is it true that asians are expected to get a higher MCAT score?

[Hah]

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[iniquus]

Funny how people respond to generalities with anecdotal single events, as if those events dispute the generality.

It's funny how people like you on SDN are full of condescension. An opinion is an opinion. It's called discussion, you should try it sometime.

Generalities are composed of the entirety of these "anecdotal single events." I was sharing a personal example to shed more awareness that not all Asians have parents who pursued higher education, and that includes a majority of the Vietnamese that came over here after the war.

 

[MCAT guy]

It's funny how people like you on SDN are full of condescension. An opinion is an opinion. It's called discussion, you should try it sometime.

Generalities are composed of the entirety of these "anecdotal single events." I was sharing a personal example to shed more awareness that not all Asians have parents who pursued higher education, and that includes a majority of the Vietnamese that came over here after the war.

Agreed.

And not all billionaires will be rich next year. But most will.

 

[rusyrusyrusy]

It's funny how people like you on SDN are full of condescension. An opinion is an opinion. It's called discussion, you should try it sometime.

Generalities are composed of the entirety of these "anecdotal single events." I was sharing a personal example to shed more awareness that not all Asians have parents who pursued higher education, and that includes a majority of the Vietnamese that came over here after the war.

Can I ask why your parents cmae here?

 

[iniquus]

Agreed.

And not all billionaires will be rich next year. But most will.

That is not even analogous to what I said. I fail to see how a billionaire cannot be rich. What society would deem that not wealthy enough?

How is debating whether or not billionaires are rich in any way comparable to attributing the success of Asian-American students to having parents that were well-educated themselves? The first point is not arguable and the second point has room for argument, especially when I'm merely stating that I don't believe that the percentage of first-generation Asian-American college students can be ignored--especially the Southeast Asians, which are historically underrepresented in academia compared to other Asians, even though we're lumped with them.

Can I ask why your parents cmae here?

My father fought for the South and you (and your family to some extent) do not want to be in that position post-Vietnam war. So although it must have been heart-wrenching to leave home, the alternative was much worse (prison camp).

EDIT: Vietnamese Americans have a degree attainment rate of only 16% while Laotians and Cambodians only have rates around 5%. Compared to 42% rate for the other Asians.

 

[rusyrusyrusy]

That is not even analogous to what I said. I fail to see how a billionaire cannot be rich. What society would deem that not wealthy enough?

How is debating whether or not billionaires are rich in any way comparable to attributing the success of Asian-American students to having parents that were well-educated themselves? The first point is not arguable and the second point has room for argument, especially when I'm merely stating that I don't believe that the percentage of first-generation Asian-American college students can be ignored--especially the Southeast Asians, which are historically underrepresented in academia compared to other Asians, even though we're lumped with them.




My father fought for the South and you (and your family to some extent) do not want to be in that position post-Vietnam war. So although it must have been heart-wrenching to leave home, the alternative was much worse (prison camp).

? My family came from another country. There's no need to be so sanctimonious.

 

[iniquus]

? My family came from another country. There's no need to be so sanctimonious.

You're reading too much into it. I wasn't trying to be sanctimonious. You asked why my family came here and I told you why. Some families have a choice and some really don't have a good one, if one at all. This is not exclusive to just this story. I'm not going to solicit sympathy, especially when the story is not mine. I am not my father.

I don't even know where you came from. All I know is I initially responded to someone's statement that he/she believed Asian-Americans are successful in education due to more likely having parents in higher education...I do not see what's fundamentally wrong with saying it could also be more a cultural work ethic thing than that if I have gone to a school of higher education where many of the Asian-American students who had parents in higher education were the exception.

 

[Fakesmile]

Unfortunately for Asians, it really seems that Asians need to be much better to get in, compared to other non-white races (or even including whites). I heard that most med schools have an unstated policy where they set limits on how many people of certain race to allow into their school. For example, a med school might decide that, out of 10 new entering students, they want 5 of them to be white, 3 Asian, and 2 all others. The result is that people are competing against others of the same race as they are. This might explain why most Asians with GPAs of 3.6 and MCAT of 30 get rejected while many more black people with the same GPA and MCAT get in, which is simply because Asians' average GPA and MCAT are much higher than those of many other ethnic groups. I believe this is a very convincing explanation as to why Asians need higher scores, especially if you spend few minutes analyzing past AMCAS data of applicants.

