What is the average % of kids you see in your class that will drop out of pre-med?

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pootercat

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I'm just curious on the general % of kids you wont see anymore in your class after a year, or even after a semester. Today, out of curiosity, I calculated the average % of kids in my classes who are assigned to the pre-med track at my university and it was that of something near 75%. Obviously it is unrealistic to think all 75% of these peers will either a.) stick with it all the way, or b.) make it into medical school. Has anyone found an average % of kids that change their mind, or around what year it becomes popular to abandon the ship?
 
I think ~20% of any given class at my school applies to medical school at some point in their lives. Of that 20%, ~85-90% are successful. I think that about 35-40% of the freshman class comes in as people who are strongly considering going to medical school. So about half of the students who come in wanting to be doctors end up doing something else.

Of course, this varies by school and not everyone who doesn't go to med school was because they got weeded out.
 
At my university almost every student in the bio department is pre-med

About 40% get kicked out of the bio department or switch to something else

I'm pretty sure it's safe to assume that most of those 40% drop out of pre med as well
 
I took one particular small class my freshman year where literally everybody was pre-med. There was something like 33 or 34 people in that class; 4 of us are in medical school.
 
I don't go the biggest school but freshman year we had about 28-30 premeds in my class. Junior year there are six left who still declare they are premed (OChem took out a lot of people). Good chance two of them though aren't even going to follow through and apply to med school. One of them I have no clue what he is doing.

However, I will say my class is the smallest premed class we've ever had at my school. So idk how the other classes stack up.
 
Of all those who started Day1 Ochem in my year, only 30% actually passed the whole series.
 
The stat that professors always threw around at my school was that 1 in 3 students at our school will enter premed (as in enroll for chem and bio), but only 1 in 10 will make it to medical school.

That said most people dropped because they didn't want to put in the hours necessary, not because they couldn't. Unless you love the subject matter it just doesn't make sense to work at least 2x as hard for the same grades as a prelaw or business school student
 
There were hundreds of us in gen Chem, half that after orgo, then tens of us who actually did well on the MCAT. Where everybody is nowadays is beyond me. Most of the people who dropped out (that I knew) were simply not cut out for the work and would do poorly in courses. There are only a handful of people I knew that were excellent students that simply lost interest in medicine and switched fields.
 
The Knife & Gun Club said:
The stat that professors always threw around at my school was that 1 in 3 students at our school will enter premed (as in enroll for chem and bio), but only 1 in 10 will make it to medical school.

That said most people dropped because they didn't want to put in the hours necessary, not because they couldn't. Unless you love the subject matter it just doesn't make sense to work at least 2x as hard for the same grades as a prelaw or business school student
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This. It isn't that it is outrageously difficult. Nothing that I've had to learn has been hard because of the complexity of the material. Sciences are GREAT that way, in that once you understand the principles, the answers are suddenly very unambiguous and intuitive. In some sense, this makes it much easier than humanities, where there are a lot more opinions than facts.

The hard part is getting to understand and apply the principles. That takes time, and a lot of very dedicated, careful thinking. That requires discipline. If the desire to "be a doctor" isn't so great that it can overcome the desire to do every other thing that you could be doing instead, keeping focus will become impossible. That is what takes out the vast majority of pre-meds that switch paths, not inability. I've known some fine doctors who weren't necessarily the brightest people I'd ever met... but they made up for it by having great study skills (aka discipline to keep at the material until they got it.)

EDIT: And personally, I kind of envy those folks. My discipline level is evidenced by my frequent SDN postings. It takes a lot of effort for me to stop procrastinating and get my nose in my books. I'm just very fortunate that once it is there, the info sticks pretty well. Otherwise, I'd be up a creek.
 
Promethean said:
This. It isn't that it is outrageously difficult. Nothing that I've had to learn has been hard because of the complexity of the material. Sciences are GREAT that way, in that once you understand the principles, the answers are suddenly very unambiguous and intuitive. In some sense, this makes it much easier than humanities, where there are a lot more opinions than facts.

