Better School VS Better Professor to Student Ratio.

[cbb19]

I'm finishing my AA (associates in Liberal Arts), and am looking to transfer to a 4 year university. I applied to the following 2 schools, Rutgers and Georgian Ct University.

The way I see it is as follows:

Rutgers is considered a good premed school, but it's a bit of a commute (45 min).

Georgian Court University is literally less than 5 minutes from where I live, and has a 1 to 15 student ratio. I feel I can do much better in Georgian Ct University considering the close proximity and easy access to the professors.

Would the medical schools view one school over the other? Can anyone offer insight on this?

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[Tapepsi]

I do know that some schools like SUNY downstate uses this one book (I forget what it's called) that ranks every US and Canada college on a scale from 1-4 with No-Name Uni getting a 1 and Ivy League getting a 4. How much weight this ranking has and how it's added to your application I have no clue.

Besides that, the college you go to really has no other impact on your application. The most important aspects of your application are: GPA, MCAT, EC's, shadowing, research, and PS. Since you said you feel like you can perform better at one school vs. the other I'd go to GCU. Plus you're saving gas money!

Good luck!

 

[cbb19]

Besides that, the college you go to really has no other impact on your application.
Good luck!

Really? A 3.5 in Harvard VS a 3.5 in GCU is weighed equally by medical schools?

 

[Tapepsi]

Really? A 3.5 in Harvard VS a 3.5 in GCU is weighed equally by medical schools?

No. Some schools do use a ranking like I previously mentioned, but I said that besides that number, which I don't know how much of a weight it has on your application, there is no other benefit to going to an ivy league. So I'd say in that example with the 3.5, if everything else for both applicants were about equal, the one from Harvard would most likely get the acceptance over the one at GCU.

 

[BAMF]

Personally, I would shoot for the school where I can get a better educational experience (which will be different for everyone). GCU sounds like the professors would be more easily accessible, which means that you'll have an easier time forming connections and building relationships along the way - definitely not something that should be underestimated. I don't believe that one would be more favorable over the other, as long as you do well.

 

[ejw5075]

I was in a similar situation 3 years ago, and I chose the smaller school with better professor-student ratio. I do not regret it at all, I read every one of my letters (we had a committee that released them to us) and they were FANTASTIC. It is so important to have letter writers who actually know you, and judging from my last year at a 40,000+ student university, my letters would not have been so amazing.

I'm not sure how much research is going on at your school, and if you are even interested in it, but I had better opportunities for more independent research at my small school but more "real" research (publications, presentations, etc) at the large university. Then again you can gain research experience outside of undergrad too.

Finances should also be an important factor because no matter which medical school you end up attending you will be probably be in debt, why add to that with massive undergrad loans.

Stick with the small school if the education is up to par, form good relationships with your professors, do research if you wish, volunteer, get a good MCAT and you won't regret it.

I forgot to mention tutoring was much more beneficial for me at a smaller university because it was 1 on 1 and more like teaching than at a larger school where our groups were larger and I attempted to "tutor" 10 students at once, basically going through mechanisms on a whiteboard and answering questions instead of actually going through the material. I don't know if that matters to you.

 

[FrkyBgStok]

Generally, I would say go with the ratio one but it also depends on what you want to do. I took a couple classes at a small college where I live and they didn't have the resources that a larger college would have and the labs were severely lacking. If someone was interested in research, they would have been screwed. But if it has everything that you are interested in, you are fine.

 

[hopefuldoc97239]

Really? A 3.5 in Harvard VS a 3.5 in GCU is weighed equally by medical schools?

You're right, Harvard should probably be weighted below an unknown school.

Harvard's grades are notoriously inflated, even comparing within the same institution across time.

(Source)