disgruntled

[Amemus]

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I'm asian, which means my parent's would happily pay 70k more a year to send me to an even marginally better school

Wow. Is that typical? There is no way my parents would pay that much. With my parents the deal was get a full scholarship or go to a community college.

 

[silverlining1]

Dude, you guys are mean. Everyone on this board bitch. And if you don't bitch on this board, you do it to your friends. If you don't like what he has to say, just don't reply. Don't waste your time, typing out unsupportive sentences. It's not worth his effort to read it, and it's not worth yours.

I completely sympathize with the OP. The Bio Core at Stanford is infamous, but if one survives it with straight B, one will most likely get into the the best graduate schools. My '06 friend who goes to Princeton now for graduate school in virology got straight B's in the Bio Core.

To the OP: at the end of the day, you get the satisfaction of knowing that you learn so much more than your friend at said school. My friend goes to Seattle University and his bio classes is an exact replica of my AP Biology class in high school. They don't even go into the amazing structure of ATP synthase. Some of these people are right when they say that we both are learning the same material, but I have to say, I'm learning the same material in greater detail than he is.

I agree very much with all you said... especially since I went through Stanford's bio core last year and got B's =p And like some posters above, I have taken courses at a state university (physics) and found it much easier in general than courses at Stanford. While it wasn't as low as plug and chug, the test questions were almost exactly like the homework, the pace was extremely slow, and students seemed unmotivated to participate in discussion section. This made it very boring and not at all fun to learn. I still had to study, but I found the courses not nearly as stressful. In contrast, at Stanford, I find that students are taught some concepts (and very detailed examples) and asked to synthesize them so as to solve much more complex problems on exams. Professors want us to go above and beyond what was in lecture and problem sets and show that we really understand. So, if we just understood the lectures and problem sets but couldn't do more complex problems, we got around a B. A's were for the extra mile. This seems pretty fair to me.

In addition to the whole "you get brownie points for being at a top institution" thing, what I want to stress is that it's not just the grades that matter; a student should think about what they want from their education when choosing a school. Even though my GPA isn't great, I am constantly challenged and surrounded by extraordinarily intelligent and supportive classmates. I appreciate that a lot and am very happy I chose that environment over a state school where I could have had better grades but been somewhat bored and not pushed to achieve my potential. So, chin up - make the most of the great opportunity you have. I hope my post has given you a little bit of perspective.

 

[Tyronebiggums]

Most all schools teach a similar science curriculum subject wise but most people in this thread are missing the point the original poster is trying to make. For example if the average of a chemistry test at a top 20 school is a 50 and the average at second or third tier school is 50 for thermodynamics the person getting a 50 at the top 20 school probably worked harder. Here's why: at top 20 schools students tend to have higher SAT scores and ACT scores which both correlate highly with college GPA and overall performance. I also think it is safe to say that students with high test scores also devote plenty of time to studying. Professors, because they know how smart their students are at top 20 schools, must make exams that create a bell-shaped distribution and the only way to do that is by having tough material. The chemistry test would still be on the same subject of thermodynamics but the level of difficulty would greater to create the curve. Basically, an average chemistry student at say MIT would probably be above average on every chemistry test at say Delaware State. The class average of 50 at MIT would be like getting a 65 on a chemistry test at Delaware State. But the end result would be the average MIT student gets a B- and the average Delaware State student gets a B- too. However, who has worked harder and may know more about chemistry? Most likely the MIT student because of the more rigorous competition. The MCAT, as mentioned elsewhere, is the great equalizer but you still see many more people with 35's and 3.5's from MIT getting interviews at great schools than 35's and 3.5's from Delaware State. I can only hope, like the original poster, that medical schools do attempt to evaluate GPA's beyond the superficial numbers. If schools didn't it would marginalize the hard work of students going up against obviously superior undergraduate competition.

 

[ChadC]

Wow, that was incredibly uncalled for.

And for the record, I actually think it says "I did well enough in HS and on my SAT's to get into a great school, with a good financial aid package to boot. And, while I'm asian, which means my parent's would happily pay 70k more a year to send me to an even marginally better school, they had to pay about 5k more a year instead."

And even if my parents payed 20k more a year, who the heck are you to judge? That's our decision. If they were willing to do it, and thought it was worth it, then why is that even remotely a bad thing?

So chill.

