Are GPA cutoffs modified for certain schools?

[toff4l]

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My orgo professor, who is also the pre-health advisor, told me that certain medical schools will modify their GPA cutoff for students from selective schools.

The example he gave me was that Drexel will raise their cutoff by .2 for Lehigh graduates because of their grading system.

Is this true? Do you know of other schools who do this?

 

[Morzh]

Maybe. Maybe not. The only time cutoffs are employed, from what I understand, is if an applicant has a below 3.0 GPA.

The overriding question of "Does your school's prestige matter" is discussed, in one form or another, in several new threads almost every day. You'll hear lots of opinions, very few of which are based on facts and experience. My own opinion is that in certain situations it may may a slight difference, but rarely a really significant one.

 

[NickNaylor]

Discussed, discussed, discussed.

 

[RookTookIt]

The example he gave me was that Drexel will raise their cutoff by .2 for Lehigh graduates because of their grading system.

Raise their cutoff? Making it harder for Lehigh grads? Either way, I HIGHLY doubt this is true.

 

[toff4l]

Raise their cutoff? Making it harder for Lehigh grads? Either way, I HIGHLY doubt this is true.

I worded it all wrong. My advisor said that Drexel will look at a Lehigh 3.4 and evaluate it at a 3.6.

 

[RookTookIt]

I worded it all wrong. My advisor said that Drexel will look at a Lehigh 3.4 and evaluate it at a 3.6.

Eh, I still don't think he knows what he's talking about.

 

[Godlike]

I worded it all wrong. My advisor said that Drexel will look at a Lehigh 3.4 and evaluate it at a 3.6.

Your advisor is a bad.

 

[NickNaylor]

I worded it all wrong. My advisor said that Drexel will look at a Lehigh 3.4 and evaluate it at a 3.6.

The rigor of your program factors into admissions decisions, which you might think of as causing "bumps" or "drops" in how your GPA is perceived. A couple of adcoms here have also posted that applicants from schools that have a reputation for being particularly difficult and/or engaging in grade deflation will likely get a little leeway in their GPA.

I doubt you're going to find someone that can speak to your specific case. But the rigor and difficulty of a program is taken into consideration.

 

[okal]

I thought the point of the MCAT was to make up for differing amounts of rigour.

 

[skiing]

I think that one reason there's probably no clear answer on this is that it varies from committee to committee, and within that, from individual to individual. Through talking with several members of various committees and admissions offices, as well as Professors with experience on admissions, I've heard that both cases are true.

At least at one top 5 school I know they don't calculate school institution into their scoring method for sending secondaries. On the other hand, My PI, a Professor I met at another top 5 school, and a former Dean at yet another school said that they WILL take into account that I was "from UCLA". I went through my CV with a director of a phD program and one of the first things she said was, "oh, you're from UCLA." It was a casual observation. I also saw a listing published in a Korean paper several years ago that outlined the number of students matriculating at Stanford and JHU from various undergrad institutions - the mostly highly represented were the top private schools and Berkeley and UCLA. Altogether however, those students probably made up half the class and the rest were 1 and 2 students each from smaller schools.

So, the short answer is that the answer is not black and white. From what I have seen from talking to people with admissions experience, for some people on some committees, being from a great school can give you a boost, though it is clearly not necessary to be from a "top institution" to get in, some people don't care, there is probably varying opinions within committees. I've also heard that for PhD committees at least, student interviewers are seen as less accommodating of tougher curricula/schools than professors are, again evidencing that it varies from person to person (again however, this view is just one person's view).

My personal opinion is the cream (no matter where it's from) will always rise to the top because schools will give you a holistic consideration. Then again, in this game, it never hurts to hvae every little leg up, but it's hard to tell how decisive your UG institution will be (it probably won't be). Committees will pay MUCH more attention to other aspects of your app and who you really are as a doctor. The point is to make the most of what you have wherever you are, do all you can do. From talking with committee members, the one thing that they emphasized over and over was they are looking for people with passion, drive, who will be leaders, etc (the stereotypical stuff) - if you just show them you'll be a great doctor, there's nothing else you need to prove?

 

[gatorade848]

I think that one reason there's probably no clear answer on this is that it varies from committee to committee, and within that, from individual to individual. Through talking with several members of various committees and admissions offices, as well as Professors with experience on admissions, I've heard that both cases are true.

My PI, a Professor I met at UCSF, and a former Dean at another school said that they WILL take into account that I was "from UCLA" (i.e. a highly competitive public school). I went through my CV with a director of a phD program at UCSF, and one of the first things she said was, "oh, you're from UCLA." It was a casual observation. I also saw a listing published in a Korean paper several years ago that outlined the number of students matriculating at Stanford and JHU from various undergrad institutions - the mostly highly represented were the top private schools and Berkeley and UCLA. Altogether however, those students probably made up half the class and the rest were 1 and 2 students each from smaller schools. However, other members of the same committees they worked on have told me about the process for grading and evaluating secondaries and it didn't sound like there was anything about school name calculated into their scoring formula for sending secondaries.

So, the short answer is that the answer is not black and white. From what I have seen from talking to people with admissions experience, for some people on some committees, being from a great school can give you a boost, though it is clearly not necessary to be from a "top institution" to get in, some people care some don't, there is probably varying opinions within committees. My personal opinion is the cream (no matter where it's from) will always rise to the top because schools will give you a holistic consideration. Then again, in this game, it never hurts to hvae every little leg up, but it's hard to tell how decisive your UG institution will be (it probably won't be). Committees will pay MUCH more attention to other aspects of your app and who you really are as a doctor. The point is to make the most of what you have wherever you are, do all you can do. From talking with committee members, the one thing that they emphasized over and over was they are looking for people with passion, drive, who will be leaders, etc (the stereotypical stuff) - if you just show them you'll be a great doctor, there's nothing else you need to prove?

i agree there is no clear answer. some committee do favor highly competitive colleges but there is no clear +0.2 or whatever; for example I go to a competitive university with a top 20 med school. My premed advisor used to be on the admission committee and when I described my worry about my low gpa, he said "dont worry you are from university X, vast majority of med school admission ppl I know knows the highly competitive/difficult nature of our undergraduate classes, they will take that into account".