Percentage of Accepted Minorities

[bluesTank]

I was looking through USNews top med school rankings, and I noticed there is a big fluctuation with the % enrollment in some schools, often times in the same state. For example East Carolina has 21% URM while UNC Chapel Hill has only 12% URM.

I was wondering are low % URM because of low URM applications there, or because of some kind of lower "standard" that they accept there?

Thanks

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[TheRealMD]

Questions like this are better directed to the Underrepresented in Healthcare forum.

 

[DrBowtie]

Questions like this are better directed to the Underrepresented in Healthcare forum.

Agreed...Moving to URM Forum.

 

[bluesTank]

How many people visit that forum? Like 1 per week?

 

[mongrel]

How many people visit that forum? Like 1 per week?

No...


More like 2 or 3 per week.

 

[Truth74]

I could answer your question from a vet school perspective, but you aren't asking about vet school, so...
Sorry, I'm not much help.

 

[njbmd]

I was looking through USNews top med school rankings, and I noticed there is a big fluctuation with the % enrollment in some schools, often times in the same state. For example East Carolina has 21% URM while UNC Chapel Hill has only 12% URM.

I was wondering are low % URM because of low URM applications there, or because of some kind of lower "standard" that they accept there?

Thanks

You may need to ask this type of question of the schools themselves. Since choosing a medical school is an individual preference the difference in percentages may be a function of the preferences of the URM applicants in any given year, the number of URM applicants in any given year or some combination of the two.

Higher URM percentage does not equal "lower standard" if that is the point of your question. Seems that you need to contact the individual schools and ask your question.

 

[elwademd]

I was looking through USNews top med school rankings, and I noticed there is a big fluctuation with the % enrollment in some schools, often times in the same state. For example East Carolina has 21% URM while UNC Chapel Hill has only 12% URM.

I was wondering are low % URM because of low URM applications there, or because of some kind of lower "standard" that they accept there?

Thanks

there are a lot of factors going into school's accepting potential medical students... and there are a lot of factors going into the decision on which school to choose:

school x typically admits 10% urm's

but this year, school x admits 20% urm's while school y admits 10%.

however, the students themselves don't know how many are admitted. many people feel school x traditionally doesn't admit that many urm's.

half of the urms admitted to school x end up going elsewhere... and half decide to stay... and the numbers stay at 10% urms.

it's not necessarily for school x's lack of trying, but the perception that already exists.


so, in real life, east carolina (according to your figures) has more urm's than unc chapel hill. i suppose the important thing for you as an individual is:
do you want to apply to one or both of these schools?
does the percentage of urm's at an institution matter to you?

a school may try to get more urm's at their instituion through various means... but they may not be able to escape the perception of not being urm friendly.

 

[chuckles1]

I was looking through USNews top med school rankings, and I noticed there is a big fluctuation with the % enrollment in some schools, often times in the same state. For example East Carolina has 21% URM while UNC Chapel Hill has only 12% URM.

I was wondering are low % URM because of low URM applications there, or because of some kind of lower "standard" that they accept there?

Thanks

You can see this trend at many schools within the same state, NY being a good example. Columbia has a higher percentage of minorities than many other schools in which the GPA/MCAT averages are lower. However, number averages do not tell the whole story, which should go without saying. While people in general choose schools for different reasons, there may be certain trends among populations to go to certain schools regardless of ranking or averages, especially when it comes to location and how this relates to the patient populations and surrounding community.

Additionally, schools that start off with low numbers of minorities may have difficulty increasing these numbers. For some minorities, it just may not be appealing to go to a school where there are only three people of your race or ethnicity, especially when you want to participate in outreach and professional organizations that have a cultural backing which already exist at other schools.

Finally, some schools just recruit harder than others, and students can often sense this.