The hard part is getting to understand and apply the principles. That takes time, and a lot of very dedicated, careful thinking. That requires discipline. If the desire to "be a doctor" isn't so great that it can overcome the desire to do every other thing that you could be doing instead, keeping focus will become impossible. That is what takes out the vast majority of pre-meds that switch paths, not inability. I've known some fine doctors who weren't necessarily the brightest people I'd ever met... but they made up for it by having great study skills (aka discipline to keep at the material until they got it.)

EDIT: And personally, I kind of envy those folks. My discipline level is evidenced by my frequent SDN postings. It takes a lot of effort for me to stop procrastinating and get my nose in my books. I'm just very fortunate that once it is there, the info sticks pretty well. Otherwise, I'd be up a creek.
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while i agree with u that the material isnt necessarily "difficult" i think what you say about applying principles only matters to a handful of people. For me, i found calc and chem easy. this is also why people score high on physics because problem solving is easy to them, while other classes like bio bio chem gen eds, part of ochem 1 and ALL of ochem 2... f u ochem2, is Memorization. very little understanding since we are still in the lower leveled sciences we dont see application unless its chem or physics. So when you say where discipline is lacking is different from person to person really... Thats why when u study for the mcat people who score higher are the ones who found their weaknesses and patched them up, discipline. It takes a different way of thinking and it feels uncomfortable making new neural networks for someone to understand a concept sometimes but thats how u fix ur weaknesses and thats what makes a smart doctor that we need today.


Though, they are all general "level 100" classes, the system is designed to weed out people, i think. Weeding occurs until u land residency or atleast limits your options , your grades and what you do,affect what you can or cant be doing for the next 30 years+.
 
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stereotypeasianpremed said:
while i agree with u that the material isnt necessarily "difficult" i think what you say about applying principles only matters to a handful of people. For me, i found calc and chem easy. this is also why people score high on physics because problem solving is easy to them, while other classes like bio bio chem gen eds, part of ochem 1 and ALL of ochem 2... f u ochem2, is Memorization. very little understanding since we are still in the lower leveled sciences we dont see application unless its chem or physics. So when you say where discipline is lacking is different from person to person really... Thats why when u study for the mcat people who score higher are the ones who found their weaknesses and patched them up, discipline. It takes a different way of thinking and it feels uncomfortable making new neural networks for someone to understand a concept sometimes but thats how u fix ur weaknesses and thats what makes a smart doctor that we need today.

Though, they are all general "level 100" classes, the system is designed to weed out people, i think. Weeding occurs until u land residency or atleast limits your options , your grades and what you do,affect what you can or cant be doing for the next 30 years+.
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I've noticed that the people who struggle with OChem generally are the same ones who approach the course with the mentality "just memorize everything". Sure, it's very possible to do so, but IMO it's much more effective to understand the concepts and the rules governing said concepts and then apply them. I do agree with your weeding out comment though.



On topic, I believe my undergrad had roughly 40 premeds in the freshmen class, about 50-60% didn't make it through OChem and of the one's who did I would say about 10-12% actually applied to med school.
 
IMHO Ochem was significantly easier than gen chem. Being able to visualize reactions through the model kits was easier than understanding more abstract concepts such as rate theory, titrations, equillibrium that isn't as easy to visualize imho.
 
JustAPhD said:
I've noticed that the people who struggle with OChem generally are the same ones who approach the course with the mentality "just memorize everything". Sure, it's very possible to do so, but IMO it's much more effective to understand the concepts and the rules governing said concepts and then apply them. I do agree with your weeding out comment though.



On topic, I believe my undergrad had roughly 40 premeds in the freshmen class, about 50-60% didn't make it through OChem and of the one's who id I would say about 10-12% actually applied to med school.
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Yep i agree with you. I think in my semester around 5 people got an A, double that for B,s and 70% got C's, because they tried to memorize everything. Yes, if u understand it tends to stick better instead of fact after fact. Then there is also the variable of what prof u get, if they will simply read slides with enthusiasm and hope itll stick in our clueless brains, and some who atleast try to explain the meaning behind things. Thats why i would love to see more application based learning. More discussion time for large schools. but u must learn material before discuss! The fact that i can stay at my dorm and read slide after slide and show up on test day is demotivating.

there are many variables that go into school learning and grades but overall if ur persistent in your schoolwork there shouldnt be problems, unless your asian =D

I noticed a reoccuring theme among prehealth majors and its very demoralizing, but true. The ones who work smart and hard usually get in.