Personally, I know plenty of people that chose less-expensive schools due to financial reasons, and I applaud them for it. I know that, being smart, they will be very successful in life, and a less prestigious college will not hold them back. But my decision to choose a more expensive university is no less valid. Maybe it's an asian thing, but I think that it's worth it. With parents that were denied the right to an education for many years due to the Cultural Revolution, we feel that not getting the BEST education we can possibly afford is inexplicable. Maybe it's a bad investment... perhaps the difference in return isn't as big as the difference in the cost... but we don't see education as an investment. We're not rational like that.😉

My two cents.

~Silk and Steel

I think you have forgotten that you are a premed. Let me know if I need to elaborate.

 

[airshad8]

The only school I would rather go to than have a freeride at a state school is MIT. Because it really is worth it. *wishes he could have majored in nuclear engineering*

 

[Kikaku21]

Here is a little secret about the real world that MOST undergraduate students don't understand.

In the real world your exam scores mean ZERO, NOTA, Zilch.

Get over yourself. All undergraduate institutions teach the same material (the basics of all subjects). So what if your exam might have been a little different (being more difficult) then yours, you both still were taught the same basic material. If you want to blame your 3.3 GPA on having to take harder exams then the average student, then transfer to the average student type of college and get your 4.0, ok!

You clearly have no clue what you are talking about. Some science courses require a good memory and the ability to use some equations to get an A. Others require you to apply concepts taught in class to foreign situations. The latter requires you to THINK. The former does not. You probably have not taken a class that requires the latter, or you would probably have at least SOME sympathy for what the OP is going through. I have had both kinds of classes. And let me tell you, my A in the latter was FAR more expensive in terms of my time and effort.

There is a difference between memorizing and UNDERSTANDING. And there is another difference between understanding and APPLYING. Applying is tougher. Profs that test it are asking far more of their students. If there were some way to translate this into the AMCAS application, we would all be better off.

 

[muncher]

it's too bad you didn't work hard enough in high school to get into an ivy... then you coulda had the good grades and prestige =D

 

[notdeadyet]

in your eyes, what exactly is a tier 1 and a tier 2 school???

By definition, tier 1 is sized down to the point that it includes your school; tier 2 is everyone else.

 

[airshad8]

By definition, tier 1 is sized down to the point that it includes your school; tier 2 is everyone else.

On a more serious note, tier 1: top 50, tier 2: 51-100, tier 3: 101-150, then I think there is a tier 4 aka unranked.

 

[Eric Lindros]

On a more serious note, tier 1: top 50, tier 2: 51-100, tier 3: 101-150, then I think there is a tier 4 aka unranked.

What defines these so called "tiers"? A magazine?

 

[airshad8]

What defines these so called "tiers"? A magazine?

uh...DUH! It also defines how much prestige we can acquire from our said schools.

 

[dontwakeme]

You clearly have no clue what you are talking about. Some science courses require a good memory and the ability to use some equations to get an A. Others require you to apply concepts taught in class to foreign situations. The latter requires you to THINK. The former does not. You probably have not taken a class that requires the latter, or you would probably have at least SOME sympathy for what the OP is going through. I have had both kinds of classes. And let me tell you, my A in the latter was FAR more expensive in terms of my time and effort.

There is a difference between memorizing and UNDERSTANDING. And there is another difference between understanding and APPLYING. Applying is tougher. Profs that test it are asking far more of their students. If there were some way to translate this into the AMCAS application, we would all be better off.

This is what I'm getting at. Yes, the concepts are exactly the same whether you goto podunk community college or MIT. The difference is the quality of the student body. Professors at podunk CC expect lesser of the students; therefore, the material is taught in an easy to understand manner with the tests being straightforward. On the otherhand, students at MIT are obviously of very high caliber as evidenced by their SAT scores and grades. As a result, the school expects more of them and although they are learning the exact same concepts, the tests are designed in such a way that they require the student to use and manipulate the simple equations and concepts that the average CC student learns to solve a problem that is completely foreign to them. That, my friends, is the difference between an average university and a top-tier university.

By top tier, I'm referring to the top 20 universities according to USNews.

