Does undergraduate school selectivity matter?

[infinitesimal]

I found two conflicting surveys from the AAMC. Although they are from different years, I say conflicting because it's odd that within a year, the mean importance of undergraduate selectivity changed by the amount it did.

Here is an image from a previous thread. Undergraduate selectivity is shown to be as important on average as GPA/MCAT. This survey was taken in 2014. The next shows the same survey but updated for 2015:

Here undergraduate selectivity is shown to be as important as your undergraduate major. So does undergraduate selectivity matter?

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[Sunna12]

I found two conflicting surveys from the AAMC. Although they are from different years, I say conflicting because it's odd that within a year, the mean importance of undergraduate selectivity changed by the amount it did.

Here is an image from a previous thread. Undergraduate selectivity is shown to be as important on average as GPA/MCAT. This survey was taken in 2014. The next shows the same survey but updated for 2015: View attachment 239907Here undergraduate selectivity is shown to be as important as your undergraduate major. So does undergraduate selectivity matter?

Our ADCOM (MD) occasionally looks up undergrad schools if we aren't familiar with them- but no, it doesn't really matter. But certainly for big-name med schools it may be a different story, hence the data footnote.

 

[gyngyn]

Sometimes.
What matters more is how the applicant took advantage of those opportunities.

 

[infinitesimal]

But shouldn't we be at least a little worried then that it seems as if after the first survey went public, adcoms started lying on their surveys?? Also what footnote are you talking about?

 

[gyngyn]

But shouldn't we be at least a little worried then that it seems as if after the first survey went public, adcoms started lying on their surveys?? Also what footnote are you talking about?

Surveys are exactly that. A snapshot of anonymous responders. We all know that the aggregated result of these surveys will be made public. There is no reason to lie.

 

[infinitesimal]

Surveys are exactly that. A snapshot of responders. There is no reason for them to lie.

I'm just confused about the huge change. One year it was as important as the MCAT and the next year it was irrelevant???

 

[gyngyn]

I'm just confused about the huge change. One year it was as important as the MCAT and the next year it was irrelevant???

Things change.

 

[The Knife & Gun Club]

I'm just confused about the huge change. One year it was as important as the MCAT and the next year it was irrelevant???

There could also be some variability in sample size and who answered each year.

I think In general it’s hard to read the tea leaves for what Adcoms as a whole think. After all, the adcoms are people and can have some substantial variation of opinion.

There’s also no one right way to build a med school class. Some places may prefer taking people from brand name schools, as their grades are a known quantity. Other places are probably content using MCAT as a surrogate instead of UG rank.

 

[infinitesimal]

There could also be some variability in sample size and who answered each year.

I think In general it’s hard to read the tea leaves for what Adcoms as a whole think. After all, the adcoms are people and can have some substantial variation of opinion.

There’s also no one right way to build a med school class. Some places may prefer taking people from brand name schools, as their grades are a known quantity. Other places are probably content using MCAT as a surrogate instead of UG rank.

The first survey was answered by 127 schools and the 2nd 130. This is almost all US MD schools. The other 11 are probably BS/MD only programs. The purpose of the mean is that it shouldn't change drastically due to statistical variance. Since this was at the same time as the MCAT change, perhaps they felt that the new MCAT better reflected applicant's academic success than before.

 

[The Knife & Gun Club]

The first survey was answered by 127 schools and the 2nd 130. This is almost all US MD schools. The other 11 are probably BS/MD only programs. The purpose of the mean is that it shouldn't change drastically due to statistical variance. Since this was at the same time as the MCAT change, perhaps they felt that the new MCAT better reflected applicant's academic success than before.

I think it just shows how much variance there is among opinions even from year to year.

For example I recall my school re-writing their entire admissions algorithm when I was an M1, which I don’t think is uncommon for a school to do every so often. I think at that time they increased the weight for UG rank, but they change so often it’s tough to tell

 

[OneTwoThreeFour]

The first survey was answered by 127 schools and the 2nd 130. This is almost all US MD schools. The other 11 are probably BS/MD only programs. The purpose of the mean is that it shouldn't change drastically due to statistical variance. Since this was at the same time as the MCAT change, perhaps they felt that the new MCAT better reflected applicant's academic success than before.

The first survey showed a significant difference between public and private but didn't list how many private schools are in the data. Public schools have consistently rated school selectivity as low. If the n for private schools is low then only a few responders changing from one year to the next could have large swings in the data.

I'd say the important things are the parts that are consistently highest ranked every year. Looking for trends or parsing an anonymous sample is destined for failure.

 

[getdown]

Can you change your undergrad at this time? No. So it's not something that you can really control. Move on and focus on something you can control like your GPA and MCAT. If you didn't get in it won't be because of what undergrad school you went to that's for sure.