Why is it so hard to get into med.school from UC BERKELEY?

[MED_04]

why are the averages for those accepted from Berkeley so much higher than the school's averages?
http://career.berkeley.edu/MedStats/top20.stm

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[mbadoc]

The data is very interesting and surprising, I wonder if the pre-med advisor there has anything to say about this, it is rather alarming...I had a really good friend who graduated from Berkeley and got a 36MCAT and 4.0 BCPM 3.92Overall GPA in Molecular Cell Biology and he only got into USC, his state school, and waitlists on a couple of other ones... Maybe because medical schools want to increase the diversity of undergraduate institutions represented and since there are so many strong applicants from UC Berkeley, one needs to get an even higher gpa, mcat, and better credentials to get in....it sucks to be at Berkeley is the conclusion. Anyone else have other interpretations?

 

[MED_04]

The data is very interesting and surprising, I wonder if the pre-med advisor there has anything to say about this, it is rather alarming...I had a really good friend who graduated from Berkeley and got a 36MCAT and 4.0 BCPM 3.92Overall GPA in Molecular Cell Biology and he only got into USC, his state school, and waitlists on a couple of other ones... Maybe because medical schools want to increase the diversity of undergraduate institutions represented and since there are so many strong applicants from UC Berkeley, one needs to get an even higher gpa, mcat, and better credentials to get in....it sucks to be at Berkeley is the conclusion. Anyone else have other interpretations?

your right on target with what i was thinking

 

[BOBODR]

why are the averages for those accepted from Berkeley so much higher than the school's averages?
http://career.berkeley.edu/MedStats/top20.stm

Well I think its only looking at top 20 medical schools. Of course those are going to be tuff on graduates from any school and require high averages.

 

[Messerschmitts]

I had a really good friend who graduated from Berkeley and got a 36MCAT and 4.0 BCPM 3.92Overall GPA in Molecular Cell Biology and he only got into USC, his state school, and waitlists on a couple of other ones...

"Only" got into USC!!? Dude, I don't know what state you're from, but it's a tremendous accomplishment to get into USC, or any med school in California! I would kill to go to USC! Getting into a "state school" is a dream come true for Californians. Your good friend should be very proud of his accomplishment, and very grateful of his superb luck.

That aside, I did go to Berekely, and I did fail to get into medical school the first time with a 34/3.96 stats. I don't think it's a Berkeley thing though, I think it's a Californian thing. Plenty of Cal grads get into med school. I just had some extraordinarily bad luck last year. This year I got into a UC med school...ha ha, University of Cincinnati. Whatever though, it's still a US med school, I'll take what I can get.

 

[NonTradMed]

I believe the website is only looking at the stats of those that applied and got into the top 20 med schools, not the overall acceptances' stats. So of course, the stats will be very, very high.

That said, it still sucks to be from Cali. I had a Cali friend who had good stats by all accounts (>3.5 BCPM and >3.5 in bio at top university, >30 MCAT) but couldn't get in....she wasn't even close to getting into a cali school (applied to all nine schools and got two interviews, and no acceptances, not even waitlists), but she did get into a decent private school outside of the state. At most anywhere else, someone with her stats would have gotten into their state school with relatively little trouble. All well, there has to be a downside to all that nice weather.

 

[Elastase]

"Each year profiled includes December, May and August UC Berkeley grads (e.g. 2001 includes 12/00, 5/01 & 8/01 graduates) who released their AMCAS information to UCB. This report includes only the seniors, those who applied the summer before their last academic year at Cal. "

I'm pretty sure that this data is not representative, I personally know four UC Berkeley students from Class of 2004 that are not on this list: Myself, two others that have 5+ top interviews, and another that is currently at UCSF. I also know a few w/great stats whom have not applied yet but are planning to. I'm not sure if they add the numbers of students that apply after graduation (almost everyone I know has taken time off, and most of my friends from Berkeley are NOT URM). Also on the interview trail I have seen plenty of UCLA or UCB students at top/Cali schools.

 

[dz88]

hence UCLA is better!!!!

