My daughter who is a senior in HS, Bay area resident got into all the UC’s (UCB,UCLA,UCSD,UCSB,UCI,UCD & UCSC) with her preferred major. She also got the full ride to pepperdine university. Finally we narrowed down to UCLA (MCDB major) and Pepperdine (Biology). We are torn between which direction to go. Her ultimate desire is to go to Med school. We are not sure, which would be the best route to take to reach her goal as UCLA has brand name and Pepperdine is a private university with a full ride (Also easy to maintain GPA). Your experiences or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
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Pepperdine is also a brand name so take that out of the equation.
She needs to figure out a place where she can thrive intellectually and academically and socially. She may or may not end up as a doctor, so finding the college with the right price tag and the right “plan B” options is key right now.
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If you don’t pay for undergrad, are you willing to divert that money to medical school should your daughter get accepted? Medical school will cost $100,000 a year…or more by the time your daughter gets there.
All that aside…I’d suggest putting medical school aside…because she could apply to medical school as a grad of either of these colleges. Or she could change her mind completely about medical school.
What is your daughter’s preference? At this point, if finances are not a consideration, she needs to choose an undergrad where she feels she wants to be for four years. So…she has to weigh the pros and cons.
UCLA is a large public research university located in a large metro area. It has no religious affiliation. Pepperdine is located in Malibu…but way up on the hill. Very different location type than UCLA. Pepperdine is also a religious college with firm required religion courses.
But both are fine colleges.
I hope your daughter gets to choose…really whichever she chooses will be fine!
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Absolutely… Pepperdine has the right price tag but unlike UCLA it has limited opportunities if she wanted to change her goal direction later on. But she seems very fixated on going towards med school now.
Here is a link to find all the courses of study at Pepperdine. There are plenty from which to choose.
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I just want to add…Pepperdine was a college our DD considered, and we did tour there. She ended up applying to other CA colleges, but it was not because Pepperdine didn’t have a lot of majors.
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Thank you so much. She is a christian so taking religious classes wouldn’t be a problem for her. Its just going to which university would actually benefits/makes it easy for her to go to med school.
Both of these schools will be fine for a premed student. Students get accepted to medical schools from both. It’s not like attending one vs the other will make getting accepted to medical school easier. That’s a thought you need to put aside…because it just isn’t true.
Your daughter needs to choose the school where she feels she will be happiest for her four undergrad years…happy students do better than unhappy ones.
It’s hard to get accepted to medical school regardless of where you attend undergraduate school. Very hard. And that will be the case regardless of the college your daughter attends. She will need to work hard for a strong GPA andsGPA at either college. The required courses for medical school applicants…well…some just aren’t easy no matter where you take them. Let’s just say…OChem is a tough course everywhere! And your kid will need a strong MCAT score, shadowing, volunteering with underprivileged groups, patient facing experience. The shadowing/volunteering/patient facing experiences can be done during school vacations and summers.
@WayOutWestMom your thoughts?
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I would pick UCLA. There will be more opportunities to do research and get shadowing or clinical experience. Also, personally I much prefer the vibe at UCLA.
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If the OP’s daughter feels the same…fine. But she might like Pepperdine better because it’s smaller.
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And adding…at UCLA, there will be lots of masters and doctoral students jockeying g for the research opportunities too. And classes are likely to be a lot larger, especially gen Ed’s.
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Thank you. I have heard that getting A’s in competitive schools like UCLA is challenging because of grade curve. And its highly important to have a good GPA for med school and where you did undergrad doesn’t really matter for med school application. Is that a valid point?
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Hoping @WayOutWestMom addresses this.
Neither school is going to give her a sure shot at med school.
Will your daughter have a car to use at college? (I ask because she will need to get involved in pre-med ECs off campus at Pepperdine. She will need both community service with disadvantaged groups/communities and clinical volunteering at medical sites. )
If your daughter decides that she doesn’t want pre-med or gets weeded out of pre-med, which college offers her the best choice for a Plan B career?
Pre med is tough at every college. A national study of freshmen pre-med students revealed that only 16% of freshmen premeds actually finish all the med school pre-reqs. (And of those who actually apply to med school–and not all of the 16% do–only 40% of applicants get an acceptance to med school. This mean every premed absolutely positively needs to have Plan B career in mind.)
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It matters some, but not as much as people like to think it does. Med students can and do come from all sorts of undergrads–from Ivies, to state flagship universities to directional state colleges and Never-Heard-of-It rural LACs.
What matters is the student has a good GPA strong MCAT score. But that’s by itself isn’t enough. That’s only the starting point. Beside great stats, a med school applicants needs to have the “right” ECs, strong LOEs from professors who have taught them in science or math classes, excellent writing & oral communication skills, a strong personal narrative for “Why Medicine?” and the personal qualities that make a good doctor (See Core Competencies for Entering Medical Students
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Thank you so much for your thoughts. Just to clarify,she never had any B’s in her entire schooling years. GPA 4.0/4.7 and ACT 35 for first time. Having said that I understand med school is hard even for strong students and need to consider Plan B.
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OOPs. Sorry got your post confused with another thread I was reading…
I edited out the comments about stats ion my previous post.
But–will your daughter able to access the necessary off campus pre-med ECs at Pepperdine?
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@WayOutWestMom can much of this be done during school vacations and summers…or during a gap year between undergrad and applying to medical schools. I know students do these things this way. Something to consider.
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No worries. Appreciate your thoughts 
Community service is supposed to long term, so doing a bunch of community service hours in the summer right before applying is going to look…like an afterthought or box checking.
Doing it post-grad during a gap is better, but still some adcomms will question why she wasn’t doing more service in undergrad.
Having a service orientation has become a “big” thing in med school admission.
And on this year’s AMCAS application there’s new category for advocacy activities.
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