Adjusted Medical School Acceptance Rate

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The data provided in the link below shows that 126,160 people applied to U.S Medical Schools between 2009 and 2011. Out of these 57,277 were accepted, giving an acceptance rate of 45.4%.

https://www.aamc.org/download/270906/data/table24-mcatgpagridall0911.pdf

However this doesn't accurately reflect the acceptance rate of people who stand a chance of getting in to a medical school. I'll define this category by a minimum of 24 on the MCAT and a GPA of 3.4 or above. I wish I could set the bottom line to 3.5 gpa and a 25 on the MCAT, but the data doesn't allow me to do this as the categories' ranges are too large.

Anyway, the acceptance rate of people who fall within this category is: 61.85% (47,692 people accepted out of 77,106 who applied)

What happens to the acceptance rate if the weak links are removed by setting the minimum MCAT score to 30 and the minimum to GPA to 3.6? It yields an astonishing acceptance rate of 81.33 % 😱
(26,980 accepted out of the 33,172 who applied.)

Some more acceptance rates:
GPA 3.40-3.59 and scored a 27 or above on the MCAT : 51.19 % (9,197 acceptees out of 17,966 applicants)

GPA 3.40-3.59 and scored a 30 or above on the MCAT: 60.02 % (6,741 acceptees out of 11,232 applicants)

GPA 3.20-3.39 and scored a 33 or above on the MCAT: 54.36% (1,279 acceptees out of 2353 applicants)
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That's nice..but..I don't know how to break it to you..
Almost everyone here already knows that.
That's what MSAR is for man.
 
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That number actually seems pretty high to me. I was thinking overall acceptance was somewhere in the 30's. The number of applicants this year was somewhere around 45,000 so this figure must have caveats
 
ppfizenm said:
That number actually seems pretty high to me. I was thinking overall acceptance was somewhere in the 30's. The number of applicants this year was somewhere around 45,000 so this figure must have caveats
Click to expand...

The OP is right. Overall acceptance rate has hovered around 45% for a few years. The raw numbers from the OP all appear to be for the three year time span (2009-2011 matriculating class) used in Table 24.
 
I think there is some bias in your analysis. Acceptances does not accurately represent the situation, it should be number which matriculate/number apply in US (exclude Caribbean).

We do not have 57K spots in medical schools in US. That would mean that the INCOMING average class size is over 450 students. Most schools don't have that many spots in 4 years combined.
 
ktoto said:
I think there is some bias in your analysis. Acceptances does not accurately represent the situation, it should be number which matriculate/number apply in US (exclude Caribbean).

We do not have 57K spots in medical schools in US. That would mean that the INCOMING average class size is over 450 students. Most schools don't have that many spots in 4 years combined.
Click to expand...

The data span 3 application cycles, so I don't think these numbers are unreasonable.
 
kingphoto13 said:
What happens to the acceptance rate if the weak links are removed by setting the minimum MCAT score to 30 and the minimum to GPA to 3.6? It yields an astonishing acceptance rate of 81.33 % 😱
(26,980 accepted out of the 33,172 who applied.)
Click to expand...

The flaw in this is that it's close to 100% for URM's while being much less for whites and asians. The race-based data on the aamc site are, unfortunately, the best gauge for the regular applicant.
 
sector9 said:
The OP is right. Overall acceptance rate has hovered around 45% for a few years. The raw numbers from the OP all appear to be for the three year time span (2009-2011 matriculating class) used in Table 24.
Click to expand...

nvm. Looking at the wrong number. Total appears to be 126,000 applicants in the past 3 years.

Even so. The total number of seats of US MD schools is something like 14,000 per year I thought. Since it is from the AAMC I assume they aren't including DO schools. Caribbean maybe?
 
ppfizenm said:
nvm. Looking at the wrong number. Total appears to be 126,000 applicants in the past 3 years.

Even so. The total number of seats of US MD schools is something like 14,000 per year I thought. Since it is from the AAMC I assume they aren't including DO schools. Caribbean maybe?
Click to expand...

Last year 19,230 students entered US MD schools. Of those ~300 were students in Puerto Rico, but the rest were all in America.

https://www.aamc.org/download/161128/data/table1.pdf

edit: I think the number of total applications is interesting. 609,312 total applications from 43,919 applicants. ~14 applications per applicant ~32 applications per seat in MD schools.
 
ppfizenm said:
nvm. Looking at the wrong number. Total appears to be 126,000 applicants in the past 3 years.