 

[rusyrusyrusy]

Unfortunately for Asians, it really seems that Asians need to be much better to get in, compared to other non-white races (or even including whites). I heard that most med schools have an unstated policy where they set limits on how many people of certain race to allow into their school. For example, a med school might decide that, out of 10 new entering students, they want 5 of them to be white, 3 Asian, and 2 all others. The result is that people are competing against others of the same race as they are. This might explain why most Asians with GPAs of 3.6 and MCAT of 30 get rejected while many more black people with the same GPA and MCAT get in, which is simply because Asians' average GPA and MCAT are much higher than those of many other ethnic groups. I believe this is a very convincing explanation as to why Asians need higher scores if you a spend few minutes analyzing the past AMCAS data of applicants.

get over yourself. Med school admissions were NEVER supposed to be a meritocracy. They're supposed to be about graduating people who will be the best doctors for their communities. Your admission is into med school is not nearly as important as getting a person into southern chicago who understands the community enough to garner their trust and improve their health. Would you, as an asian american, be able to do that as effectively as someone who grew up there/ in a similar culture to there? no you wouldn't. Is that unfair? Absolutely not. The med schools have a larger mission than making sure people with the highest grades and the best mcat scores and the publications get into their schools. They have a responsibility to the public as much as they have a responsibility to give you fair assessment.

Get over it.

As for quotas, that's the most ridiculous thing i've heard. There are no quotas. African american, native american, hispanics and pacific islanders are given a preference (justifiably so) because they are underrepresented. Always given a preference. No quotas.

 

[MCAT guy]

I think IvyHopeful said it the best a little while back.

He basically said, the mistaken notion of a pre-med is that medical schools want to graduate the highest GPA/MCAT combos they can find. Yet the true mission of a medical school is to graduate individuals they think they can train to be competent physicians.

These are two different things.

 

[rusyrusyrusy]

.

That's right. Take back what you were going to say. punk.

 

[Narmerguy]

That's right. Take back what you were going to say. punk.

So aggressive...? Why?

get over yourself. Med school admissions were NEVER supposed to be a meritocracy. They're supposed to be about graduating people who will be the best doctors for their communities. Your admission is into med school is not nearly as important as getting a person into southern chicago who understands the community enough to garner their trust and improve their health. Would you, as an asian american, be able to do that as effectively as someone who grew up there/ in a similar culture to there? no you wouldn't. Is that unfair? Absolutely not. The med schools have a larger mission than making sure people with the highest grades and the best mcat scores and the publications get into their schools. They have a responsibility to the public as much as they have a responsibility to give you fair assessment.

Get over it.

As for quotas, that's the most ridiculous thing i've heard. There are no quotas. African american, native american, hispanics and pacific islanders are given a preference (justifiably so) because they are underrepresented. Always given a preference. No quotas.

Key point here.

 

[rusyrusyrusy]

So aggressive...? Why?



Key point here.

Me and MCAT guy go way back. We've got a little thing going here.

 

[rusyrusyrusy]

Me and MCAT guy go way back. We've got a little thing going here.

oh I thought he was going to argue with me. pssh.

 

[MCAT guy]

That's right. Take back what you were going to say. punk.

Me and MCAT guy go way back. We've got a little thing going here.

oh I thought he was going to argue with me. pssh.

I don't usually argue with trolls... oh, you got banned.

 

[paul411]

Good news everyone: Thanks to my amazing ability to procrastinate on my World Music paper due tomorrow, I have spent the last 30 minutes doing crude statistical comparisons of the acceptance rates for Asians vs Whites and Asians vs All Applicants (incl. Asians).

Intro
Number in each cell represents Asian acceptance rate – White (or All) acceptance rate for that category.

For example, between Asians and Whites, in the All GPA–All MCAT category, the number is -3.0. This means that the acceptance rate for Asians is 3% less than the acceptance rate for Whites.


