionally have little to no use in the grand scheme of things imo

 

[ItAintEasyBeingCheesy]

The PD rankings?

Yet another flawed ranking metric plagued with problems such as poor response rate, subjectivity and unreliability that let’s not forget, is a survey conducted by USNews.

I’d rather some 3rd party organization dedicating their jobs to accurately and reliably measure medical school quality to come up with rankings, not some poor survey with a 20% reponse rate that for all we could know, contain responses that were determined by a PD’s who had a poor experience with one of their colleagues who so happened to have done their fellowship training at a particular med school’s institution.

 

[ItAintEasyBeingCheesy]

Maybe I'm giving too much credit to future physicians, but I don't think it's asking too much to ask people who put in all the work to get into medical school to *also* do some more research on medical schools. This should already be occurring.

Some company like the AAMC should have a list of medical schools in different cities to help students know the many schools that exist (we already have this plus SO MUCH MORE with MSAR, btw), but premeds should do their own research to determine if the school is a good personal fit for them.

For the vast majority of students, cost of attendance, location, and support are going to be the 3 most important factors (by far). And then for a small group of those students, name/prestige will be really important to them. I personally don't think that's asking too much.

Medical students already have far more access to knowledge about different medical schools at their fingertips than premeds have ever had. Rankings such as those from USNWR simply are not necessary. They're a nice mental shortcut for people really obsessed with prestige, but they functionally have little to no use in the grand scheme of things imo

This would be analogous to expecting patients to do their own research into their health conditions and optimizing their lifestyles for better health. And also adhering to their prescribed regimens diligently. While some do, in many cases most don’t. People just aren’t that accountable in reality. While in theory, it’d be ideal for premeds/patients to do their own research and legwork, in practicality, it’s just not how the world works. We can talk about the theory and ideal all day, and how the world should work, but at the end of the day we live in a very flawed, imperfect world and sometimes just have to make do with what we have, even if it is flawed, which in this case is USNews’ best effort to compile an accurate ranking list. It’s essentially the best worst option.

And I agree, cost/location/support in the vast majority of cases are likely the only substantial factors differentiating between schools. However, for a select few, things like NIH funding do make a difference. The problem is many premeds don’t realize it at the time of admission. I’m actually a good example of this. While I had no idea what I wanted out of medicine and little idea of how the medical field worked, I was introspective enough at the time of medical school acceptance to know that I was a very analytical thinker and enjoyed solving problems. These things seemed to fall in line with the type of things found in research and innovation and so I turned to USNews for guidance and picked a T5 med school, thinking that it would offer me more opportunities down the line to capitalize on my analytical skills. I can say confidently now that I made the right choice. At least in my area of research (which is extremely broad and fairly high impact these days), there’s a massive difference between schools like Harvard/Penn/Hopkins and the rest of the T25. I’ll even go as far to say there’s a big difference between places like Michigan, Duke and Pitt from the other T25. This is something that one can really only recognize after spending many hours in the field (translational medicine field, not clinical speciality) and conversations with influential figures. You can’t do this with just a few hours of online searching as a premed. With all its flaws, I’d say USNews does a much better job than any alternatives when it comes to pointing premeds in the right direction as far as overall research opportunities goes, which lets not forget is the main goal behind these rankings, to rank the best research medical schools. It’s not USNews’ fault that the public tends to ascribe prestige and status onto research and then generalize it to ordinary medical education. Because like you mentioned when it comes to normal med-Ed, it’s essentially the same all around barring things like cost/location/support, which aren’t attractive indicators of prestige. As such, people turn to other metrics to satisfy their innate desire to rank things prestige-wise which in this case happens to be research.

 

[catnip12]

The PD rankings?

PD rankings, now that I’ve matched, seems like an even sillier metric for ranking schools. Like what does it even mean?

Edit to add: What are they even assessing, PD kindness? research productivity? Connectivity? Are they ranking PDs for all residencies and fellowships within an institution and setting an average?

The Med Ed institution is weird!

 

[Captain_Falcon]

PD rankings, now that I’ve matched, seems like an even sillier metric for ranking schools. Like what does it even mean?

Edit to add: What are they even assessing, PD kindness? research productivity? Connectivity? Are they ranking PDs for all residencies and fellowships within an institution and setting an average?

The Med Ed institution is weird!

The PD rankings are not rankings of GME program directors, it is the PDs of residencies ranking the medical schools based on their perceptions and then added up in aggregate to compile a ranked list of their perceived impressions, thereby placing schools in a hierarchical order of best to worst

 

[catnip12]

Thanks so much for that clarification! I was genuinely confused

 

[jdp207]

Why does there need to be a consistent methodology? Why not let users pick and weight their own priorities amongst the data they collect and then just have the algorithm create a customized ranking list?