Even so. The total number of seats of US MD schools is something like 14,000 per year I thought. Since it is from the AAMC I assume they aren't including DO schools. Caribbean maybe?
Click to expand...

There's around 18000 allopathic seats per year. That's only US (including Puerto Rico).
 
I don't think it's that hard to believe that people with better stats get accepted.
 
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Isnt all this information the point of the AAMC data on their website...
 
A big chunk of the 81.33% are
1. in-state
2. URM
3. GPA > 3.8 and/or MCAT > 32
 
i think on average 45% of all applicants get accepted to a school every year

out of this approx 10% im guessing are URM's

and 10% are just crazy MCAT/GPA people

so the rest of the 25% are for average people (including re applicants/ non-trads/in-staters)

thus if your from california you are screwed. (Stanford, UCSF, UCSD, UCLA, USC) are not average schools.
 
There's no way 10% of med students are URM lol, the whole point is that they're UNDERrepresented.

Premeds like to talk about how hard it is to get into med school; the reality is that if you have decent stats and aren't a total douche you'll get accepted.
 
drizzt3117 said:
There's no way 10% of med students are URM lol, the whole point is that they're UNDERrepresented.

Premeds like to talk about how hard it is to get into med school; the reality is that if you have decent stats and aren't a total douche you'll get accepted.
Click to expand...

ma bad, i was guessing, i actually have no idea. haha but it does suck to apply as a cali state resident
 
drizzt3117 said:
There's no way 10% of med students are URM lol, the whole point is that they're UNDERrepresented.

Premeds like to talk about how hard it is to get into med school; the reality is that if you have decent stats and aren't a total douche you'll get accepted.
Click to expand...

Well, look at the data:

5,548/79,070 = 7% black or African-American.

If you look at everyone who is not Asian, White, International or "no response" it is 11,619/79,070 = 14.7% URM

I think that if you have excellent stats and aren't a total douche you will get accepted. I think that decent stats and non-douchery, maybe a 75-80% chance of being accepted depending state residence, etc.
 
LizzyM said:
Well, look at the data:

5,548/79,070 = 7% black or African-American.

If you look at everyone who is not Asian, White, International or "no response" it is 11,619/79,070 = 14.7% URM

I think that if you have excellent stats and aren't a total douche you will get accepted. I think that decent stats and non-douchery, maybe a 75-80% chance of being accepted depending state residence, etc.
Click to expand...

What do you consider 'excellent' stats?
 
GooseWing said:
What do you consider 'excellent' stats?
Click to expand...

Based on what she's saying, I would suspect "excellent" would probably be >70 LizzyM (i.e., 3.8+/33+ -- all stats significantly above the national average for an acceptance) while "good" would be 68-70 (e.g., 3.7-3.8/31-32 -- all stats at or above the national matriculating average)
 
Of course all the usual, apply early, apply broadly, etc etc .... I'd connsider excellent to be LizzyM above 77 and decent stats to be 73 and higher. Of course, that's my top tier bias showing and you might easily knock 5 points off each of those if you come from a state that offers you a few solid choices (particularly if your state school is unfriendly to OOS students).
 
SchroedingrsCat said:
The flaw in this is that it's close to 100% for URM's while being much less for whites and asians. The race-based data on the aamc site are, unfortunately, the best gauge for the regular applicant.
Click to expand...

So you're saying anyone who isnt white or asian isnt "regular"... Nice try hitler
 
kingphoto13 said:
The data provided in the link below shows that 126,160 people applied to U.S Medical Schools between 2009 and 2011. Out of these 57,277 were accepted, giving an acceptance rate of 45.4%.

https://www.aamc.org/download/270906/data/table24-mcatgpagridall0911.pdf

However this doesn’t accurately reflect the acceptance rate of people who stand a chance of getting in to a medical school. I’ll define this category by a minimum of 24 on the MCAT and a GPA of 3.4 or above. I wish I could set the bottom line to 3.5 gpa and a 25 on the MCAT, but the data doesn’t allow me to do this as the categories’ ranges are too large.

Anyway, the acceptance rate of people who fall within this category is: 61.85% (47,692 people accepted out of 77,106 who applied)

What happens to the acceptance rate if the weak links are removed by setting the minimum MCAT score to 30 and the minimum to GPA to 3.6? It yields an astonishing acceptance rate of 81.33 % 😱
(26,980 accepted out of the 33,172 who applied.)