 

[HumbleMD]

Most all schools teach a similar science curriculum subject wise but most people in this thread are missing the point the original poster is trying to make. For example if the average of a chemistry test at a top 20 school is a 50 and the average at second or third tier school is 50 for thermodynamics the person getting a 50 at the top 20 school probably worked harder. Here's why: at top 20 schools students tend to have higher SAT scores and ACT scores which both correlate highly with college GPA and overall performance. I also think it is safe to say that students with high test scores also devote plenty of time to studying. Professors, because they know how smart their students are at top 20 schools, must make exams that create a bell-shaped distribution and the only way to do that is by having tough material. The chemistry test would still be on the same subject of thermodynamics but the level of difficulty would greater to create the curve. Basically, an average chemistry student at say MIT would probably be above average on every chemistry test at say Delaware State. The class average of 50 at MIT would be like getting a 65 on a chemistry test at Delaware State. But the end result would be the average MIT student gets a B- and the average Delaware State student gets a B- too. However, who has worked harder and may know more about chemistry? Most likely the MIT student because of the more rigorous competition. The MCAT, as mentioned elsewhere, is the great equalizer but you still see many more people with 35's and 3.5's from MIT getting interviews at great schools than 35's and 3.5's from Delaware State. I can only hope, like the original poster, that medical schools do attempt to evaluate GPA's beyond the superficial numbers. If schools didn't it would marginalize the hard work of students going up against obviously superior undergraduate competition.

😱
Undergrad matters? And so does GPA? And MCAT scores? Stop with your lies; next you're going to tell us that LOR's aren't the most important thing ever, and being a non-traditional student isn't a set-back...
...G.P.A. mattering, that's a good one.

 

[Tyronebiggums]

😱
Undergrad matters? And so does GPA? And MCAT scores? Stop with your lies; next you're going to tell us that LOR's aren't the most important thing ever, and being a non-traditional student isn't a set-back...
...G.P.A. mattering, that's a good one.[/QUOTE


I said nothing about general GPA nor MCAT scores "mattering" or not. However, I did make an argument for why GPA's at elite schools should be evaluated differently than lower tier schools. GPA's shouldn't be considered in a vacuum. That is my point and I gave a hypothetical to back it up. For example, 3.3's from elite schools deserve more consideration than 3.5's from lower tiers in my opinion. You mistakenly critiqued my argument as simplistic and obvious when I was merely responding to other posts by individuals who clearly didn't understand the OP. The harse responses reeked of ignorance and I agree with the OP so I made my argument. You clearly understand my argument and it seems like you agree so I believe you are just as perplexed as I was by the lack of reasoning and logic displayed by dissenting posters. My argument is only simplistic to those of us that understood it apriori but most of the posts preceding me did not demonstrate your level of understanding. Thus I felt my post was necessary and offered a more in-depth analysis of why the OP's feelings are justified than most other supporting posts.

 

[krachenfels89]

Out of your control anyway, so why waste your time. Plus I would think it varies just as much from teacher to teacher as from school to school.

 

[ChadC]

😱
Undergrad matters? And so does GPA? And MCAT scores? Stop with your lies; next you're going to tell us that LOR's aren't the most important thing ever, and being a non-traditional student isn't a set-back...
...G.P.A. mattering, that's a good one.[/QUOTE


I said nothing about general GPA nor MCAT scores "mattering" or not. However, I did make an argument for why GPA's at elite schools should be evaluated differently than lower tier schools. GPA's shouldn't be considered in a vacuum. That is my point and I gave a hypothetical to back it up. For example, 3.3's from elite schools deserve more consideration than 3.5's from lower tiers in my opinion. You mistakenly critiqued my argument as simplistic and obvious when I was merely responding to other posts by individuals who clearly didn't understand the OP. The harse responses reeked of ignorance and I agree with the OP so I made my argument. You clearly understand my argument and it seems like you agree so I believe you are just as perplexed as I was by the lack of reasoning and logic displayed by dissenting posters. My argument is only simplistic to those of us that understood it apriori but most of the posts preceding me did not demonstrate your level of understanding. Thus I felt my post was necessary and offered a more in-depth analysis of why the OP's feelings are justified than most other supporting posts.

We have already established that there is more inflation at the "top tier" schools, so GPA's should be evaluated on the same level.

To help some out who don't get it, if you study 10hrs and get a D at a "good school" then someone is studying 10 hrs to get a B at a "bad school". The inflation is more at the good school so both kids come out with a B. It's all the same if there is more of a curve at the "good school".

To quoted poster, please get over yourself. 😉

 

[BeatrixKiddo]

My friend attends a 2nd tier school and I've noticed a very large disparity in difficulty between our science courses. I saw his chemistry midterm and practically all of the questions simply involved plugging in numbers and solving for a variable (e.g. given this wavelength, calculate the frequency). The average is usually in the 80's. I could answer every question with ease. Suffice to say, he easily has an A in the class. On the other hand, my exams involve more conceptual, difficult questions that do not simply involve plugging in numbers to solve for a variable. The average is usually in the mid 60's. As a result, I have a B+. I may attend a top 25 school, but I can't help but think that his 4.0 BCPM GPA will look much better than my ~3.3.

