how much does reputation matter for matching?

[Excelsius]

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While I agree that school name doesn't usually rank high on the list of PD preferences, I actually have a case where it did.

I was doing an audition rotation with a student from an ivy league school that was also interested in the program. Grade-wise we were equal, I did better on boards, and I had great SLORs from great academic places. I'm sure she had great SLORs too considering the school she was from. In all honesty, she was pretty much middle of the road when it came to clinical stuff. Nothing spectacular. Residents had mixed feelings about her. They loved me, and I know this because they still call me to go out. She never wanted to work weekends and was constantly changing her schedule, to which I offered to cover her shifts and work pretty much every weekend. I never missed a lecture, she missed a few because her boyfriend was in town.

Guess who got the residency spot over me.
Politics SUCK

I broke 260 on the boards, got a good mix of honors and near honors (at a school where honors is capped at the top 15%), and honored a visiting rotation at arguably the top program in my field of choice. My school was "top 20" - not too shabby (but I was shown a form used for scoring applicants at one of my interviews; med school was rated on a 5 point scale and my school was a mere 3/5).

I also know people who were not near the top of their class but went to "top" schools (Harvard, Stanford, UCSF...).

Guess who got more interviews. They did.

Guess what schools matched a disproportionate number of people at my #1 choice. Their schools.

People who care about prestige tend to take faculty positions at places with prestige, where they select their replacements and so on. It's a self-perpetuating cycle, and if you want to be at one of those program, prestige counts. I am sure there are many great programs in all fields that don't care about med school prestige.

Obviously there are many confounding factors and perhaps I just made a bad impression at some point in the process. Nonetheless if I had the option to trade 30 or 40 USMLE points for a med school spot at Harvard or Stanford, I would take it, no question.

I did match at my #2 (and it probably would have been #2 even if I got interviews everywhere), so perhaps I shouldn't complain too much.

Exactly. This is why I don't like when people give absolutes about how prestige doesn't matter. I am actually a bit more concerned because I used to think that lord_jeebus was attending a low ranking medschool (I remember his old posts about residency), but top 20? So if top 20 is not good enough, what is? Top 10? Ivy?

In the end it all depends on your goals. If you want to do rural medicine, go to the cheapest school that accepts you. If you want a top spot in ROADs residencies and later job positions, go to the most prestigious school that will accept you. One SDN member turned down a full ride at Vandy to go to UCSF. I think that if you can't make this decision yourself and have to rely on third party information (almost none of whom are residents yet), then just stick to your simple goals and go to the cheapest school where you think you will be "happy" based on a single visit for interview.

 

[Excelsius]

By the way, anyone interested what someone with real experience had to say about this, should read Which Med School Ranking do Residency Programs Look at? The attending there is Danbo1957, who completely disagrees what what the med students have to say.