Does the school matter?

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Does schools like Penn medicine more likely choose applicants from their own school?

 

[Geneticist]

I hope so.

 

[TexasPhysician]

Its individualized. I know medical schools that prefer to not take their own students for greater diversity and national prestige, and I know other medical schools that prefer to take their own.

 

[Geneticist]

Its individualized. I know medical schools that prefer to not take their own students for greater diversity and national prestige, and I know other medical schools that prefer to take their own.

Do some schools publicize whether or not they prefer their own students? I've noticed that schools like UWash tend to admit a higher percentage of their undergrad students...

And, if you don't mind me asking, which prefer to take their own and which don't?

 

[Anonymous01]

And, if you don't mind me asking, which prefer to take their own and which don't?

I don't know if the statistics are available for acceptances, but you can look at the matriculation numbers for some schools. Specifically, Vandy comes to mind: https://medschool.vanderbilt.edu/admissions/undergraduate-schools-represented

 

[Geneticist]

I don't know if the statistics are available for acceptances, but you can look at the matriculation numbers for some schools. Specifically, Vandy comes to mind: https://medschool.vanderbilt.edu/admissions/undergraduate-schools-represented

Oh damn! 😱

I shoulda went to Vandy...

 

[Anonymous01]

Also, here's the profile for Case: http://casemed.case.edu/admissions/images/Entering Class of 2010 - For Communications.pdf

Remember that they're only looking at one year while Vandy's profile looks over four years. Case seems to show some preference, but it looks like it matters less than it would for Vandy.

 

[slatermd]

That's funny...10 MIT, 13 Princeton, 14 Yale, 95 Vanderbilt.


21 from Notre Dame?

 

[Geneticist]

That's funny...10 MIT, 13 Princeton, 14 Yale, 95 Vanderbilt.


21 from Notre Dame?

Notre Dame brags about sending 1 out of 10 students to medical school. I don't really know how they do it, but they do tend to send a lot of students to med school...

 

[slatermd]

I didn't know that. I should have been a little pickier about my undergrad institution.

 

[Geneticist]

I didn't know that. I should have been a little pickier about my undergrad institution.

Right?

I don't like how only prestigious medical schools publish their incoming class results...

 

[Anonymous01]

That's funny...10 MIT, 13 Princeton, 14 Yale, 95 Vanderbilt.

21 from Notre Dame?

There's probably a TON of information that happens behind the scenes that we don't know about here. First off, remember that we're looking at matriculation numbers, not acceptance numbers (I'm making an assumption here, but those from MIT, P-ton, and Yale who were admitted but didn't matriculate probably chose to go to other schools...if they were qualified for Vandy, they were probably qualified for quite a few other schools...). Also, note that MIT, P-ton, and Yale are in the NE while Notre Dame is more or less parallel with Nashville...perhaps a regional self-selection. Last, but not least, I bet that the guy who writes composite letters for Notre Dame (assuming they have a guy...) probably tells is straight to schools without sugarcoating their applicants, leading to increased trust, and thanks through accepting of their students.

 

[EpiIV]

I didn't know that. I should have been a little pickier about my undergrad institution.

I try to look at the positive side. Can you imagine applying to one of those schools with 100k in undergrad debt racked up? I don't regret picking my state school for a second.

 

[bookfreak89]

I try to look at the positive side. Can you imagine applying to one of those schools with 100k in undergrad debt racked up? I don't regret picking my state school for a second.

 

[Geneticist]

Anyone have any info on Penn State, for that matter?

 

[WeAreNotRobots]

Notre Dame brags about sending 1 out of 10 students to medical school. I don't really know how they do it, but they do tend to send a lot of students to med school...

maybe it's not 1/10 notre dame students, but 1/10 notre dame student applicants. HUGE difference.

EDIT: class size at notre dame is roughly 2,000...so they would have to turn out 200 first yr med students each year for that stat to be true. based on this link (https://www.aamc.org/download/161116/data/table2-7-mwhite2010-web.pdf.pdf) there were only 296 total applicants from notre dame in 2010. that's about a 1/10 APPLICATION rate. unless each and every one of those applicants was accepted, that statistic is most likely NOT referring to sending 1/10 'graduates' to med school, but 1/10 'graduates who apply to med school' to med school. whatever...but myth busted.

 

[fizzgig]

why would ND brag about only 10% of their applicants getting in to med school?