I don't want to sound anal or stuck up, but I really think it's unfair. I mean he attends a fairly respectable school, yet his exams are something that my younger brother (who is a high school sophmore taking a general chemistry high school course) could ace.

Maybe you're not smart enough to be attending a "top 25" school.

I used to feel like you when I was in the IB program and stupid kids who couldn't tie their shoes had 4.0s. The bottom line is, you get a challenge and learn more than the stupider kids, just work harder or give up.

 

[Amemus]

You all speak as if top tier schools are always harder. I've read articles that say that many "good" schools are just as hard. They may have been easier to get into, but I'd say how the student comes out is what matters more.
My school is excellent but it's not marked top tier probably because it's not a research institution. There are no graduate students so all attention goes to the undergrads. TAs are unnecessary because the professors are always available, although TAs are available as an extra resource for lower level courses. The professors who choose to teach at my school value teaching above research. In my mind that's a good school.. I may not be getting recognition points but having a strong education really shows.
I don't mean to disrespect any of you--I am sure you are all excellent students--but you shouldn't automatically assume top tier schools are the best.

 

[lindac]

For the smart high school kid who did well in high school but isn't inclined to be scholarly, when you go to a "tough" school (such as MIT), and are determined to make it, you learn how to study with an intensity that you probably wouldn't have tapped into had you gone to an easier school, and you become a different kind of learner because of it. This is a great advantage when persuing any advanced academic study.

Also, where you go as an undergraduate must be considered by adcoms, because at Reed College, notoriously proud of having no grade inflation for the last 50+ years, applicants with at least a 3.1 gpa (not easy to get) and MCATs of at least 28 have an 85% acceptance rate to medical school. The most frequent med schools Reed students matriculate at are Harvard, Stanford, OHSU & UWash (close to home) and a few other top ranked schools. BTW, Reed has had only 4 students graduate in the past 22 years with a 4.0 (student body is small, about 1,300, but still!)

 

[Tired]

Maybe you're not smart enough to be attending a "top 25" school.

This is why I like you.

Thank you for telling the truth.

 

[Nasrudin]

I object to the term "2nd Tier." I did my undergraduate work (Civil Engineering) at two widely disparate types of universities, The University of Vermont and Louisiana Tech (as 2nd tier as you can get) and noticed no appreciable difference in the quality of the instruction, the difficulty of the material, or my grades. All you got at UVM was a more picturesque campus and a lot more celebration of diversity but that was about it.

Not to mention that UVM was five times as much in-state as Louisiana Tech.

That's right. Its hard to sympathize with somebody who drops the fact that they attend a prestigious university and pay a ton of quid for it and then look down on another school for being of lower status and then complain about it. Hardest class I took was at a CC--the Berkeley kids thinking they could come across the Bay for an easy ride dropped the first couple of weeks.

OP if you're young and you have the resources to attend a big name school you'll make it through the process easier than most. Besides you're B will fare you better on the MCAT.

 

[Nasrudin]

For the smart high school kid who did well in high school but isn't inclined to be scholarly, when you go to a "tough" school (such as MIT), and are determined to make it, you learn how to study with an intensity that you probably wouldn't have tapped into had you gone to an easier school, and you become a different kind of learner because of it. This is a great advantage when persuing any advanced academic study.

Also, where you go as an undergraduate must be considered by adcoms, because at Reed College, notoriously proud of having no grade inflation for the last 50+ years, applicants with at least a 3.1 gpa (not easy to get) and MCATs of at least 28 have an 85% acceptance rate to medical school. The most frequent med schools Reed students matriculate at are Harvard, Stanford, OHSU & UWash (close to home) and a few other top ranked schools. BTW, Reed has had only 4 students graduate in the past 22 years with a 4.0 (student body is small, about 1,300, but still!)

Absolutely agree. Never heard of that place but anyone who learns to make good at a place like that will be a well-oiled studying machine and that has to pay big dividends in future success.

 

[guptaso2]

Medical schools have the mean averages and all statistics when it comes to students from your UG applying for medical school. My premed advisor provided these stats for us...

You know where I could get these stats, I'd love to see what they are for my school

 

[braluk]

You know where I could get these stats, I'd love to see what they are for my school

I got mine from my premed committee- I'm sure theres something similar to that around at your school

 

[BeatrixKiddo]

This is why I like you.

Thank you for telling the truth.