/endrant #internet
 
hopefulERdoc251 said:
IMHO Ochem was significantly easier than gen chem. Being able to visualize reactions through the model kits was easier than understanding more abstract concepts such as rate theory, titrations, equillibrium that isn't as easy to visualize imho.
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woah ochem is way more abstract, gen chem? plug n chug breh no need for visualization even if you are a visual learner
 
pootercat said:
I'm just curious on the general % of kids you wont see anymore in your class after a year, or even after a semester. Today, out of curiosity, I calculated the average % of kids in my classes who are assigned to the pre-med track at my university and it was that of something near 75%. Obviously it is unrealistic to think all 75% of these peers will either a.) stick with it all the way, or b.) make it into medical school. Has anyone found an average % of kids that change their mind, or around what year it becomes popular to abandon the ship?
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I took a look at my chemistry class the beginning of the semester and it was full. Now less than half remains. The material isn't even that difficult. People aren't serious.
 
Turkishking said:
I took a look at my chemistry class the beginning of the semester and it was full. Now less than half remains. The material isn't even that difficult. People aren't serious.
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A lot of people went to highschools where showing up was enough to get a B. When they get to college and are actually expected to LEARN the material, they make a hasty retreat.
 
stereotypeasianpremed said:
woah ochem is way more abstract, gen chem? plug n chug breh no need for visualization even if you are a visual learner
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If your gen chem class involved only plug and chug then I'm very jealous.

I found Ochem far easier than gen chem, but at my school ochem was curved to a B- while Gen chem wasnt curved (average hung around 70%).

In the end end, between Physics, Bio, Gen chem, Ochem, and Bio Chem everyone will have that one class that just doesnt click as well as the others.
 
well our class size is ~150,and there was a slight curve so i mustve been doing something right. Theres obviously that chemical principle u have to apply and also know to find it and use when applicable, otherwise it just would be a math class right?
 
From my experience, I'd estimate only 10-15% of Pre-meds actually make it to med school. Most students drop the med school plans after either gen chem or orgo.
 
stereotypeasianpremed said:
well our class size is ~150,and there was a slight curve so i mustve been doing something right. Theres obviously that chemical principle u have to apply and also know to find it and use when applicable, otherwise it just would be a math class right?
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True, basically just a math class (not my best subject), but it involved alot of complex reasoning, poofs, and that sort of thing.

One question I still remember because it was so frustratingly useless:
How would you mathematically prove that Body centric cubic atomic packing is less efficient than hexagonal closest packed atomic packing in metals? Give examples of metals that use both styles, the properties they exhibit, and why.
 
mimelim said:
My year at Wash U, we went from 1500 pre-meds in freshman chem to ~140 admitted to medical school.
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Your Chem class was 1500 students?? Or do you mean all sections combined?


At my school I'd say retention in general is like 50% past freshman year, 50% of those take the MCAT, most of those who take the MCAT apply based on a conversation I had with the health professions office here. No official numbers for our school though I don't think so take that with a grain of salt.
 
I think the problem with gen chem in college specifically is so many people take AP Chem in HS and ace the AP which is really easy.

They all come together and dont use AP credit because everybodys scared to death of jumping into Ochem and it just creates a clusterf*** of really smart people who already know everything there is to know about Gen Chem before the first day of class. Hence teachers have to make the tests hard as hell to create a reasonable curve which is where you get profs asking about P-Chem principles on gen chem tests. There was a teacher that taught Sn1-2/E1-2 rxns and carbocation rearrangement/dehydration rnx ochem stuff in a gen chem class at our school and the averages were still fairly high.

Between that and how basic intro physics is, Im completely convinced many many top notch high schools could score 90th+ percentile on the MCAT physical sciences easily.
 