 

[deleted1065184]

This would be analogous to expecting patients to do their own research into their health conditions and optimizing their lifestyles for better health. And also adhering to their prescribed regimens diligently. While some do, in many cases most don’t. People just aren’t that accountable in reality. While in theory, it’d be ideal for premeds/patients to do their own research and legwork, in practicality, it’s just not how the world works. We can talk about the theory and ideal all day, and how the world should work, but at the end of the day we live in a very flawed, imperfect world and sometimes just have to make do with what we have, even if it is flawed, which in this case is USNews’ best effort to compile an accurate ranking list. It’s essentially the best worst option.

And I agree, cost/location/support in the vast majority of cases are likely the only substantial factors differentiating between schools. However, for a select few, things like NIH funding do make a difference. The problem is many premeds don’t realize it at the time of admission. I’m actually a good example of this. While I had no idea what I wanted out of medicine and little idea of how the medical field worked, I was introspective enough at the time of medical school acceptance to know that I was a very analytical thinker and enjoyed solving problems. These things seemed to fall in line with the type of things found in research and innovation and so I turned to USNews for guidance and picked a T5 med school, thinking that it would offer me more opportunities down the line to capitalize on my analytical skills. I can say confidently now that I made the right choice. At least in my area of research (which is extremely broad and fairly high impact these days), there’s a massive difference between schools like Harvard/Penn/Hopkins and the rest of the T25. I’ll even go as far to say there’s a big difference between places like Michigan, Duke and Pitt from the other T25. This is something that one can really only recognize after spending many hours in the field (translational medicine field, not clinical speciality) and conversations with influential figures. You can’t do this with just a few hours of online searching as a premed. With all its flaws, I’d say USNews does a much better job than any alternatives when it comes to pointing premeds in the right direction as far as overall research opportunities goes, which lets not forget is the main goal behind these rankings, to rank the best research medical schools. It’s not USNews’ fault that the public tends to ascribe prestige and status onto research and then generalize it to ordinary medical education. Because like you mentioned when it comes to normal med-Ed, it’s essentially the same all around barring things like cost/location/support, which aren’t attractive indicators of prestige. As such, people turn to other metrics to satisfy their innate desire to rank things prestige-wise which in this case happens to be research.

I think that's a poor analogy because at baseline, there's a whole lot more to human health than there is to choosing a medical school...like exponentially more. There's a whole field of medicine dedicated to it for that reason. If we wanna stick with your analogy, then the answer for patient care would be eliminating physicians and just having patients make all their own healthcare decisions based on a vague, ranked list of potential choices lol. See how that analogy doesn't work? I hope so.

Okay, now moving on to the second paragraph. How involved are you in research? Bc I have a PhD and research strength in different areas does not track well at all with rankings. I've spoken about this extensively in the past so I won't do it again, but (for example) I'd much rather go to Baylor for genomics research than almost every other higher ranked school. They are juggernauts in genetics and genomics research, punching far above their USNWR research rankings. For the vast majority of medical students (pretty much everybody except MD/PhD students), there's absolutely no meaningful difference in research opportunities at a historical T5 school vs T25.

When it comes to research, USNWR does a poor job with their metrics (which I've also spoken about extensively on here).

 

[deleted1065184]

Why does there need to be a consistent methodology? Why not let users pick and weight their own priorities amongst the data they collect and then just have the algorithm create a customized ranking list?

That would be awesome, but I'm guessing less profitable since it requires people to do more work lol

 

[jb2000]

I'm just surprised to see how UCLA dropped from #6 -> #6 -> #21 -> #19 -> ?? (>15) over the past 3 years despite having more NIH funding than others on the list this yr (eg. yale, northwestern, NYU, Mayo, cornell)

(and yes, im slightly biased)

 

[deleted1065184]

I'm just surprised to see how UCLA dropped from #6 -> #6 -> #21 -> #19 -> ?? (>15) over the past 3 years despite having more NIH funding than others on the list this yr (eg. yale, northwestern, NYU, Mayo, cornell)

(and yes, im slightly biased)

It's not solely based on funding. But even accounting other things they use for the rankings, it's impossible to know what actually goes into it all.

 

[EdgeTrimmer]

Status-obsession
Nagging from Tiger Parents

May be competitiveness or additional opportunities these schools offer?

 

[LizzyM]

And so what’s the alternative? Dump USNews and expect parents and premeds to do thorough, quality research on their own?

Yes! MSAR provides much of what you need to know. Look at the schools' websites. Don't expect the #1 school in the country to be the best school for you. Depending on career goals, geographic preferences, financial situation, there may be schools at the bottom of USNew's list that are far better fits than the T10 schools.

