We are all familiar with the criteria that medical schools use to evaluate prospective students. Students are expected to excel or at least be proficient in each of these areas to be granted an interview. Doing so is supposed to show that you, as a pre-med, are capable of handling the tough coursework that will be thrown at you during medical school. The truth is, while success in the above factors does make for a successful medical student, it also implicitly suggests something else: that the student is well off.
I took an entire summer off to study for the MCAT. I did practically nothing but study from May until the beginning of August, yet I still did not feel ready to take my MCAT in September. I ended up taking another month and a half (from December to January) to study to really ace the MCAT. Additionally, to boost my application, I spent about 4 weeks in total shadowing doctors, and another 10-15 hours a week as an unpaid research assistant throughout the first three years of my college career. Thankfully, I was able to do this because I received a full scholarship to my state school.
I was fortunate enough to gain admission to my medical school of choice very early in the application season; however, many students aren't so lucky. Many students are wait-listed or are rejected point-blank from every school they apply to. Faced with rejection, many students pursue other interests. If I were to not get accepted this cycle, I believe I would join the ranks of students who pursue other interests. Why? While I would like to take a year off to boost my application and retake the MCAT, the truth is, I lack the resources to provide for myself in that gap year.
However, the students who do have the resources to take a gap year fully take advantage of those resources. They spend months doing research (often for free). They spend thousands of dollars on outreach trips abroad. They spend thousands on expensive MCAT review courses. And then, when the reapply in the following cycle, they are accepted. It's been shown that students who take a year off have a substantially higher chance of getting accepted into medical school. This is expected to be the obvious result - if a student has an additional year (that's 25% longer than the average college student who graduates in 4 years) to boost their application - they're bound to at least marginally increase their chances). As a result of this, many of these privileged pre-meds get into medical school.
The question that I ask is this: if those students who did not get accepted from medical school had the resources to go on lavish medical missions in Guatemala or to enroll in expensive Kaplan MCAT preparatory classes, would they have gotten accepted to medical school? How much of a factor did Daddy's money have on a given privileged kid gaining admission?
I believe money plays a tremendous factor. As a recently admitted student, I feel surrounded by students who are sons or daughters of to-do medical professionals, researchers, lawyers, etc. I would go so far as to say that more than half of my future classmates I have met so far come from households with income in the top 5% of society.
For example, I received a phone call from my med school "peer mentor". He was a third year medical student who gave me a call congratulating me on gaining acceptance, and told me that he was here for me had I any questions for him, etc. I asked him questions about the curriculum and the environment, to which he gave excellent and helpful responses. However, the moment I asked him about FAFSA - the free application for federal student aid - he told me frankly that he was "fortunate enough that family could cover the cost of attendance." He then offered to put me in touch with on the financial aid officers that the school had hired. I politely refused his offer. When I probed him about his place of residence, the response was similar. He had no idea about anything - he was living in a $1200/month studio apartment fully paid for by daddy. I knew then that he was in a total state of disconnect. He simply didn't see money the same way as the rest of us did.
There's something wrong with this picture. Isn't America supposed to be a country where upward mobility is encouraged? What exactly does the American dream promise? Why is it that the bulk of America's future doctors are rich, spoiled, disconnected people? How can this generation of people be taught to empathize with and care for those who have nothing when they themselves have unfairly snatched admission by flashing their store-bought resumes to the admissions staff?
As a senior who has been talking to pre-med students for my entire college career, I know the tell-tale signs of a pre-med who isn't going to make it. Do they have to take a part-time job so they can pay the bills? Probably not going to be able to afford the time to work in a research lab for free 10-15 hours a week. Definitely not going be able to afford a KAPLAN test prep course. Can't take classes over the summer because their scholarship doesn't cover it? Probably not going to be able to take all of the classes they need to take to take their MCAT on time (during junior year).
Now, there are the few students who do make it despite coming from a middle-class family. These are often your extremely hard-workers. Other middle-class students are simply lucky. Perhaps they went to a great high school which prepared them well and they were able to secure a scholarship, or a paid internship, etc. And of course, there are hard-working and intelligent students who come from well to-do families who deserve their admission to medical school.
But the majority of applicants are neither extremely hard-working nor extremely intelligent. They are simply your run-of-the-mill applicant. And for those applicants who are struggling to stand out amongst their peers, a lot of cash goes a long way. Ten hours a week of research instead of waiting tables is not only going to make them more competitive, but it's also going to make them smarter and more capable.
Sure, you might say that medical school committees often take note when students are having to support themselves through school and give them extra consideration when making admissions decisions, but the number of students admitted through such means is few and far between. The standard that medical schools set for admission can only be afforded by the children of the top 5-10% of society. If medical schools wanted to truly create an admissions process that is more conscious of socioeconomic barriers, then the medical schools would have already done so. But that is not the priority. So long as the AMA and the medical schools are able to produce capable physicians, they are content.
I didn't write this piece with the hope of inciting a rebellion. I wrote this as a reflective piece based on my personal experience. Next time you hear news of a young student gaining acceptance to medical student on his second, third, or fourth try, I hope you view his story as more than one of perseverance and indomitable spirit. I see that acceptance more as a credit to his parents' success in providing the best opportunities for their child.