 

[NehsNairb]

I hate to bring this up but it might have something to do with the fact that UCBerkeley is like half Asian. Since Asian applicants need higher stats to remain competitive, the GPAs and MCAT scores on that table are inflated also. That's just a theory though.

 

[MED_04]

I hate to bring this up but it might have something to do with the fact that UCBerkeley is like half Asian. Since Asian applicants need higher stats to remain competitive, the GPAs and MCAT scores on that table are inflated also. That's just a theory though.

never heard of mcat scores being inflated

the numbers are given by aamc

 

[drmota]

because everyone at berkeley is pre-med.
-mota

 

[anystream]

because everyone at berkeley is a crazy hippie (actually one of my interviewers told me he thought this)

 

[NonTradMed]

because everyone at berkeley is pre-med.
-mota

Is that really true? I always figured it was big on engineering.....

 

[chaldobruin]

I will tell you why that data is not accurate...

There are ~600 med school applicants from berkeley each year (check AAMC), and you can almost be sure that every single one applies to the UC's, or at LEAST more than 500 of them (its state schools, everyone applies there).

This charts claim that only 114 people applied to UC Davis?? 121 to UCLA?? 117 to UCI?

Come on, thats a load of crap. UC's like UCI get over 4,000 applicants a year, like 99% of which are in state. Imagine if UC's only put out 100 applicants to each med school in Cali. That'd be less than 1,000 applicants to each Cali Med school.

Besides, gimme a break, I have friends from UCLA with 30s, 31s and 3.6's getting into Northwestern, Pitt, U Chicago, and a few UC schools. These are bogus stats.

 

[Benzo4every1]

because everyone at berkeley is pre-med.
-mota

DORK ALERT

 

[pnasty]

"Only" got into USC!!? Dude, I don't know what state you're from, but it's a tremendous accomplishment to get into USC, or any med school in California! I would kill to go to USC! Getting into a "state school" is a dream come true for Californians.

i thought USC was a private school....not a state school?

 

[thundercat25]

One reason I think UCLA and other schools have an advantage over Berkeley is that Berkeley has no medical school. Having a top med school on campus like at UCLA gives students a slew of opportunities to get involved in clinical activities that help boost their applications.

 

[drmota]

i thought USC was a private school....not a state school?

it is. but its still in california. meaning you're assured cali residency.
-mota

 

[drmota]

DORK ALERT

um, i probably had ~1 premed friend at berkeley. my comment was based on the fact that my ochem classes were ~1000 people. i repeat. everyone at berkeley is pre-med.
-mota

 

[Elastase]

um, i probably had ~1 premed friend at berkeley. my comment was based on the fact that my ochem classes were ~1000 people. i repeat. everyone at berkeley is pre-med.
-mota

I would say 75% of ppl in MCB, and 50% of ppl in IB are premed. Thats about 600+ applicants per year produced in those departments at Berkeley.

 

[drmota]

I would say 75% of ppl in MCB, and 50% of ppl in IB are premed. Thats about 600+ applicants per year produced in those departments at Berkeley.

exactly. that's an absurd amount from one school.
-mota

 

[MED_04]

I would say 75% of ppl in MCB, and 50% of ppl in IB are premed. Thats about 600+ applicants per year produced in those departments at Berkeley.

these numbers are accurate, they're published by the career center, i think the only thing that it doesn't represent are those who didn't apply straight out of college

having a medical school on campus gives you no advantage in terms of the application process, it may give you an opportunity however to work with clinical faculty, but i think med.students snap those positions too quickly for them to be available

my brothers applying to college this year and he's planning on going to med.school, with these stats i almost want to tell him not to goto berkeley, i myself am a berkeley alumn and found it difficult to maintain high grades there.

 

[DrBowtie]

these numbers are accurate, they're published by the career center, i think the only thing that it doesn't represent are those who didn't apply straight of college

having a medical school on campus gives you no advantage in terms of the application process, it may give you an opportunity however to work with clinical faculty, but i think med.students snap those positions too quickly for them to be available

As someone else said:

Each year profiled includes December, May and August UC Berkeley grads (e.g. 2001 includes 12/00, 5/01 & 8/01 graduates) who released their AMCAS information to UCB. This report includes only the seniors, those who applied the summer before their last academic year at Cal.