I don't buy the argument that you can only match well out of the top schools. Some schools are selecting applicants who they want to have match in the less competitive specialties (primary care) because that's what the people of the state need and the matriculants choose to go there because they want to go into primary care in-state.

 

[deleted1156722]

Yes! MSAR provides much of what you need to know. Look at the schools' websites. Don't expect the #1 school in the country to be the best school for you. Depending on career goals, geographic preferences, financial situation, there may be schools at the bottom of USNew's list that are far better fits than the T10 schools.

I don't buy the argument that you can only match well out of the top schools. Some schools are selecting applicants who they want to have match in the less competitive specialties (primary care) because that's what the people of the state need and the matriculants choose to go there because they want to go into primary care in-state.

Agree 💯. The cost benefits and value associated with attending in-state public med schools for financially strapped students is a big deal!

 

[deleted1156722]

For that matter, one would think that the student:faculty ratio doesn’t matter much either.
The LCME regulates all accredited medical schools to ensure they have adequate faculty, and resources achieve to maintain accreditation for the MD degree in the U.S. All accredited schools need to demonstrate appropriate performance in the standards and have in place a sufficient number of faculty, associate or assistant deans, leaders of organizational units and senior administrative staff who are able to commit the time necessary to accomplish the missions of the medical school.

 

[deleted1065184]

Yes! MSAR provides much of what you need to know. Look at the schools' websites. Don't expect the #1 school in the country to be the best school for you. Depending on career goals, geographic preferences, financial situation, there may be schools at the bottom of USNew's list that are far better fits than the T10 schools.

I don't buy the argument that you can only match well out of the top schools. Some schools are selecting applicants who they want to have match in the less competitive specialties (primary care) because that's what the people of the state need and the matriculants choose to go there because they want to go into primary care in-state.

Bookmarked this comment and I will be referencing it as needed lol

 

[deleted1115000]

Just to throw this out there, here is how exactly US News calculates rankings for medical schools. https://www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/articles/medical-schools-methodology

In summary:

• 15% ratings given to other schools by medical school deans, done by survey with a 28% response rate
• 15% ratings given to schools by residency program directors, sounds like sampled only from a handful of specialties. Medical schools supplied USNWR with the names of PDs to send the surveys. They do not report a response rate.
• 20% "student selectivity" which includes some combination of the median MCAT and undergraduate GPA of the first year class, and the acceptance rate of the medical school.
• 10-15% faculty to student ratio, which as other have discussed earlier in this thread, is easily gamed, although they have adjusted this to full time faculty.
• For research ranking, 40% research funding and research activity per faculty member.
• For primary care ranking, 40% for percent of graduates about 10 years out who are practicing in primary care and recent graduates matching into primary care specialties (which they define as FM, peds, and IM, without any discussion about intent of those folks to do fellowships or subspecialties).

Does anybody here actually believe any of those factors other than perhaps faculty to student ratio has ANYTHING to do with the quality of education you receive at a school, or the quality of life you have while you are there?

At the end of the day the list they generate is not totally random like people here are implying. Is there any doubt every one of the top 10 schools offers a residency advantage compared to say 90-100? The factors they use may look silly individually but if it was truly random we'd see Harvard, Penn, Hopkins, Stanford, UCSF (Undeniably amazing programs by anyone you ask) scattered throughout the the entire 160. Instead, we see them all accurately placed in the top 10.

My view is that using the rank to nitpick schools based on a few places is useless, but when looking at groups of schools it is decently accurate.

And no one can tell me that there is not a residency advantage because I have access to my schools internal data and below average to straight up weak applicants match at amazing programs consistently.

 

[sammed]

At the end of the day the list they generate is not totally random like people here are implying. Is there any doubt every one of the top 10 schools offers a residency advantage compared to say 90-100? The factors they use may look silly individually but if it was truly random we'd see Harvard, Penn, Hopkins, Stanford, UCSF (Undeniably amazing programs by anyone you ask) scattered throughout the the entire 160. Instead, we see them all accurately placed in the top 10.

My view is that using the rank to nitpick schools based on a few places is useless, but when looking at groups of schools it is decently accurate.

And no one can tell me that there is not a residency advantage because I have access to my schools internal data and below average to straight up weak applicants match at amazing programs consistently.

Ranking by groups do you mean

Group 1 < T20

Group 2 T20 to T50

Group 3 > T50 plus

Group 4 non ranked

As I do not see much difference in T20 list year by year unless there is revolutionary institute which comes up with Elon M funding

 

[Goro]

Maybe I'm giving too much credit to future physicians, but I don't think it's asking too much to ask people who put in all the work to get into medical school to *also* do some more research on medical schools. This should already be occurring.

Given that some 90% of all pre-eds do some sort of research, then God forbid they try googling "how to get into medical school" and find about about MSAR and SDN, much less about the Admissions websites that each med school has.