I've also color coded the data with a gradient
- more red = Asians have less acceptance rate in this category (difference < 0)
- more green = Asians have more acceptance rate in this category (difference > 0)
- closer to white = Equal acceptance rate for the two groups (difference = 0)

Tables:

I deleted rows that had no useful data (the lowest GPAs). The 3.8-4.0 GPA row got deleted when I thought I was automatically deleting blank rows, so sorry about that.

(Crude) Analysis
Appears that Asians generally have a very slight lower acceptance rate in most categories - nothing alarmingly disparate.

The large differences (>10%) are generally from groups with small sample sizes, so they are somewhat worthless.

Some notes about the methods:
- Taken from then official AAMC fact sheets for 2008-2010 aggregate data
-- https://www.aamc.org/data/facts/app...mcat-gpa-grid-by-selected-race-ethnicity.html
-- https://www.aamc.org/download/157450/data/table24-mcatgpagridall2008-10.pdf.pdf
- Categories with 0 acceptance rates Asians were ignored for convenience
- Some categories have a smaller sample size leading to an apparently larger disparity so take the extremes with a grain of salt
- Getting the data from the PDF to Excel was EXCRUCIATING and took too long -___-

 

[MCAT guy]

Good news everyone: Thanks to my amazing ability to procrastinate on my World Music paper due tomorrow, I have spent the last 30 minutes doing crude statistical comparisons of the acceptance rates for Asians vs Whites and Asians vs All Applicants (incl. Asians).

Intro
Number in each cell represents Asian acceptance rate – White (or All) acceptance rate for that category.

For example, between Asians and Whites, in the All GPA–All MCAT category, the number is -3.0. This means that the acceptance rate for Asians is 3% less than the acceptance rate for Whites.


I've also color coded the data with a gradient
- more red = Asians have less acceptance rate in this category (difference < 0)
- more green = Asians have more acceptance rate in this category (difference > 0)
- closer to white = Equal acceptance rate for the two groups (difference = 0)

Tables:

Some notes about the method:
- Taken from then official AAMC fact sheets for 2008-2010 aggregate data
-- https://www.aamc.org/data/facts/app...mcat-gpa-grid-by-selected-race-ethnicity.html
-- https://www.aamc.org/download/157450/data/table24-mcatgpagridall2008-10.pdf.pdf
- Categories with 0 acceptance rates Asians were ignored for convenience
- Keep in mind that some categories have a smaller sample size leading to an apparently larger disparity; take the extremes with a grain of salt

lol. wow bro.

 

[paul411]

Unfortunately for Asians, it really seems that Asians need to be much better to get in, compared to other non-white races (or even including whites).... I believe this is a very convincing explanation as to why Asians need higher scores, especially if you spend few minutes analyzing past AMCAS data of applicants.

The difference isn't that dramatic to warrant such an extreme conclusion.

 

[Puppet Master]

It seems that my conclusion is if I want to go to a big name school, I have got to score higher!

Why do you want to go to a big name school? You should seriously consider this question. Look at the reasons why people think medicine was the worst choice they've ever made. Many believe so because of the enormous debt they're in (check out the residency forums). The name of the school plays a very MINOR role in what residency program you get into. Focus on the end game and not just the next step.

 

[MeowMeowCAT]

Also, don't "big names" not matter as much as where you go for undergraduate. Especially with medical school, pretty much everyone has to go through the AAMC's checklist. And an MD is an MD, I really doubt someone would really care if you became a doctor from one school or another.

 

[Cleavername]

Why do you want to go to a big name school? You should seriously consider this question. Look at the reasons why people think medicine was the worst choice they've ever made. Many believe so because of the enormous debt they're in (check out the residency forums). The name of the school plays a very MINOR role in what residency program you get into. Focus on the end game and not just the next step.

agreed.

state schools are a better choice. 20k a year u can save, 4 years after thats 80k easy. plus the interest ur not paying on ur loan lol. not to mention, if u live in texas, damn thats some cheap ass tuition rofl.

 

[bookfreak89]

Unfortunately for Asians, it really seems that Asians need to be much better to get in, compared to other non-white races (or even including whites).

Have a higher GPA/MCAT? From the data, yes, they do.

Higher GPA/MCAT alone =/= better

Higher GPA/MCAT + better ECs/essays/research/awards/etc = better