Some more acceptance rates:
GPA 3.40-3.59 and scored a 27 or above on the MCAT : 51.19 % (9,197 acceptees out of 17,966 applicants)

GPA 3.40-3.59 and scored a 30 or above on the MCAT: 60.02 % (6,741 acceptees out of 11,232 applicants)

GPA 3.20-3.39 and scored a 33 or above on the MCAT: 54.36% (1,279 acceptees out of 2353 applicants)
Click to expand...

obvious facts are obvious. who's 😱 about an 81% acceptance rate in the top quartile of the applicant pool? the most interesting thing to me out of the new chart, actually, is that the largest single cohort of applicants is now the 3.6-3.79/30-32 crowd. is the average applicant now sporting 30+?

drizzt3117 said:
There's no way 10% of med students are URM lol, the whole point is that they're UNDERrepresented.

Premeds like to talk about how hard it is to get into med school; the reality is that if you have decent stats and aren't a total douche you'll get accepted.
Click to expand...

uh, yeah. 14% of med students vs ~30% of the population (higher in the larger cities where most med schools and medical services tend to be) is what defines UNDERrepresented.
 
LizzyM said:
Well, look at the data:

5,548/79,070 = 7% black or African-American.

If you look at everyone who is not Asian, White, International or "no response" it is 11,619/79,070 = 14.7% URM

I think that if you have excellent stats and aren't a total douche you will get accepted. I think that decent stats and non-douchery, maybe a 75-80% chance of being accepted depending state residence, etc.
Click to expand...

Oh my! I assume this is 4 year data? Then if you look at 2011 data(6.1%), African-American matriculation is falling? Also, doesn't this data include Puerto Rico? How can you include students in Puerto Rico going to their own schools as URMs?

One more thing, Lizzy. Does it trouble you at all that 20-25% of applicants with "decent stats and non-douchery" status, are not accepted anywhere? Is the system broken? Do we need to move to something like a common pool? (run by the government or a non-affiliated contractor)
 
plumazul said:
Does it trouble you at all that 20-25% of applicants with "decent stats and non-douchery" status, are not accepted anywhere? Is the system broken? Do we need to move to something like a common pool? (run by the government or a non-affiliated contractor)
Click to expand...

There aren't enough spots for everyone, we have to draw the line somewhere. Moving to a system based strictly on numbers is not the way to go, which is really the only way to make things more "fair". That would effectively keep nontrads, who maybe have poor undergrad records, out even five-ten years after they finished undergrad. That is not fair, because I think most people would agree nontrads bring a unique perspective to medicine.

Medical school applications are a MUCH more fair process than finding a job in the real world. I wouldn't complain too much.
 
tiedyeddog said:
There aren't enough spots for everyone, we have to draw the line somewhere. Moving to a system based strictly on numbers is not the way to go, which is really the only way to make things more "fair". That would effectively keep nontrads, who maybe have poor undergrad records, out even five-ten years after they finished undergrad. That is not fair, because I think most people would agree nontrads bring a unique perspective to medicine.

Medical school applications are a MUCH more fair process than finding a job in the real world. I wouldn't complain too much.
Click to expand...

There could be ways to address all of your concerns. For example, schools could reserve seats for nontrads. I just see so much waste and inefficiency. There are so many ways to improve the process. Why not use the internet more in screening. Each medical school (or within a region) could host a "common interview" site. The interviews could be recorded and used by several different schools, etc. The process should seek to put the best people in the seats available, right? And as for the number of seats nationwide, why are there not enough? Who draws that "line"? Is the current "line" in the national interest?

I'm not complaining, just observing and commenting on what I see around me.
 
plumazul said:
Oh my! I assume this is 4 year data? Then if you look at 2011 data(6.1%), African-American matriculation is falling? Also, doesn't this data include Puerto Rico? How can you include students in Puerto Rico going to their own schools as URMs?

One more thing, Lizzy. Does it trouble you at all that 20-25% of applicants with "decent stats and non-douchery" status, are not accepted anywhere? Is the system broken? Do we need to move to something like a common pool? (run by the government or a non-affiliated contractor)
Click to expand...

The system is not broken, there are just more qualified applicants than there are seats. For a variety of reasons, we don't want to have enough seats for everyone who could successfully complete medical school. (It would cause more problems than it solves.) The same could be said for highly talented opera singers or football players.
 
plumazul said:
There could be ways to address all of your concerns. For example, schools could reserve seats for nontrads. I just see so much waste and inefficiency. There are so many ways to improve the process. Why not use the internet more in screening. Each medical school (or within a region) could host a "common interview" site. The interviews could be recorded and used by several different schools, etc. The process should seek to put the best people in the seats available, right? And as for the number of seats nationwide, why are there not enough? Who draws that "line"? Is the current "line" in the national interest?