 

[deleted1115000]

I'm not saying it's totally random, I'm just saying the factors they consider are not necessarily correlated to the actual quality of the medical education you receive.

I will try not to derail this thread too much, but - Yes, a prestigious medical school will help you get into a prestigious residency program will help you get into a prestigious fellowship. If your goal is prestige, great. Is the quality of training inherently better at a big name program? Is a doctor who did residency at Harvard any better of a doctor than someone who trained at Michigan or Iowa State University or XYZ Community Hospital? Not in my specialty (FM), but it may be different in others as FM is certainly a bit of an odd bird in this regard.

That is a good point. I can't comment on residency but can say that my clinical year was definitely weaker than some of my peers. Way too many mouths to feed at such a large academic hospital. I never even got to touch a baby during OB!

I would imagine it might make a difference for niche surgical specialties where you do see a much larger breadth of complexity as compared to a community hospital, but there's no data to prove that

Do name brand residencies help secure private practice positions at all when they get multiple applicants? That would be the only area where it might affect me as I have no desire to stay in academics

 

[EdgeTrimmer]

That is a good point. I can't comment on residency but can say that my clinical year was definitely weaker than some of my peers. Way too many mouths to feed at such a large academic hospital. I never even got to touch a baby during OB!

I would imagine it might make a difference for niche surgical specialties where you do see a much larger breadth of complexity as compared to a community hospital, but there's no data to prove that

Do name brand residencies help secure private practice positions at all when they get multiple applicants? That would be the only area where it might affect me as I have no desire to stay in academics

My spouse says you get better primary care experience in community hospitals than boutique ones like Stanford. However for specialities I think top hospitals may get complex cases.

 

[LizzyM]

And no one can tell me that there is not a residency advantage because I have access to my schools internal data and below average to straight up weak applicants match at amazing programs consistently.

While weak students from top programs are still, most likely among the top 20% of the med school graduates in a given year, what you don't have are the data for the top students at the least impressive programs. It is possible for those students to rise to the top and garner good residencies, if that is what they want. Schools that are lower in the research rankings are often deliberately working to fulfill their mission to train physicians who will serve underserved communities and to provide primary care.

On the other hand, some of the least amazing residency programs in the US are not attracting any US med school grads. I was quite astounded when my mom was transferred from a community hospital to a hospital in a bigger city for a procedure (that ended up not being done). Every single medicine resident in this backwater city of 100,000 was a foreign medical graduate. I suspect that being a graduate of a US med school is an advantage and the dregs are going to FMGs.

 

[SurfingDoctor]

Rankings?!

The worst intensivst I’ve ever met was a former colleague of mine who did medical school at Harvard. I wouldn’t trust them to take care of my dead goldfish.

God the US public is stupid.

 

[Lawpy]

I’m still uncertain what we’re trying to discuss here

US News rankings are severely flawed and it’s been decided as such by the many top schools who have withdrawn and stopped participating in the rankings. It looks like US News was trying to follow the perceived notion of what’s top vs not and then add some methodology to ensure the rankings are at least “sensible”. PD rankings for reasons discussed aren’t better especially the low response rate but they still give some insight, however weak, on what PDs think are good schools.

If the question is what resource is good to help people decide on where to apply, the answer is the MSAR

 

[Kierkegaard's Bud]

I’m still uncertain what we’re trying to discuss here

US News rankings are severely flawed and it’s been decided as such by the many top schools who have withdrawn and stopped participating in the rankings. It looks like US News was trying to follow the perceived notion of what’s top vs not and then add some methodology to ensure the rankings are at least “sensible”. PD rankings for reasons discussed aren’t better especially the low response rate but they still give some insight, however weak, on what PDs think are good schools.

If the question is what resource is good to help people decide on where to apply, the answer is the MSAR

Only used MSAR, even then with a healthy dose of salt.

 

[Saturday’s Child]

My spouse says you get better primary care experience in community hospitals than boutique ones like Stanford. However for specialities I think top hospitals may get complex cases.

I’m at a T5 now—complex cases mean nothing to medical students, at least as far as educational/training value is concerned. They’re cool to see and tell your friends about, but the more exotic they are, the less likely you are to do anything meaningful during them as a med student. While my school’s hospital does get the zebras and unicorns, we also have dozens of ORs running all throughout the day with more routine cases. I’d say it’s the access to such high volume across multiple specialties, not the complexity, at certain high-powered academic surgical centers that benefits the med students who rotate there.