Yeah I sort of feel like there is a large number of kids that went to special high school programs where they learned a lot of the stuff that is taught in college, and then all of the other kids are at a disadvantage......
 
acetylmandarin said:
Yeah I sort of feel like there is a large number of kids that went to special high school programs where they learned a lot of the stuff that is taught in college, and then all of the other kids are at a disadvantage......
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Abbbbbbbbsooooooolutely. I had no idea this was a thing until I went to college. Lots of people here come from TAMS and come in with like 100 credit hours, no joke, and graduate with 1-2 degrees in 2-3 years. Some of my friends had O-Chem I/II in high school before coming to college and took it again in college for the easy A. Lots of people went to private high schools where English and languages were actually respected and were already insanely well read and could read and speak 3 languages. I never felt like my public high school education ripped me off more than I did freshman year. Things equalize after a while, but that early start can be the difference between a 3.4 with an upward trend and a 4.0 for pre-meds.
 
Lucca said:
Abbbbbbbbsooooooolutely. I had no idea this was a thing until I went to college. Lots of people here come from TAMS and come in with like 100 credit hours, no joke, and graduate with 1-2 degrees in 2-3 years. Some of my friends had O-Chem I/II in high school before coming to college and took it again in college for the easy A. Lots of people went to private high schools where English and languages were actually respected and were already insanely well read and could read and speak 3 languages. I never felt like my public high school education ripped me off more than I did freshman year. Things equalize after a while, but that early start can be the difference between a 3.4 with an upward trend and a 4.0 for pre-meds.
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This pretty much highlights one big reason why I think the use of pre-req grades is so limited. Im generally not into getting into the whole "difficulty of top school vs state school" type of thing but this is really one example where it's so applicable: most people at top 20 schools took AP physics and gen chem in HS and know all the material before Day 1. Most people at State U's dont: having competition being the later is a blatant advantage that you cant account for.

Fortunately med schools seem to be shifting artificial emphasis on pre-reqs to more "competency based admissions". Many schools ditched their Ochem 2 requirement. Heck there are 15 MD schools like Hofstra and Keck that dont require a single pre-req anymore. Major in something like business, ace the MCAT, show scientific capabilities in other ways, and you are good to go at those places, we'll see if others follow that trend in coming years.
 
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mimelim said:
My year at Wash U, we went from 1500 pre-meds in freshman chem to ~140 admitted to medical school.
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I had 950 in freshman chem, 270 left after Ochem II, and about 170 people per year are accepted to med schools

Lucca said:
Abbbbbbbbsooooooolutely. I had no idea this was a thing until I went to college. Lots of people here come from TAMS and come in with like 100 credit hours, no joke, and graduate with 1-2 degrees in 2-3 years. Some of my friends had O-Chem I/II in high school before coming to college and took it again in college for the easy A. Lots of people went to private high schools where English and languages were actually respected and were already insanely well read and could read and speak 3 languages. I never felt like my public high school education ripped me off more than I did freshman year. Things equalize after a while, but that early start can be the difference between a 3.4 with an upward trend and a 4.0 for pre-meds.
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GrapesofRath said:
This pretty much highlights one big reason why I think the use of pre-req grades is so limited. Im generally not into getting into the whole "difficulty of top school vs state school" type of thing but this is really one example where it's so applicable: most people at top 20 schools took AP physics and gen chem in HS and know all the material before Day 1. Most people at State U's dont: having competition being the later is a blatant advantage that you cant account for.

Fortunately med schools seem to be shifting artificial emphasis on pre-reqs to more "competency based admissions". Many schools ditched their Ochem 2 requirement. Heck there are 15 MD schools like Hofstra and Keck that dont require a single pre-req anymore. Major in something like business, ace the MCAT, show scientific capabilities in other ways, and you are good to go at those places, we'll see if others follow that trend in coming years.
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Doesn't familiarity with some of the material just mean a little less study time? The highschool Ochem person might only need to review notes once instead of thrice or do half as many practice problems, but someone new to the subject who studies up and also gets everything memorized shouldn't be at some huge disadvantage. They both walk into the exam knowing what a Grignard or Wittig or whatever reaction is, and the better/faster problem solver gets the higher grade.
 