 

[calvnandhobbs68]

unless each and every one of those applicants was accepted, that statistic is most likely NOT referring to sending 1/10 'graduates' to med school, but 1/10 'graduates who apply to med school'

Haha and myth is not busted. Notre Dame has something around a 90+% acceptance rate for applicants applying to medical school. I would pull out my sheet they gave me last year when applying and photocopy it so I could show you but I don't think I have it anymore....anyway yeah its true basically everyone who applies from Notre Dame gets accepted somewhere.

They do kind of self select by discouraging people who have really crappy grades from applying right out of school (I know someone who got a few Cs in core sciences and a D one semester of orgo was straight up told not to apply without retaking the classes) but if you are applying, their pre-med office is one of the best you could ask for. We had to go to a applying to medical school "class" every week (although you could skip it without anyone really noticing) spring semester last year that talked about everything from PS writing to what counts as BCMP to how to fill out your AMCAS to when to ask people for recommendation letters. Applying through that office is about as painless as it can be and apparently their committee letters are awesome. We each had to do a kind of "mock" interview with one of the advisors so they could get more information for their committee letter. Their office is also very well connected with schools in this region especially I think (which would probably include Vanderbilt, Chicago, Northwestern, Michigan, Ohio State, Case, WashU to name some big ones in the area).

So in short, yeah pretty much everyone who applies gets accepted somewhere, so I wouldn't attribute the lower Princeton, Harvard, Yale numbers matriculating at Vanderbilt simply to a selection bias on the students part (although I'm sure that has to do with part of it).

 

[TexasPhysician]

Do some schools publicize whether or not they prefer their own students? I've noticed that schools like UWash tend to admit a higher percentage of their undergrad students...

And, if you don't mind me asking, which prefer to take their own and which don't?

No they don't publicize these things, and it is really tough to tell unless you know the schools pretty well.

Take a look at Vandy. Based on numbers, they accept less than 25 of their own students/year. Vandy matriculates only 9.5% of students that are in-state. I would bet that Vandy undergraduates are more likely to accept a position at Vandy med than almost anywhere else - no moving costs, you know the area, you know the school, etc. Whereas what percentage of Harvard & Johns Hopkins applicants really desire to move to the South, even if it is Vandy? Most NE people like to stay in the NE so you have to accept many more to get that high number of Harvard/Princeton people. ND makes sense - its close by.

Therefore those 95 total Vandy undergrads is probably a big percentage of the total Vandy undergrads they accepted. 13 from Princeton is a small # of undergrads they accepted from there that actually matriculated.

Without having all the data, it is really tough to tell, but I would say that Vandy is actually tougher to get into from its undergrad than other medical schools. There are a # of Vandy undergrads in my medical school who performed quite well (step scores in the 99th%ile) that were rejected by Vandy med school.

 

[Anonymous01]

So in short, yeah pretty much everyone who applies gets accepted somewhere, so I wouldn't attribute the lower Princeton, Harvard, Yale numbers matriculating at Vanderbilt simply to a selection bias on the students part (although I'm sure that has to do with part of it).

Lets not (accidentally) make the subtle distinction that just about everyone applying from Harvard, Princeton, and Yale aren't accepted at least somewhere too. Again, if you're qualified for Vandy, you're probably qualified for atleast half of the other top 20 schools, and you begin dealing with a huge selection bias. I personally think you're severely underestimating the selection bias.

 

[venacontracta]

Anyone have any info on Penn State, for that matter?

 

[Ignatius M.D.]

Oh damn! 😱

I shoulda went to Vandy...

I believe this is including those that were admitted in the guaranteed acceptance program, which is 10-15 per year I think. That larger number is total enrolled in the school. Since 200 Vandy undergrads apply to Vanderbilt each year in regular admissions, the preference is not as pronounced as you people are making it out to be. I'm probably not (haven't decided yet) even going to apply due to intense inter-competition and super high averages. Also, most of the top grads here get accepted to other top schools, but often choose Vandy, while it seems that nationwide, Vandy often gets snubbed by people that got into multiple top schools. I'm not sure why this is though.

EpiIV: I dunno about your school, but Vandy and other top 20's offer 100% need met guaranteed. Many people here graduate with the same debt or less than attending their state school would have yielded.

 

[Anonymous01]

No they don't publicize these things, and it is really tough to tell unless you know the schools pretty well.

Take a look at Vandy. Based on numbers, they accept less than 25 of their own students/year. Vandy matriculates only 9.5% of students that are in-state. I would bet that Vandy undergraduates are more likely to accept a position at Vandy med than almost anywhere else - no moving costs, you know the area, you know the school, etc. Whereas what percentage of Harvard & Johns Hopkins applicants really desire to move to the South, even if it is Vandy? Most NE people like to stay in the NE so you have to accept many more to get that high number of Harvard/Princeton people. ND makes sense - its close by.