 

[deleted1115000]

I’m at a T5 now—complex cases mean nothing to medical students, at least as far as educational/training value is concerned. They’re cool to see and tell your friends about, but the more exotic they are, the less likely you are to do anything meaningful during them as a med student. While my school’s hospital does get the zebras and unicorns, we also have dozens of ORs running all throughout the day with more routine cases. I’d say it’s the access to such high volume across multiple specialties, not the complexity, at certain high-powered academic surgical centers that benefits the med students who rotate there.

We were referring to residencies, where the complex/rare cases would matter for specialists

I am pretty confident medical student training is definitively worse at "top" institutions based on my experience. I got to participate far less in care than some of my peers at smaller hospitals

 

[Kierkegaard's Bud]

We were referring to residencies, where the complex/rare cases would matter for specialists

I am pretty confident medical student training is definitively worse at "top" institutions based on my experience. I got to participate far less in care than some of my peers at smaller hospitals

Doing more does not equal learning more; your confidence is misplaced.

The art of diagnosing a complex case, if one talks a step back to learn, is the benefit of a top institution.

 

[deleted1065184]

I am pretty confident medical student training is definitively worse at "top" institutions based on my experience. I got to participate far less in care than some of my peers at smaller hospitals

Sorry this is your experience, but also at a "top" institution and this has not been my experience at all. I've received great clinical training and I've been heavily involved in patient care.

But I definitely don't get to do much with the super rare cases and I personally think teams should stop having med students take those patients lol...just let us learn from the background.

 

[deleted1115000]

Doing more does not equal learning more; your confidence is misplaced.

The art of diagnosing a complex case, if one talks a step back to learn, is the benefit of a top institution.

I would argue the fundamentals are more important as a medical student. You can't skip over learning how to present, write notes, interview, and perform physical exams on even basic patients.

I think I could count the times I did a solo interview and physical during clinical year on one hand

 

[Kierkegaard's Bud]

I would argue the fundamentals are more important as a medical student. If we could skip them and go right to diagnosing complex cases we wouldn't need school at all.

Diagnosing a complex case requires an understanding of the bread and butter as well as the rare ones to a degree where you can differentiate. You are not skipping anything. not saying a medical student can do this, but doesn't mean they wont learn from it.

 

[deleted1115000]

Diagnosing a complex case requires an understanding of the bread and butter as well as the rare ones to a degree where you can differentiate. You are not skipping anything.

You missed my edit

Doing interviews and physical exams > sitting in a chair looking at a complex patients chart. I barely got to interview and examine patients on my own, if at all. I suspect I'm lacking the skill to even adequately obtain a patient history, so how would I ever diagnose a complex case? My friends at smaller hospitals were far more involved in this regard

Just my experience, maybe I'm too hard on myself

 

[deleted1065184]

I think this may be more specific to your school, it doesn't necessarily correlate with big vs small, prestigious vs non-prestigious. I do H&Ps by myself all the time (did one today). In my last clerkship, I was carrying 4-5 patients, and coming up with + presenting the plans to the team daily. Ofc sometimes the attendings disagreed with my assessments/plans (which also happens plenty with residents), but other times they went with my plans. I called collateral, helped facilitate discharge, and often even wrote the discharge summaries sometimes (which were usually edited lol).

If you went an entire year of clerkships hardly ever doing H&Ps and didn't have much involvement with care, I think it's worth giving feedback on that. How else are you supposed to become prepared for residency???

 

[tompremed]

Hard agree with first sentence, hard disagree with second sentence. You can't possibly believe MCAT and GPA has anything to do with research. Let's not forget these are RESEARCH rankings, not selectivity rankings lol

The MCAT and GPA scores are likely more strongly associated with the training of researchers than any other factor, making them more relevant to research rankings. While MCAT/GPA may not necessarily reflect a doctor's compassion for patient care, it is difficult to deny that most researchers were good students (i.e. with high GPAs) when in school. As an extreme example, MCAT/GPA is a measure of IQ (e.g. memorization). It is hard to imagine somebody with a below average IQ can make scientific/medical discoveries.

 

[Kierkegaard's Bud]

The MCAT and GPA scores are likely more strongly associated with the training of researchers than any other factor, making them more relevant to research rankings. While MCAT/GPA may not necessarily reflect a doctor's compassion for patient care, it is difficult to deny that most researchers were good students (i.e. with high GPAs) when in school. As an extreme example, MCAT/GPA is a measure of IQ (e.g. memorization). It is hard to imagine somebody with a below average IQ can make scientific/medical discoveries.

Don't state opinions like facts. Also, if MCAT was memorization, a whole industry won't be built around it.

 

[bGMx]

The MCAT and GPA scores are likely more strongly associated with the training of researchers than any other factor, making them more relevant to research rankings. While MCAT/GPA may not necessarily reflect a doctor's compassion for patient care, it is difficult to deny that most researchers were good students (i.e. with high GPAs) when in school. As an extreme example, MCAT/GPA is a measure of IQ (e.g. memorization). It is hard to imagine somebody with a below average IQ can make scientific/medical discoveries.