Lucca said:
Abbbbbbbbsooooooolutely. I had no idea this was a thing until I went to college. Lots of people here come from TAMS and come in with like 100 credit hours, no joke, and graduate with 1-2 degrees in 2-3 years. Some of my friends had O-Chem I/II in high school before coming to college and took it again in college for the easy A. Lots of people went to private high schools where English and languages were actually respected and were already insanely well read and could read and speak 3 languages. I never felt like my public high school education ripped me off more than I did freshman year. Things equalize after a while, but that early start can be the difference between a 3.4 with an upward trend and a 4.0 for pre-meds.
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My mom always talks about how much she hates private schools and how it would have been a waste of money for me to go to one. I agreed with her, but I guess we were wrong....
 
efle said:
I had 950 in freshman chem, 270 left after Ochem II, and about 170 people per year are accepted to med schools



Doesn't familiarity with some of the material just mean a little less study time? The highschool Ochem person might only need to review notes once instead of thrice or do half as many practice problems, but someone new to the subject who studies up and also gets everything memorized shouldn't be at some huge disadvantage. They both walk into the exam knowing what a Grignard or Wittig or whatever reaction is, and the better/faster problem solver gets the higher grade.
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Yeah but the new person has to work so much harder for the same result
 
Sure, I agree they'll have to put more time in. But it's not like we refer to MCAT scores as if you can have some huge advantage from taking lots of relevant coursework early on. Everyone is expected to put in whatever work they personally need to, and scores are read as your ability to apply ideas you have learned, not a measure of how early on you were first exposed to those ideas.
 
efle said:
Sure, I agree they'll have to put more time in. But it's not like we refer to MCAT scores as if you can have some huge advantage from taking lots of relevant coursework early on. Everyone is expected to put in whatever work they personally need to, and scores are read as your ability to apply ideas you have learned, not a measure of how early on you were first exposed to those ideas.
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But I guess if you're in a class where study time more directly correlates to performance (say, a memory heavy subject in Bio) then reviewing vs learning from scratch might actually change the grade even a hard worker can get.
 
efle said:
I had 950 in freshman chem, 270 left after Ochem II, and about 170 people per year are accepted to med schools
Doesn't familiarity with some of the material just mean a little less study time? The highschool Ochem person might only need to review notes once instead of thrice or do half as many practice problems, but someone new to the subject who studies up and also gets everything memorized shouldn't be at some huge disadvantage. They both walk into the exam knowing what a Grignard or Wittig or whatever reaction is, and the better/faster problem solver gets the higher grade.
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Meh not really. First off at many schools that arent top 20 your overstating the need to problem solve/reason or do so quickly. Very often at state u's the pre-req tests are vomitting back info from your notes. There's a reason nationally 40% of people with a 3.8+ who apply cant even hit 30 on the MCAT: everybody complains about their school having grade deflation but in reality there's hoards and hoards of grade inflation for pre-meds across the country, it's just nobody goes out and says "My school is great inflated".

I can give my own experience as well. Familiarity with material enhances "conceptual understanding" so much. I was piss poor at gen chem in HS: got a B in the class got a 4 on that absolute joke of an AP test. Went to college, had tests that were much harder than HS gen chem tests and did the best I did in college in any class given my performance to the rest of the class. Easiest A I ever had, studied 5X less per test than HS etc.

I'll put it this way: I would bet my life savings that if I took ochem 2 again, this time at Princeton or MIT, I would do far better than I would at an Ochem3( yes such a thing exists, my point is a class that is the same subject but different material).
 
Yes i think we can all agree that there is great variance among each applicant but through the MCAT and trust in the Admissions Committee that things will go well. 😉

plsnoticeme
 
pootercat said:
I'm just curious on the general % of kids you wont see anymore in your class after a year, or even after a semester. Today, out of curiosity, I calculated the average % of kids in my classes who are assigned to the pre-med track at my university and it was that of something near 75%. Obviously it is unrealistic to think all 75% of these peers will either a.) stick with it all the way, or b.) make it into medical school. Has anyone found an average % of kids that change their mind, or around what year it becomes popular to abandon the ship?
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When I was in community college taking a chem class, we had 35 students with all of them premed. Only 3 (including myself) made it through the next 4 years. One went on to be a cop, another a occupational therapist, another went into a PhD track for chem.