Oh.
I thought you liked my charming good looks and the way my eyes sparkled in the candle light. =\

 

[SilkandSteel]

For the smart high school kid who did well in high school but isn't inclined to be scholarly, when you go to a "tough" school (such as MIT), and are determined to make it, you learn how to study with an intensity that you probably wouldn't have tapped into had you gone to an easier school, and you become a different kind of learner because of it. This is a great advantage when persuing any advanced academic study.

Also, where you go as an undergraduate must be considered by adcoms, because at Reed College, notoriously proud of having no grade inflation for the last 50+ years, applicants with at least a 3.1 gpa (not easy to get) and MCATs of at least 28 have an 85% acceptance rate to medical school. The most frequent med schools Reed students matriculate at are Harvard, Stanford, OHSU & UWash (close to home) and a few other top ranked schools. BTW, Reed has had only 4 students graduate in the past 22 years with a 4.0 (student body is small, about 1,300, but still!)

EXACTLY!

I slept through high school. I mean, literally, slept. It was a public school, but a very good one. We offered 15 AP's - I took 9 and graduated with an above 4.0 GPA. I spent very very little time on homework - maybe less than an hour on an average night, a little more the night before a paper was due. All of my freetime was spent either on extracurriculars or burried in novels. It's not that I was averse to work...it's just that I didn't have to.

That totally changed in college. I went to a top 10 university, and for the first time I had to back up my ambition with an actual work ethic.🙂

ChadC, you're hypothetical of the B and D is obfuscating. It's makes much more sense to refer to things by means, because individual teachers can make much harder or easier exams at both hard and easy schools. Getting a raw score of 60 or 70 percent at the SAME school doesn't even mean the same thing.

So say at the top tier school A, a mean grade gets you a B, and at the easier school B, a mean grade gets you a C. Both require that the student of each respective school study for 10 hours. But that doesn't mean that a student from school A studying 10 hours would take the test from school B and get the same mean score. That's a logical fallacy, because you fail to take into account factors such as how quick a student is to pick up material, how well they memorize things, and how effectively the student picks and chooses which concepts are more important to others.

All I know is that if I were in a college populated by the general population of my high school, say the honors students only (not the multiple-AP students but not the regents students either), I would not have to study nearly as hard as I do now to get a mean grade. I know that if I put in the same time and effort as I did to get a B (the mean grade) in my biology class, I would definitely get an A at that hypothetical college. I have a fairly good sense of the competition there in comparison to the competition at my current university. 95% of my class went to college. I can do the math.

~Silk and Steel

P.S.

I think you have forgotten that you are a premed. Let me know if I need to elaborate.

Being a premed makes me a douche? 🙄 Grow up, would you please?

 

[ChadC]

ChadC, you're hypothetical of the B and D is obfuscating. It's makes much more sense to refer to things by means, because individual teachers can make much harder or easier exams at both hard and easy schools. Getting a raw score of 60 or 70 percent at the SAME school doesn't even mean the same thing.

The hypothetical was meant to simplify the logic of comparing inflation. Just imagine that there are identical twins at different schools. Both end up with B's and both learn equal amounts. The only justification of the OP's bitching would be if his/her school did not inflate grades and they studied twice as much to get the same GPA.

All I know is that if I were in a college populated by the general population of my high school, say the honors students only (not the multiple-AP students but not the regents students either), I would not have to study nearly as hard as I do now to get a mean grade. I know that if I put in the same time and effort as I did to get a B (the mean grade) in my biology class, I would definitely get an A at that hypothetical college. I have a fairly good sense of the competition there in comparison to the competition at my current university. 95% of my class went to college. I can do the math.

If you study the same amount of time at one school as you do the other, and the tests are harder at one then you will get a lower school, which will be curved to equal the grade of the easier school.

Being a premed makes me a douche? 🙄 Grow up, would you please

My comment is directed at the fact that no one will care where you did your undergrad once you get through medschool. What's the purpose of spending an extra 20k a year if it gives you no benefit in your career.

 

[staticsoliloquy]

You'd rather give the OP false hope?



Is your friend a biology major? Do they offer a bio course for science majors and another for non-sci majors?

I don't think he's asking for anything. He's simply here to complain and if you and if you don't want to hear it, you don't have to respond to it. My friend is a Biochemistry major, so yes, he's taking a biocore for science major.

 

[On3H34rT]

I guess if I go to a Public institution in Arkansas, it must be lower tier--I must not deserve my A's~

 

[Vox Animo]

I guess if I go to a Public institution in Arkansas, it must be lower tier--I must not deserve my A's~

the right thing to do you be to turn in your transcript and ask them to change the grades to Bs in quotes. Like this

biology 101: A actually "B"

Thats what i did before i applied. Never looked back.

😀