Most OVERRATED and UNDERRATED schools?

[Doublecortin]

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Isn't residency more important than name of med school and I'm sure people who to go to Wash U end up in similar residencies as someone that goes to say....Tufts.

yeah, but many people would argue that the NAME of med school helps you get into more competitive residency

 

[Doublecortin]

overrated: Brown and Dartmouth. Because they are Ivies, people like to say they went there, but their programs are not competitive with many, many others.

I would disagree about Brown. Their philosophy in undergrad is all about teaching, rather than research, and that philosophy also applies in med school.

Are you kidding? It's the only school in the state, 7 state-of-the-art teaching hospitals, 1000s of faculty, so the resources you have access to are truly unparalelled. And research is defininitely on the way up

 

[chudog15]

yeah, but many people would argue that the NAME of med school helps you get into more competitive residency

I am sure residency directors don't care much for the name of the med school. At Case, I interviewed with their neurosurgery residency director. He said prestige has nothing to do with a med school's ability to produce competitive applicants.

 

[Phoenix.]

I am sure residency directors don't care much for the name of the med school. At Case, I interviewed with their neurosurgery residency director. He said prestige has nothing to do with a med school's ability to produce competitive applicants.

Prestige might not, but connections might.

 

[thoffen]

Isn't residency more important than name of med school and I'm sure people who to go to Wash U end up in similar residencies as someone that goes to say....Tufts.

What have you done for me lately?

 

[Long Dong]

Prestige might not, but connections might.

Word, don't underestimate how important connections are for landing your dream res.

 

[enigma85]

so I've been wondering about WashU's INSANELY high averages. How do they do it? Do they strictly pick kids with the highest #s?

Their MCAT and GPA averages are even higher than Harvard, Hopkins, Yale, Stanford. . . . I mean, if someone has insanely high numbers, why do they choose to go to WashU vs. an Ivy, or a Stanford, Duke? Yeah, I know, it's a great school and all, but outside the medical community, name wise, WashU is almost unheard of in the general population

While they do seem to focus on numbers more than other schools, there are some unique things about the school that may partially explain the high #s--

1. They have the largest MD/PhD program in the country. I would bet that the average MCAT (and maybe GPA) for MD/PhD applicants is significantly higher than MD only applicants.
2. A lot of students would prefer a school on one of the coasts. However, students from the Midwest who prefer to stay nearer to home may select WashU over, as you mentioned, Duke or Stanford. For example, look at this mdapps profile: http://mdapplicants.com/viewprofile.php?id=7891. This applicant could have gotten interviews at every top 10 school, but only chose to apply to schools in the Midwest.
3. From what I can tell, they offer the most lucrative merit-based aid in the country.

 

[sanchopanza]

I feel like it's pretty short-sighted to be all gah-gah over Ivies when it comes to medical school (or really any other professional or graduate school). That's an undergraduate mind set.

Some of them are among the best, sure, but with graduate education there's a lot more variability out there. Turning down a place like Wash U. just to "go to an Ivy" is a pretty ill-informed (not to mention underconfident) way to choose your school.

 

[Jamorama]

i still think rochester it the most underrated because ucsf and washu are relatively well-known to be part of the top programs in the US already, if not relatively clear from US rankings alone (which you know most pre-meds look at even if they really shouldn't when choosing schools and determining the quality of the school). i don't think rochester has really ever been on the radar screen as much as it deserves. if it had a greater research endowment maybe we'd see it climb the ranks of us news and more people would apply and its reputation would get out there, but as it stands, its still a hidden gem. anyways, just putting my 2 cents out there...

going home for winter break. happy holidays to all!