At UCSD, I think of those who declared pre-med (so like 3/4 of the school) maybe 45-50% made it through to applying to medical school. Much higher yield.
 
I wish I knew the stats for my UG. I was (unfortunately) one of those kids that came into college with a bunch of credits and wasn't a traditional pre-med major so I took a lot of my pre-reqs out of sequence and with older students. I'd assume ~20% made it to med school. I don't regret it though - I feel I would have done worst being around super neurotic kids year after year lol.
 
GrapesofRath said:
I think the problem with gen chem in college specifically is so many people take AP Chem in HS and ace the AP which is really easy.

They all come together and dont use AP credit because everybodys scared to death of jumping into Ochem and it just creates a clusterf*** of really smart people who already know everything there is to know about Gen Chem before the first day of class. Hence teachers have to make the tests hard as hell to create a reasonable curve which is where you get profs asking about P-Chem principles on gen chem tests. There was a teacher that taught Sn1-2/E1-2 rxns and carbocation rearrangement/dehydration rnx ochem stuff in a gen chem class at our school and the averages were still fairly high.

Between that and how basic intro physics is, Im completely convinced many many top notch high schools could score 90th+ percentile on the MCAT physical sciences easily.
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At my state school, if you got a 5 on an AP exam you cannot "retake" the classes for a grade or credit and if you got a 4 you had to choose between one of the two intro classes, the other one you couldn't take. It seems like they have this policy to intentionally to avoid this problem.

The result of this is that the majority of the successful medschool applicants at my school are the ones that got 3s on their AP exams and got to compete in intro science classes with kids that had never learned anything about intro chem/bio/physics before, thus having near-perfect science GPAs after almost 30 credits of science classes
 
GrapesofRath said:
Meh not really. First off at many schools that arent top 20 your overstating the need to problem solve/reason or do so quickly. Very often at state u's the pre-req tests are vomitting back info from your notes.
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Then how is Ochem so universally a tough class where a minority make As? Something that is simple regurgitation can't weed out half+ of a class.

GrapesofRath said:
There's a reason nationally 40% of people with a 3.8+ who apply cant even hit 30 on the MCAT
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I figure those are people with straight A's in Psych/Bio majors balancing lower prereq grades - I'd have a hard time believing people with 3.8+ prereq GPAs at state flagships struggle so.

GrapesofRath said:
I'll put it this way: I would bet my life savings that if I took ochem 2 again, this time at Princeton or MIT, I would do far better than I would at an Ochem3
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Hah, I'd take that bet against you! I'd be much more scared of the MIT freaks. Like I said everyone walks into exams knowing what methyl transfers and backside attacks are, the challenge is looking at a molecule and seeing what needs to happen in what order. Trying to see that better/faster than a bunch of geniuses is much scarier than learning an unfamiliar topic.

AlteredScale said:
At UCSD, I think of those who declared pre-med (so like 3/4 of the school) maybe 45-50% made it through to applying to medical school. Much higher yield.
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Nooooooooo way. 3/4ths of a UCSD class would be ~4500 students. They had 571 applicants to med school last year. Low teens percentage survival rate. You must have been running with an extremely successful crowd.
 
trickydick said:
At my state school, if you got a 5 on an AP exam you cannot "retake" the classes for a grade or credit and if you got a 4 you had to choose between one of the two intro classes, the other one you couldn't take. It seems like they have this policy to intentionally to avoid this problem.

The result of this is that the majority of the successful medschool applicants at my school are the ones that got 3s on their AP exams and got to compete in intro science classes with kids that had never learned anything about intro chem/bio/physics before, thus having near-perfect science GPAs after almost 30 credits of science classes
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But if they hit a 3 on their AP, they clearly didn't have much mastery of chem/bio/physics themselves, pretty fair game to compete against a true novice. You're only really at an advantage if you're heading into intro classes after acing all that material before (and even then, I'm skeptical it helps much other than reduced study time).
 
efle said:
Nooooooooo way. 3/4ths of a UCSD class would be ~4500 students. They had 571 applicants to med school last year. Low teens percentage survival rate. You must have been running with an extremely successful crowd.
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LOL I was just being over-dramatic in the sense that 3/4's of the students at UCSD were pre-med. My bad.
 