I'm not complaining, just observing and commenting on what I see around me.
Click to expand...

not sure if you have been to interviews yet.... a big part of the interview day is your response to that particular school's environment. of course you as the applicant are interested in that, as a way to discriminate between schools. but the schools too are interested in your response to what they are offering. most schools really value their unique aspects, and try hard to sell you on them when you are there.

no one wins by centrally recording interviews, that sounds like just another highly gameable factor in a process with too many gameable components already. and saying, as you have, that we should be looking for "the best people" suggests that there is one, broadly accepted definition of "best." the criteria for "acceptable" are broadly recognized, but what makes an applicant "best" is highly school-specific.
 
gravitywave said:
no one wins by centrally recording interviews, that sounds like just another highly gameable factor in a process with too many gameable components already. and saying, as you have, that we should be looking for "the best people" suggests that there is one, broadly accepted definition of "best." the criteria for "acceptable" are broadly recognized, but what makes an applicant "best" is highly school-specific.
Click to expand...

Agreed on all points. Different schools really do look for different qualities in their students. There is a reason top 20 schools almost require research while many students getting into lower than top 50 schools don't really need it, and it isn't simple to just add another hoop.

Some schools are tailored to producing community physicians, like smaller in-state schools, compared to schools that have mission statements more geared towards producing academic, university physicians.

There are not enough spots and that is pretty much how it has to be. If we didn't self-police the amounts of spots available we would end up like law has ended up and the quality of how physicians would go down. Besides, how is it unfair that those with "decent" grades might not get in? it's not like it was a secret all along, you need great grades and EC's to get into medical school. Not having that is somewhat of a gamble.
 
Lil secret, if you wanna get into med sch, c
Don't be a douche.
 
LizzyM said:
Of course all the usual, apply early, apply broadly, etc etc .... I'd connsider excellent to be LizzyM above 77 and decent stats to be 73 and higher. Of course, that's my top tier bias showing and you might easily knock 5 points off each of those if you come from a state that offers you a few solid choices (particularly if your state school is unfriendly to OOS students).
Click to expand...
It is hard to believe that 3.4 GPA and 43 are as competitive as 3.9 GPA and 38, unless it is a 3.4 from Princeton.
 
How do you get a GPA of 2.00-2.19 and an MCAT of 15-17 and get accepted? 😳
 
gravitywave said:
not sure if you have been to interviews yet.... a big part of the interview day is your response to that particular school's environment. of course you as the applicant are interested in that, as a way to discriminate between schools. but the schools too are interested in your response to what they are offering. most schools really value their unique aspects, and try hard to sell you on them when you are there.
Click to expand...

I will apply to MS in the summer of 2013, but I have been to many interviews (jobs, scholarships). I never meant for a "common interview" to totally replace the current system. I propose it as an adjunct. It seems so unfair to bring many hundreds to a campus for face to face interviews when you only have less than one hundred seats. MS should limit their on campus interviews to a small multiple of their available seats so that everyone invited knows that the expense is justified. The internal system could be expanded to share information on who is being invited to an on campus interview and where.

no one wins by centrally recording interviews, that sounds like just another highly gameable factor in a process with too many gameable components already. and saying, as you have, that we should be looking for "the best people" suggests that there is one, broadly accepted definition of "best." the criteria for "acceptable" are broadly recognized, but what makes an applicant "best" is highly school-specific.
Click to expand...

We are on the same page here. My goal would be to tilt the system toward more objective metrics. Since there is an (artificial) limit on seats, these seats should be fairly allocated to all qualified candidates. There should be no royalty.
 
tiedyeddog said:
There are not enough spots and that is pretty much how it has to be. If we didn't self-police the amounts of spots available we would end up like law has ended up and the quality of how physicians would go down. Besides, how is it unfair that those with "decent" grades might not get in? it's not like it was a secret all along, you need great grades and EC's to get into medical school. Not having that is somewhat of a gamble.
Click to expand...

LOL, whenever I see/hear the words "that is how it has to be", is when I really get curious. Some call it "thinking outside the box"😀 Are your claims justified by any research? As to the definition of "decent" stats, I was using Lizzy's definition.