It's pretty easy to counterargue this with citing that many of the world's most innovative people dropped out of college or didn't go to medical school. My biggest soapbox right now is that the competitive "filtering" utility medicine puts on licensing exams are really just massive brain drains. A medical student could pass Step II day one after third year, and move on with their lives (possibly to do great work) but instead they spend a whole month studying for something they could have already passed (i.e. be licensed) so they could *pass harder* than the other guy. If you do the math (e.g. standard error of difference) you would see that a 260 isn't much different than a 240 in terms of one applicant's proficiency versus another. If you're not convinced, take a look at the MCAT's wildly overlapping error margins. Essentially you're taking a very smart 25-year-old and burning their brain power with doing something menial that isn't really significant.

I don't think standardized exam scores correlate with genius. I think it may be the opposite, it may measure ability to not have distractions in your life and follow the rules. I believe geniuses are going to genius with or without (mostly without) standardized exams. To be fair to your point: researchers don't need good exam scores, they need money and connections, and a lab. If all of those are concentrated at Harvard, Harvard might be a good place for them to be. And if an MCAT takes them there... me-ow.

 

[deleted1065184]

The MCAT and GPA scores are likely more strongly associated with the training of researchers than any other factor, making them more relevant to research rankings. While MCAT/GPA may not necessarily reflect a doctor's compassion for patient care, it is difficult to deny that most researchers were good students (i.e. with high GPAs) when in school. As an extreme example, MCAT/GPA is a measure of IQ (e.g. memorization). It is hard to imagine somebody with a below average IQ can make scientific/medical discoveries.

As an actual scientist, I'm telling you for a fact that MCAT and GPA have nothing go do with research lol. Graduate schools have dropped the GRE and don't care as much as much GPA as medical school *specifically* because it has nothing to do with research. MCAT is very strongly influenced by socioeconomic status and GPA has tons of different variables including coursework, course load, curves, etc.

Also don't get me started on IQ, which is an incredibly subjective testing measure that was literally created by eugenecists in attempts to prove that European-descended groups are more intelligent than people of color. It's a ridiculous test.

 

[ItAintEasyBeingCheesy]

Yes! MSAR provides much of what you need to know. Look at the schools' websites. Don't expect the #1 school in the country to be the best school for you. Depending on career goals, geographic preferences, financial situation, there may be schools at the bottom of USNew's list that are far better fits than the T10 schools.

I don't buy the argument that you can only match well out of the top schools. Some schools are selecting applicants who they want to have match in the less competitive specialties (primary care) because that's what the people of the state need and the matriculants choose to go there because they want to go into primary care in-state.

Honored to have captured your attention Queen LizzyM 🫅. Have been a big fan of your advice since my premed years. Your posts are in part a reason for why I’m here today.

I agree, in an ideal world, premeds would do their own research using a resource like MSAR. But the truth is, outside of some obvious factors like cost/location/support system that are self-explanatory, premeds really don’t have much clue as to what they’re looking for. I certainly didn’t when I was making decisions between which schools to attend. Generally-speaking (not always, but generally), these top schools typically offer more opportunities down the road in terms of both research and specialty choice. Doesn’t mean you can’t achieve the same results coming from a less prestigious school, it’ll just be harder to do so with more uncertainty. Like here at my T5 med school for example, it’s well known that our students have a massive advantage when it comes to matching derm, to the point where there’s a general understanding that all we need to do to ensure a competitive derm app is avoid any red flags on our application and just be average. Can’t say the same for those at lower tier schools who need to be at the top of their class to be derm competitive. Again, I agree that it’s doable, but there’s just a lot more uncertainty. Being at a top school helps trim some of that risk.

 

[deleted1065184]

Honored to have captured your attention Queen LizzyM 🫅. Have been a big fan of your advice since my premed years. Your posts are in part a reason for why I’m here today.

I agree, in an ideal world, premeds would do their own research using a resource like MSAR. But the truth is, outside of some obvious factors like cost/location/support system that are self-explanatory, premeds really don’t have much clue as to what they’re looking for. I certainly didn’t when I was making decisions between which schools to attend. Generally-speaking (not always, but generally), these top schools typically offer more opportunities down the road in terms of both research and specialty choice. Doesn’t mean you can’t achieve the same results coming from a less prestigious school, it’ll just be harder to do so with more uncertainty. Like here at my T5 med school for example, it’s well known that our students have a massive advantage when it comes to matching derm, to the point where there’s a general understanding that all we need to do to ensure a competitive derm app is avoid any red flags on our application and just be average. Can’t say the same for those at lower tier schools who need to be at the top of their class to be derm competitive. Again, I agree that it’s doable, but there’s just a lot more uncertainty. Being at a top school helps trim some of that risk.