This may be a special case, as I'm in biomedical engineering, but in a major class of about 130, about 60-70 started out freshman year as pre-med. It's now junior year, time to apply, and there are 5 of us left! Needless to say, we're pretty close. Another 3 that I know of are still pre-med, but switched out of biomedical engineering.
 
efle said:
1) Then how is Ochem so universally a tough class where a minority make As? Something that is simple regurgitation can't weed out half+ of a class.

2)I figure those are people with straight A's in Psych/Bio majors balancing lower prereq grades - I'd have a hard time believing people with 3.8+ prereq GPAs at state flagships struggle so.

3)Hah, I'd take that bet against you! I'd be much more scared of the MIT freaks. Like I said everyone walks into exams knowing what methyl transfers and backside attacks are, the challenge is looking at a molecule and seeing what needs to happen in what order. Trying to see that better/faster than a bunch of geniuses is much scarier than learning an unfamiliar topic.
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1) For most schools, Ochem is tough because it's time consuming. I say "regurgitating facts and vomitting back reactions" in a way that sounds very easy. It might be to someone from Princeton, but for the rest it's not and it takes alot of time. Honestly the hardest class I took in college wasnt a thinking one it was an anatomy one that was rote memorization and taught by a med school professor: just way way way too much info and the questions were often full of tricks.

2) Meh it's pretty common. It's one of those things that's just hard to realize if you get good grades at a top school and did well on the MCAT how somebody who got good grades at a lower school so frequently struggle on the MCAT. Standardized test taking some people just suck at: I noticed that many of the same people who didnt do that great on the SAT despite getting good grades tended to see standardized test taking bite them to some extent again on the MCAT. My friends who aced the SAT by and large tended to at least do decently even if they werent great students. Half of med school students were some kind of bio major in college as well so if you blame the "Easy major" thing on why they do poorly on the MCAT it's a ton of the testing pop.
 
efle said:
I had 950 in freshman chem, 270 left after Ochem II, and about 170 people per year are accepted to med schools



Doesn't familiarity with some of the material just mean a little less study time? The highschool Ochem person might only need to review notes once instead of thrice or do half as many practice problems, but someone new to the subject who studies up and also gets everything memorized shouldn't be at some huge disadvantage. They both walk into the exam knowing what a Grignard or Wittig or whatever reaction is, and the better/faster problem solver gets the higher grade.
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And I thought my 400 person gen chem class was huge :O
 
efle said:
But if they hit a 3 on their AP, they clearly didn't have much mastery of chem/bio/physics themselves, pretty fair game to compete against a true novice. You're only really at an advantage if you're heading into intro classes after acing all that material before (and even then, I'm skeptical it helps much other than reduced study time).
Click to expand...

The true novices would disagree. It works like grade replacement, you took a class and got a C. You take it again and build on what you learned the first time and getting an A is much easier. But I don't know if its really an advantage, it was just my observation. Also, many of them utilize an early admission program with one of the state medschools. I think for that you need a 3.7+ GPA and a 1300 SAT(which is below average for the undergrad) and like a 28 MCAT for that program.

I do know a couple people that aced their AP classes but had the foresight to not ever submit AP scores which is where I saw the biggest advantage (The people that got 3s on the AP exams are the ones that become the 40% that had 3.8+ GPAs but can't hit a 30 on their MCAT). They did art history/comparative literature majors, sprinkled in the premed reqs over 3 years cruising to 3.95+ GPAs and got a 33/34 on their MCAT, they attend Einstein/Weill respectively.

Anyway, the point was, I can totally see how people that aced AP classes/went to private school and retake the class in college mess up the curve/are at an advantage because I regularly see people that didn't ace the AP class ace the class in college because they effectively took it twice.
 
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