@tbhbulls I wouldn’t know but so much…pre-med is pre-med. What you should compare are the courses. I would say that Emory compares fine with WUSTL in the life sciences (things like chemistry, biology, and neuroscience) in terms of intensity of the course work (needed to have a fair shot at doing well on the MCAT) and “may” have more innovative teaching especially at the introductory levels of pre-health science core courses. Over half of the general chemistry sections are flipped for example, and Emory’s introductory sections tend to be smaller than WashU’s. The curriculum is different at each though (WUSTL has more quantum concepts in their first general chemistry course) Emory’s general chemistry is supposed to undergo changes next year and I am clueless as to what that should look like if they figure it out. Biology at Emory with top instructors is likely better than most peers as there is a certain set of instructors that do more than just lecture at you. As far as I know, Emory is one of the only top privates where the large intro. biology sections have several professors doing things such as medically related case-studies and other assignments (much more intensive active learning than things like clicker questions and learning catalytics). You can take the joke instructors that are more traditional, but I don’t recommend it (a lot of MCAT material honestly comes from the foundational courses in biology and they test them at the level of the top instructors). Organic chemistry, with a top instructor, I think Emory wins. They are similar rigor as the WUSTL instructors (if you don’t trust me, and wanted to see the course materials to compare, I could PM you as I have some), but I investigated RMP ratings for these more rigorous instructors and Emory’s seemed to be rated higher: as in maybe the instructors at Emory are more effective and less traditional or students just are more willing to receive high level instruction in the area. I suspect more of the former as, on paper, WUSTL students are stronger. The top 2-3 Emory instructors likely use far more active learning and Socratic Method (they learn all or most students’ names and then go over material by asking questions and basically leading students through the problem solving process) in their organic chemistry courses, so it means students have more fun, though these sections are very difficult in terms of the level of problem-solving needed to succeed.
Physics and Math, I haven’t really looked into WUSTL in this area, but I’m going to give them the nod because Emory isn’t that good if taking pre-health intro. courses in those areas, though I’m certain it is likely easier to make a higher grade in the Emory equivalents. I suppose the only neat thing about Emory, following in the footsteps of JHU, is that it has a life sciences calculus class serving pre-healths, biology, and neurosciences (for biology and NBB, it is a requirement unless you are pursuing upperlevel maths for things like a math, chemistry, or quantitative social science major) majors which exposes students to linear algebra, differential equations, and multi-variate concepts, and some calculus based statistics concepts. I would say it is better than the regular calc. 2 courses.
Many of the intermediate and upperlevel NBB and biology courses are really good and also serve as good training for the MCAT. In fact, there are many data-analysis and problem-based learning teachers for classes like evolutionary biology and organismal biology, and friends have told me that their problem sets and exams strongly mirror MCAT passage problems, just in short answer format. They get you to analyze graphs/figures and experimental design which is what the new MCAT heavily focuses on. Also, many intermediate and advanced courses in biology have adopted “discussion sections” which are basically research article journal clubs where you write a small review on and eventually present a paper in the field. This also readies students for what is on the MCAT. These sections are a part of: evolutionary biology, human genetics, immunology, and advanced molecular genetics offerings I believe. Any course by Dr. Eisen (maybe the top instructor in the department) full focuses on case studies and reading primary literature (he typically teachers epigenetics and cell biology). Many neuroscience teachers have adopted case, problem-based, and project based learning for their special topics courses (one has even adopted for one of the main “weed-out” neuroscience courses).
Career Services is pretty good, especially if you are on the Big 3 pre-professional tracks. They’ll train you for interviews and everything. Administration, don’t know. As annoying as most elite private schools but good in certain areas.
*My investigations seem to suggest that both of these schools, among privates (especially those ranked between 10 and 25) seem more aggressive about doing science education as well as possible and this should matter to pre-healths because your success is strongly dependent on a) the quality of instruction and the level you make yourself learn at and b) the quality of support and advising you get. However, I will say, that Emory likely makes it easier for pre-meds to be tempted to take lower quality courses (which of course, are usually much easier) because for some, sections at a time are offered (or there are spring and fall offerings with instructors that differ like night and day), whereas WUSTL may only offer like 1-2 instructors per course (at one point, I think their little enrollment portals were public so I used it to disprove this person that tried to claim Emory had larger intro. courses than peers. That is utterly false. Find me the school that is Emory’s size where intro. biology 1 sections have more like 50-100 students each as opposed to 200-250/section…same for general chemistry. Only exception is physics where they don’t really try use active learning anyway, so those are the same as peer schools).
This means, students at WUSTL are more likely to get a more equal and honest science education in their pre-med courses whereas Emory students can more easily trap themselves by going the low road (so these will be the weirdos with the inflated GPA’s but a comparatively weaker MCAT. WashU is more like, more people with “meh” GPA’s and higher MCATs). Making Emory’s pre-med science courses is really up to you. One science instructor could be equivalent to being at some very top institution and another could feel more like a weaker state institution. It is okay to take the latter as GPA boosters long as it isn’t in classes that are supposed to help for your MCAT, but I wouldn’t ever pass up on more reputable professors in MCAT helper classes (like most of the pre-med cores and biology courses like organismal, cell biology, and genetics). If you find your GPA in a position that makes you ponder whether or not you can handle taking the best instructors offered for a pre-med core, then you know you are in trouble. WUSTL doesn’t appear to present that dilemma as much, however, it does mean that if a bad, but difficult teacher teaches a core course every offering, you have no choice but to suck it up. At Emory, most bad STEM instructors are typically relatively easy (so people taking them are “sucking it up for an A”) and the best do challenge you. There, I don’t know if it is as predictable and controllable.