Just like on SDN & MDapps, people with higher scores are more likely to disclose their information thus the sample size is skewed.

 

[anystream]

it is. but its still in california. meaning you're assured cali residency.
-mota

is that really true?

 

[MED_04]

is that really true?

no

 

[91946]

I"m a Berkeley alum (class of 05). The bulk of the mcb graduating class are pre-med and there's like 800 graduates in my class.

 

[NehsNairb]

never heard of mcat scores being inflated

the numbers are given by aamc

ok...let me clarify

if alot of asians(ORMs) go to berkeley than it's probable that many of the med school applicants will be asian also. now to get accepted into top 20 med schools, you need to have outstanding stats. since asians are overrepresented in the med school population, they need to have higher stats than the average applicant. say hypothetically, a 3.7 + 35 would give you a good chance of being accepted to a top 20 if you aren't an ORM. but if you are, you might need a 3.8 + 37.

thus the disproportionate number of asians from berkeley accepted to top 20 schools will raise the average for GPA and MCAT of all accepted students from berkeley. that is what I meant when I said inflated.

 

[solitude]

Regarldess of whether the sample is comprehensive, I'm shocked at how low the acceptance rates are. At my school and others comparable to Berkeley, there is a much higher percentage of applicants receiving acceptances. It seems to me that med schools just aren't giving UCB seniors a lot of respect, which is absurd considering the competition for top grades there.

 

[DrHuang]

because most berkeley people are weird

 

[medhopeful724]

I am a 2005 Berkeley graduate from MCB and im kind of offended that people are making generalizations about berkeley students.....first of all, we are NOT weird. just because Berkeley is a tough school and it takes a lot of hard work to maintain a high GPA does not make us "weird/hippie" students. seriously. can we be more mature about this? and yes my classes mainly had pre-meds but not everyone ends up being pre-end by the time they graduate, either because of poor GPA/MCAT scores. i've had tons of friends (who are asian) get into top notch schools across the country (UCLA, Northwestern, BU...). also if anyone has taken statistics, the information on the career center website cannot be generalized for everyone. its a small sample of students who actually apply to medical school from Berkeley. every interview i've gone to has had at least 2-5 other Berkeley students (id say we're the most represented with UCLA in the mix).

 

[drgnahc]

because most berkeley people are weird

Please watch your dirty mouth! You sound like your are a weird dr. for sure!

 

[DrHuang]

Please watch your dirty mouth! You sound like your are a weird dr. for sure!

make that weird and lame

edit: and im not kidding...i really think that alot of students from UCB have issues and it shows during interviews.

 

[orthoapp]

these statistics only show numbers, not extracurriculars or clinical/volunteer experience or research experience. I don't know anything about berkeley, but could a possibilty be that students may have high numbers but be lacking in these areas?

 

[91946]

make that weird and lame

edit: and im not kidding...i really think that alot of students from UCB have issues and it shows during interviews.

Speak for yourself buddy.

 

[Elastase]

these numbers are accurate, they're published by the career center, i think the only thing that it doesn't represent are those who didn't apply straight out of college

having a medical school on campus gives you no advantage in terms of the application process, it may give you an opportunity however to work with clinical faculty, but i think med.students snap those positions too quickly for them to be available

my brothers applying to college this year and he's planning on going to med.school, with these stats i almost want to tell him not to goto berkeley, i myself am a berkeley alumn and found it difficult to maintain high grades there.

I just straight up guessed what it would be. Glad I was on point.

UC Berkeley has a great reputation! Its definitely a plus to be at Berkeley for med school because we have students that are known to do VERY well in med school. UofMichigan, I think, gives extra points for the more competative schools...i.e. Berkeley. You drop the name Berkeley, and people know its a great school (on the interview trail). In conclusion, if you have the chance to go to UCB, DO IT! GO BEARS!

 

[Mister Pie]

Eh, I don't know about that whole theory about making it harder for asians to get in. That sounds alarmingly like reverse-discrimination to me.

DISCLAIMER: I myself am asian, so maybe I'm just trying to make myself feel better.