LizzyM said:
The system is not broken, there are just more qualified applicants than there are seats. For a variety of reasons, we don't want to have enough seats for everyone who could successfully complete medical school. (It would cause more problems than it solves.) The same could be said for highly talented opera singers or football players.
Click to expand...

I understand your point, but your analogies have flaws. An artist can sometimes take their case directly to the end user and so remove all middlemen. As for the football player, that really gets sticky. The football leagues have Congressional exemptions from law that allows them to do what they do.
 
plumazul said:
We are on the same page here. My goal would be to tilt the system toward more objective metrics. Since there is an (artificial) limit on seats, these seats should be fairly allocated to all qualified candidates. There should be no royalty.
Click to expand...

What are you trying to say? Only those with the highest MCAT/GPA scores should be the ones who get into medical school, in some kind of numerical order? What does royalty mean here? Are you assuming the crappy students beat out the "decent" students because of some kind of unfair edge?

plumazul said:
LOL, whenever I see/hear the words "that is how it has to be", is when I really get curious. Some call it "thinking outside the box"😀 Are your claims justified by any research? As to the definition of "decent" stats, I was using Lizzy's definition.

I understand your point, but your analogies have flaws. An artist can sometimes take their case directly to the end user and so remove all middlemen. As for the football player, that really gets sticky. The football leagues have Congressional exemptions from law that allows them to do what they do.
Click to expand...

I mean, it has to be that way for a reason. Look at what has happend to lawyers. That is my research. You can't deny their problems result from there being too many law student seats. The same thing would occur if we opened up enough seats for every "decent" applicant. Besides, who decides what a "decent" student is?!? LizzyM? The government? Maybe everyone who scores above a 3.4/24 MCAT should be considered decent. I mean, they did better than average, right?

Then we would run into the problem of who gets a residency spot. If we opened up just 2,000 or more M.D. seats then we would face another bottleneck, and a much worse one. Students with immense amounts of student loans who can't get residency positions because there are not enough of them. The numbers of residency spots is a function of government funding, not some artificial cap. The bottlenecking at medical school entrance is arguably a better one, considering almost everyone has to have a college degree in today's world to be competitive for any worthwhile job. Having MDs who can't get into residency programs would be a huge waste of resources.

Also, LizzyM is right. Even if the NFL or NBA didn't have laws exempting them from anti-trust laws, there would still be a limit to who can play in the NBA. Those laws limit where players can sign contracts, and allows a draft that essentially dictates where players have to play. The laws don't act to keep numbers of professional athletes low. If those laws were erased tomorrow, the pool of those who gain contracts would not change, only the richest teams would have the most super stars (aka what occurred in MLB and the NFL before the draft was instituted.) And in the artist analogy, a professional ballerina can not bypass a middleman. She has to gain a job with a production company.
 
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plumazul said:
We are on the same page here. My goal would be to tilt the system toward more objective metrics. Since there is an (artificial) limit on seats, these seats should be fairly allocated to all qualified candidates. There should be no royalty.
Click to expand...

I have no idea what you're talking about. Do you listen to yourself when you talk?
 
Underarchiever said:
It is hard to believe that 3.4 GPA and 43 are as competitive as 3.9 GPA and 38, unless it is a 3.4 from Princeton.
Click to expand...

I do not believe that there is school in the country that would reject an applicant with a 3.4 /43 on the basis of the 3.40. Likewise the 3.9/38. In either case, the chances of an interview invitation are high.
 
Underarchiever said:
It is hard to believe that 3.4 GPA and 43 are as competitive as 3.9 GPA and 38, unless it is a 3.4 from Princeton.
Click to expand...
I don't think they're ever intended to be equal based on LizzyM score alone. It's just a rough metric.
lezer said:
How do you get a GPA of 2.00-2.19 and an MCAT of 15-17 and get accepted? 😳
Click to expand...
I'm wondering what the circumstances were for the one applicant that got in with an MCAT ≤14.

Heck, I'm wondering what the circumstances were under which 70 people applied with MCAT scores ≤14... I would guess no one told them it wasn't worth it?
 
gettheleadout said:
I don't think they're ever intended to be equal based on LizzyM score alone. It's just a rough metric.

I'm wondering what the circumstances were for the one applicant that got in with an MCAT ≤14.

Heck, I'm wondering what the circumstances were under which 70 people applied with MCAT scores ≤14... I would guess no one told them it wasn't worth it?
Click to expand...

My guess? PR school acceptance, probably. Maybe english was a second language and they weren't very proficient at it.
 
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