Age and Performance

[smartguy]

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I've been wondering; how has your experience been when taking classes with more mature students (26-40 age range) in terms of academic performance (class rank)?

I noticed there is a slight gap between newly graduated undergrads and "career changers" with respect to their GPA. A lot of post-bacc/graduate students appear to score relatively high compared to their newly graduated counterparts. Are medical schools finding that "more experienced" applicants have a higher success rate, and would this suggest that these students have a better chance at admission?

In case you ask about raw data, this is nothing more than anecdotal. I'm not basing my opinion from actual facts. I'm just curious as usual.

 

[PeepshowJohnny]

Geeze, it's really hard to generalize. I'd have to say in my experience, the people who are the tippy top of the class ranks tend to be people who entered medical school right out of college, or one year after. I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that these super high performers are the type of people who wanted to be doctors since the age of 3 and have been grooming themselves (and sometimes by their parents) for that since that time.

They want into highly competitive residencies at highly competitive locations. They're able to focus insane amount of time into coursework because school and medicine is their life. That's not to say they're pscychopaths or anything, they tend to be pretty cool guys and gals but they have this mentality "I'll have time for a real life when I'm a dermatologist with an established practice".

Now as you move into the more run of the mill high achievers, I think it's hard for me to judge. I will say that the younger crowd tends to do better on standardized examinations, but whether that's reflected in big stuff like examinations and boards, I'm not sure.

 

[njbmd]

Moving to Topics in Healthcare as this is a multiforum related issue and not specific to Allopathic Medical Schools.

 

[rachmoninov3]

I agree with what Peepshow said, but I would like to present some hypothesis for why it seems that the 'career changers' are towards the top of the class:

1. Medical school is psychologically demanding. Other than the true top gunners, a lot of right out of college people have trouble. Some are even realizing that medicine isn't for them. If you haven't faced other challenges before medical school, it makes it difficult to face these challenges and do well in medical school at the same time.

2. There's a lot of social psych endoctrination bull**** in medical school. The people who are older seem to be slightly more immune to this. Study on their own, don't attend lecture, and don't let the stupid administration things get them down.

3. With a little bit of life experience and or healthcare experience, you know what type of stuff is important to focus on, and what can be left out. A nursing background is great for this! No freakouts about a 12000 wbc, or a platelet count of 138,000.

4. Finally, even tho older students have time commitments to spouses and kids, family takes the emphasis away from dating, and provides a nice support system.

Anyway, I hope the original poster is correct...since I'm one of those "career changer" students!