 

[AxlxA]

One reason I think UCLA and other schools have an advantage over Berkeley is that Berkeley has no medical school. Having a top med school on campus like at UCLA gives students a slew of opportunities to get involved in clinical activities that help boost their applications.

Negative!

You want a close-by Medical school that is freaking top 10 in the nation? UCSF!!!!

I personally graduated from Berkeley in 2005 from CDB(honors, yes i sat on stage!) and I have stayed away from SDN for over 3 months knowing this place eats people alive. I work at UCSF and I can attest that tons of lab associates from recent berkeley grads like me. UCSF and affiliated Hospitals have great clinic exposure for undergrads from berkeley.

So what more can i add to this thread? Well, it is true asians from any UC will have a rough time getting into medical school, because we are all so ambitious and apply to top 50 schools. I know I did and got totally creamed by this. I had only interviewed at 5 schools, waitlisted at 4 schools and I only found out i got into one school two weeks ago. I'm in heaven right now so i dont mind posting on SDN again.

I hope most SDNers from CAL has gotten into med school already and if not, hope you guys get in on MAY 15th!!!!

Oh yea since i dont even check SDN any more, i'll just input this tibit I learned two weeks ago in here as well. Maybe you guys can pass it on.


UCSD - I called and asked about acceptable pool on Feb ~20ish. Yvonne told me that they are interviewing until mid March and currently do not have any spots for waitlisters to move into acceptance yet. She said the earliest they'll move people is that special May 15th date.

I really hope i get into that school.


Adios mi Amigos.

 

[red dot]

ok, i guess i should just BART on over, take the elevator up Evans, and throw myself off...?

(bad joke, but i had to say it)

 

[dopaminesurge]

http://career.berkeley.edu/MedStats/national.stm

Ahem.

 

[NonTradMed]

Eh, I don't know about that whole theory about making it harder for asians to get in. That sounds alarmingly like reverse-discrimination to me.

DISCLAIMER: I myself am asian, so maybe I'm just trying to make myself feel better.

Well, Asians don't have a harder time than caucasions, but there is a big gap between whites and asian MCAT/GPA and other ethnic groups. I don't think it's a conspiracy but it does hurt to be overrepresented:

http://www.aamc.org/data/facts/2005/mcatgparaceeth.htm

 

[Messerschmitts]

ok, i guess i should just BART on over, take the elevator up Evans, and throw myself off...?

(bad joke, but i had to say it)

You have just proven your Berkliness. GO BEARS!! Only a true blue Cal student would make this joke, I love it! (But don't pull an Evans)

And btw, I'd like to reiterate that although we don't have an affiliated med school on the surface, UCSF is for all intents and purposes, Berkeley's med school. It only makes sense that the flagship UC med school would be right across the bay from the flagship UC. That said, not like I had a ghost of a chance of attending UCSF. (or any UC med school for that matter) The 4 years I spent at Cal were some of the most awesome of my life, even if it's so hard to get into med school from our school. I wouldn't trade it for anything, and I regret nothing. If I could do it all over again, I would turn down that UCLA acceptance all over again!

 

[solitude]

http://career.berkeley.edu/MedStats/national.stm

Ahem.

I'm not sure how to interpret your comment, but I am still shocked at how low the acceptance rate is for Berkeley undergrads. It is less than or about 10% higher than the national average. This is much lower than that of schools comparable in prestige to Berkeley (e.g. Duke is 85-90%).

 

[MED_04]

I'm not sure how to interpret your comment, but I am still shocked at how low the acceptance rate is for Berkeley undergrads. It is less than or about 10% higher than the national average. This is much lower than that of schools comparable in prestige to Berkeley (e.g. Duke is 85-90%).

i agree, i think it's fair to argue that the students at berkeley are some of the most qualified in the country, and having such low acceptance rates makes me wonder

as for the correctness of the statistics i can say that my med.school (being one of the top 20 noted) has the stated number of people attending from berkeley

 

[happydays]

I will tell you why that data is not accurate...

There are ~600 med school applicants from berkeley each year (check AAMC), and you can almost be sure that every single one applies to the UC's, or at LEAST more than 500 of them (its state schools, everyone applies there).