Therefore those 95 total Vandy undergrads is probably a big percentage of the total Vandy undergrads they accepted. 13 from Princeton is a small # of undergrads they accepted from there that actually matriculated.

Without having all the data, it is really tough to tell, but I would say that Vandy is actually tougher to get into from its undergrad than other medical schools. There are a # of Vandy undergrads in my medical school who performed quite well (step scores in the 99th%ile) that were rejected by Vandy med school.

Less than 25 Vandy students matriculate in a given year (not that less are accepted...that data isn't given).

It is very tough to tell. Although, I would argue that Vandy does show a strong preference to its own undergraduates (if we're assuming all 9.5% from TN come from Vandy...which is probably pretty close to the true number; also, where did you find the 9.5% statistic?), this doesn't necessarily mean that it shows a lack of preference to other top universities. What I'm trying to say is that Vandy probably shows a strong preference towards top universities and itself (I hate making these generalizations, because it doesn't account for the fact that really really strong applicants are in higher concentrations in these top universities than elsewhere...), but maybe not a huge preference towards other top schools such as (looking at matriculation numbers here and not acceptance numbers, flawing this data quite a bit...) Case Western Reserve (n=2), Columbia (n=2), Georgetown (n=1), Northwestern (n=3), UChicago (n=3), etc.

 

[Musclemass]

I try to look at the positive side. Can you imagine applying to one of those schools with 100k in undergrad debt racked up? I don't regret picking my state school for a second.

For people from lower or middle income levels, the generous financial aid that many private schools offer can make them cheaper than state schools. Many, but not all.

While all welcome and need $$$ from tuition (and contributions) for children of prosperous families, most do not want to have only students of wealthy families. It's a matter of managing and achieving diversity.

 

[calvnandhobbs68]

Lets not (accidentally) make the subtle distinction that just about everyone applying from Harvard, Princeton, and Yale aren't accepted at least somewhere too. Again, if you're qualified for Vandy, you're probably qualified for atleast half of the other top 20 schools, and you begin dealing with a huge selection bias. I personally think you're severely underestimating the selection bias.

I have no idea how many people apply from these schools and how many people are accepted from these schools. Of course it varies widely among schools and is dependent on the region. Maybe lots of people from Ivy schools don't even apply to Vanderbilt...I don't know and unless you know, we can't figure it out either way. Take a look at WashU's profile though...more people matriculate there from UPenn, MIT, Harvard, etc than Notre Dame so I'm sure you're right.

http://medadmissions.wustl.edu/HowtoApply/selectionprocess/Pages/WhoChoosesWU.aspx

My response was mainly to the guy who was calling it a "myth" that 1/10 people from Notre Dame get accepted to med school. I also wouldn't discount the fact that they have close connections with regional schools though either...I've personally had an admissions official tell me from one of the schools I mentioned that a call in support of a particular student can sway their decision if they're on the fence about someone because of the trust they have with Notre Dame's premed office.

 

[TexasPhysician]

Less than 25 Vandy students matriculate in a given year (not that less are accepted...that data isn't given).

It is very tough to tell. Although, I would argue that Vandy does show a strong preference to its own undergraduates (if we're assuming all 9.5% from TN come from Vandy...which is probably pretty close to the true number; also, where did you find the 9.5% statistic?), this doesn't necessarily mean that it shows a lack of preference to other top universities. What I'm trying to say is that Vandy probably shows a strong preference towards top universities and itself (I hate making these generalizations, because it doesn't account for the fact that really really strong applicants are in higher concentrations in these top universities than elsewhere...), but maybe not a huge preference towards other top schools such as (looking at matriculation numbers here and not acceptance numbers, flawing this data quite a bit...) Case Western Reserve (n=2), Columbia (n=2), Georgetown (n=1), Northwestern (n=3), UChicago (n=3), etc.

The aamc website showed 9.5%. I would agree greatly that Vandy likely shows strong preference to top universities. I disagree that Vandy shows preference to itself however. They snub many top candidates from their undergrad. They love East Coast diversity.....i.e. - Ivy league candidates. To have so many Princeton, Harvard, etc. people means they are accepting TONS of them. Top Harvard grads don't usually sit around dreaming about going to Tennessee.

Compared to many TX med schools that accept tons of UT, A&M, Texas Tech kids. Tough to compare though because TX schools are public.