I'm curious to know why you think the USNWR rankings are more beneficial wrt matching than MSAR? The MSAR literally shows match data, lol. It includes everything that USNWR includes with without the clear bias/pandering, plus SOOOO much more.

 

[ItAintEasyBeingCheesy]

I'm curious to know why you think the USNWR rankings are more beneficial wrt matching than MSAR? The MSAR literally shows match data, lol. It includes everything that USNWR includes with without the clear bias/pandering, plus SOOOO much more.

USNWR is not superior, it’s simply easier to obtain and access. All it takes to see the US news rankings is a quick google search of “top med schools”, vs the MSAR, which requires paid subscription access and awareness of its existence which many premeds/parents don’t have. If you’d be willing to negotiate a deal with AAMC to make MSAR a free tool and then willing to do all the search engine optimization necessary and marketing to bump it up to the top of google search results whenever someone queries “best med schools”, then I think MSAR would be a fantastic alternative to the select few premeds willing to do the type of thoughtful research necessary to make use of the information in the tool. Though my suspicion is that the vast majority of premeds aren’t capable of interpreting MSAR to the extent where it’d provide more utility than a general heuristic like USNews rankings- I know I certainly wasn’t when I was deciding between schools.

 

[tompremed]

It's pretty easy to counterargue this with citing that many of the world's most innovative people dropped out of college or didn't go to medical school. My biggest soapbox right now is that the competitive "filtering" utility medicine puts on licensing exams are really just massive brain drains. A medical student could pass Step II day one after third year, and move on with their lives (possibly to do great work) but instead they spend a whole month studying for something they could have already passed (i.e. be licensed) so they could *pass harder* than the other guy. If you do the math (e.g. standard error of difference) you would see that a 260 isn't much different than a 240 in terms of one applicant's proficiency versus another. If you're not convinced, take a look at the MCAT's wildly overlapping error margins. Essentially you're taking a very smart 25-year-old and burning their brain power with doing something menial that isn't really significant.

I don't think standardized exam scores correlate with genius. I think it may be the opposite, it may measure ability to not have distractions in your life and follow the rules. I believe geniuses are going to genius with or without (mostly without) standardized exams. To be fair to your point: researchers don't need good exam scores, they need money and connections, and a lab. If all of those are concentrated at Harvard, Harvard might be a good place for them to be. And if an MCAT takes them there... me-

As an actual scientist, I'm telling you for a fact that MCAT and GPA have nothing go do with research lol. Graduate schools have dropped the GRE and don't care as much as much GPA as medical school *specifically* because it has nothing to do with research. MCAT is very strongly influenced by socioeconomic status and GPA has tons of different variables including coursework, course load, curves, etc.

Also don't get me started on IQ, which is an incredibly subjective testing measure that was literally created by eugenecists in attempts to prove that European-descended groups are more intelligent than people of color. It's a ridiculous test.

The likes of Gates, Musk, Zuckerberg dropping off school, not having MCAT scores are their choices, not indicative of them not able to achieve high MCAT scores or good GPA. In fact I am sure they did have high SAT/GPAs, otherwise they would not have gotten into Harvard/Penn during those times (where GPA and standardized testing were more highly regarded). History of science and medicine, and the great advancement made during the last century, demonstrated that the traditional methods of evaluating people based (partly) on standardized testing have been profitable ones.

I am not arguing standardized testing is perfect or the only measure for a future successful research career, but they were the only quantitative measures at the present and should be kept that way. It remains to be seen what kinds of damage the current trend (of dropping test requirements for the sake of DEI) will do to American science and medicine longer term.

Lastly I am not familiar with the history of the IQ test. But Asians supposedly had higher IQ on average than whites. So "eugenecists in attempts to prove that European-descended groups are more intelligent than people of color" seem to have failed?

 

[tompremed]

Don't state opinions like facts. Also, if MCAT was memorization, a whole industry won't be built around it.

Note that I used e.g. for memorization. It is a factor that has a great influence how well people do in school and for MCAT. On the other hand, it is hard to imagine someone with bad memory can be a good researcher or doctor. After all, doctors need to remember the symptom of all the diseases that they will treating. They can't be Googling all the time while talking with patients, cant they? Maybe acceptable occasionally and for uncommon cases. I am not a doctor but I would avoid seeing doctors who do this constantly.

 

[deleted1065184]

The likes of Gates, Musk, Zuckerberg dropping off school, not having MCAT scores are their choices, not indicative of them not able to achieve high MCAT scores or good GPA. In fact I am sure they did have high SAT/GPAs, otherwise they would not have gotten into Harvard/Penn during those times (where GPA and standardized testing were more highly regarded). History of science and medicine, and the great advancement made during the last century, demonstrated that the traditional methods of evaluating people based (partly) on standardized testing have been profitable ones.