This charts claim that only 114 people applied to UC Davis?? 121 to UCLA?? 117 to UCI?

Come on, thats a load of crap. UC's like UCI get over 4,000 applicants a year, like 99% of which are in state. Imagine if UC's only put out 100 applicants to each med school in Cali. That'd be less than 1,000 applicants to each Cali Med school.

Besides, gimme a break, I have friends from UCLA with 30s, 31s and 3.6's getting into Northwestern, Pitt, U Chicago, and a few UC schools. These are bogus stats.

Yes, you're right. Only too few people are releasing their info, so this data is very skewed.

 

[happydays]

I'm not sure how to interpret your comment, but I am still shocked at how low the acceptance rate is for Berkeley undergrads. It is less than or about 10% higher than the national average. This is much lower than that of schools comparable in prestige to Berkeley (e.g. Duke is 85-90%).

Well, at some schools, the advisors would only let the ones who they think will be able to get into med school apply, hence skewing the acceptance rate.

 

[MED_04]

Well, at some schools, the advisors would only let the ones who they think will be able to get into med school apply, hence skewing the acceptance rate.

honestly do you think ppl make up their mind on whether to apply to medschool based on an advisor?

 

[happydays]

honestly do you think ppl make up their mind on whether to apply to medschool based on an advisor?

You'd be suprised.

 

[ether^O^]

Being an ORM and being from Berkeley is a bad combination. I know for a fact that Berkeley students are just as good as those from any of the top 20 universities in the nation (I think we're actually top 10, but the USNEWS rankings use bogus formulas to rank schools). It's an atrocity that schools like Columbia, Duke, etc. have acceptance rates for premeds approaching 90%, whereas Berkeley's is only 67%. I know a ton of people personally who had excellent stats (34 MCAT, high GPA with a ton of ECs; 37 MCAT, high GPA also with a ton of good ECs) who only got several interviews and no acceptances. Oh, and they're Asian (either Indian or East Asian). And the stats for acceptance rates at the top 20 schools also shows how hard it is to get in. The MSAR's MCAT and GPA averages for accepted students are lower than that of Berkeley's (i.e. 37 compared to 33 or >3.9 compared to 3.6/3.7), which really makes me wonder: Why is that? I mean, we bust our asses just as much as students from other top schools-if not more-and we do just as well on our MCATs, GPAs, and extracurriculars, so why is it that we get shafted? But yeah, I'm pretty sick and tired of people saying that California students need to stop whining, Asians need to stop whining, etc. What we need to do is whine MORE so that people know that crap we need to go through and make some changes !

 

[KevinZ]

http://career.berkeley.edu/MedStats/national.stm

Ahem.

Again, those statistics aren't even showing half of the sample. There are approximately 16,000 spots in medical school.

The three public schools that churn out the most pre-med students in the country are UCLA, Berkeley, and Michigan. All three are big, public institutions that produce at least 600 pre-meds (I say this because Michigan is 3rd and has that many pre-meds).

When we're talking about samples that big and grading curves at each school that I assume are geared toward B- averages, there are going to be a lot of unqualified students applying. I was looking over the Michigan data and there are a LOT of students applying with under a 3.2 GPA and I imagine its similar at Berkeley as well. At Michigan, we average about a 54% acceptance, with about 322 accepted. So for those of you staring at the Berkeley percentage and scratching your head wondering why it's so low, consider for a second how many people that translates into. For any school to put 300-400 people in medical school is pretty damn amazing.

So, Berkeley's a great school and don't let these numbers (which aren't comprehensive) skew your opinion. With such a high percentage of the class applying to medical school, there are probably a lot of people applying with numbers that are subpar at best, effectively lowering that percentage. I imagine there are plenty of qualified students at Berkeley that are drowning in "Top 10" acceptances.

 

[BerkeleyMD]

make that weird and lame

edit: and im not kidding...i really think that alot of students from UCB have issues and it shows during interviews.

Your posts about berkeley sound almost bitter... did someone get rejected by Cal as a senior in HS ??

And another thing, how weird and lame is it to refer to yourself as Dr. Huang when you haven't even been in med school, done a rotation, or even worked-up a patient?