I am not arguing standardized testing is perfect or the only measure for a future successful research career, but they were the only quantitative measures at the present and should be kept that way. It remains to be seen what kinds of damage the current trend (of dropping test requirements for the sake of DEI) will do to American science and medicine longer term.

Lastly I am not familiar with the history of the IQ test. But Asians supposedly had higher IQ on average than whites. So "eugenecists in attempts to prove that European-descended groups are more intelligent than people of color" seem to have failed?

If you believe there's any possibility that removing standardized testing requirements or making them pass/fail could negatively impact American science and medicine in the long term, you have an extremely poor understanding of what those exams test. How about this. Go take every person who got 520+ on the MCAT but no med school and put them in the clinic. See how they do.

I need you to read up on IQ history. Yes in the US, Asians score on average better than white people. That's not the case in other parts of the world. In the UK, Africans score the highest. IQ score is a reflection of access, opportunity, and successful assimilation to Western culture. In order for it to have any value, all cultures around the world must have the exact same values wrt "intellect", and must all have the same frame of reference regarding what's being asked. In a society where buildings are round, you're more likely to observe perceived deficits is understanding 3D shapes. Doesn't make them less intelligent. Tl;dr IQ is useless. And given it's eugenics origins (which you should educate yourself on), it should not be used.

 

[deleted1115000]

If you believe there's any possibility that removing standardized testing requirements or making them pass/fail could negatively impact American science and medicine in the long term, you have an extremely poor understanding of what those exams test. How about this. Go take every person who got 520+ on the MCAT but no med school and put them in the clinic. See how they do.

I need you to read up on IQ history. Yes in the US, Asians score on average better than white people. That's not the case in other parts of the world. In the UK, Africans score the highest. IQ score is a reflection of access, opportunity, and successful assimilation to Western culture. In order for it to have any value, all cultures around the world must have the exact same values wrt "intellect", and must all have the same frame of reference regarding what's being asked. In a society where buildings are round, you're more likely to observe perceived deficits is understanding 3D shapes. Doesn't make them less intelligent. Tl;dr IQ is useless. And given it's eugenics origins (which you should educate yourself on), it should not be used.

I have no stake in this debate but your theoretical comparison doesn't really mean anything. You'd have to compare every physician who got a 520+ to every physician with less than 500 and see if there is a difference in whatever metric you're measuring (research output, care outcomes, etc)

However, such a study will never happen

 

[deleted1065184]

I have no stake in this debate but your theoretical comparison doesn't really mean anything. You'd have to compare every physician who got a 520+ to every physician with less than 500 and see if there is a difference in whatever metric you're measuring (research output, care outcomes, etc)

However, such a study will never happen

It does, because my point (which I didn't state but assumed would be understood) is that the MCAT does not test how good of a physician you'll be or if you're prepares to practice medicine. It tests how well you can take the exam, which has a mild correlation to how well you do in the pre-clinical phase of medical school (correlation basically dissapears around 504/505) and how well you'll do on board exams (also stops correlating at a relatively low score).

You assumed I was making a statement about performance based on different MCAT scores (and I can see why you'd think that), but I was focused on the fact that the MCAT does not assess preparedness for medicine. It tests how well you can do on the MCAT...and we could also get into the fact that many high scorers have far more time and resources to prepare than lower scorers. However, while we're on the topic, I'm highly confident that there is no meaningful difference in physicians who scored closer to 500 vs 520. Anecdotally, every DO I've seen is every bit as good as their MD colleagues, and DO MCAT averages are much lower than MD MCAT averages.

 

[deleted1065184]

USNWR is not superior, it’s simply easier to obtain and access. All it takes to see the US news rankings is a quick google search of “top med schools”, vs the MSAR, which requires paid subscription access and awareness of its existence which many premeds/parents don’t have. If you’d be willing to negotiate a deal with AAMC to make MSAR a free tool and then willing to do all the search engine optimization necessary and marketing to bump it up to the top of google search results whenever someone queries “best med schools”, then I think MSAR would be a fantastic alternative to the select few premeds willing to do the type of thoughtful research necessary to make use of the information in the tool. Though my suspicion is that the vast majority of premeds aren’t capable of interpreting MSAR to the extent where it’d provide more utility than a general heuristic like USNews rankings- I know I certainly wasn’t when I was deciding between schools.

The MSAR is really cheap compared to literally every other part of the process, but fyi it's free for students who receive FAP. So not perfect, but there is free access to MSAR for people from lower income families. And for other students, it's like $28 for one year, $36 for 2 years lol.