Hi,
My daughter has been accepted at Allegheny College, U pitt Greensburg & Slippery Rock. She is looking at doing her pre med. She went for an overnight stay at Allegheny and pretty much liked it, but is thinking because of the cost. Can anyone suggest which of these college would be a good option. Which college prepares you better for MCAT
We visited Allegheny for the accepted students overnight last year and loved it. My son decided to go to another school although I pushed hard for him to go to Allegheny as I felt that small class size and personal attention from the professors would have been a lot better than 200+ introductory chemistry classes at our state’s flagship. In terms of the cost-did you get any merit or need based aid from Allegheny because we got a nice merit award. It is also very respected in terms of the med. school admissions, especially in the northwestern PA and Ohio.
Thanks for the response. This really helps…
We opted out of Slippery Rock. We visited the accepted students overnight at Allegheny this year and loved it. My daughter liked the class sizes and the personal attention from professors. The merit aid & financial aid that she received is pretty good compared to other colleges but we still end up paying about 23k. We are yet to receive the merit & financial aid details from Pitt Greensburg. She has requested Greensburg for an overnight stay to decide which college she likes better and also see if Greensburg’s merit & financial aid is any better. The only thing that she is confused is which of these colleges is more respected in terms of med school admissions.
The name of your undergraduate college is not an important consideration in medical school admissions. You can get to medical school from any of these colleges, if you have good grades and MCAT scores.
As far as I know, there is no way to get a breakdown of MCAT scores by college. However, my guess would be that Allegheny seniors probably have higher scores on standardized tests like the MCAT or LSAT – simply because Allegheny freshman probably have higher scores on standardized tests like the SAT or ACT.
In other words, Allegheny tends to enroll students who do well on undergraduate college entrance exams, and that type of student also tends to do well on graduate school entrance exams. As noted above, Allegheny students are more likely to get smaller classes and more personal attention from the faculty, and those factors would help them as well.
If financial factors were irrelevant, then my pick here would be Allegheny. But most people do have to consider the financial factors. And in that case, a public school could be a better value, depending on the circumstances. If your daughter did well on the SAT or ACT, she can probably do well on the MCAT, regardless of where she goes to school, if she applies herself.
Allegheny will have the better environment - more attention from professors,classes taught at a deeper level due to the higher quality students*, more supportive classmates who live on campus rather than commute and thus are available for study groups, clubs, and discussions. It also has more resources and more opportunities, whether for stem/pre-med or in general. It’s a very good, very respected college.
So, the big question is, is Allegheny affordable?
If not and if it’s your true first choice, could your child email and state that it’s her first choice but it’s $2,000 too much and she may have to go to Pitt Greensburg, so she is launching an attempt at making her dream college affordable, would they be able to reconsider her aid?
I hope I am not too late to this discussion but I am a student who will be going to Allegheny in the fall of 2018. I visisted and absolutely adored the campus and the students. The student body is incredibly focused and academically inclined. I believe a vast majority of the incoming freshman were in the top 20-30% of their class, with the minority being students who fell below that range. My tour-guide, was a Pre-Med student who had been kind enough to be frank with me. He said, this is not the school for kids who want to party and figure themselves out. This is for ambitious kids who want to be challenged. He also gave me another peice of advice that is great for your daughter. While Allegeny has an array of majors, especially for being a small, private liberal arts college, this is a college that favors Pre-Med, Pre-Law kids. I don’t mean favor as in the teachers and administrators don’t care about the other students but rather the kids in the Pre-Med, Pre-Law programs have more opportunities. Six months out of college, 95% of Allegheny graduates are in jobs of their desired field study, which is a higher number than a vast majority of schools whether they are private or public. Further, every student is mandated to complete a senior comp. which is the same thing as the graduate thesis, which looks incredibly favorable in the eye of grad schools. As a political science student who is a part of the pre-law program, I did my research and discovered that there are many students in my program who advanced to ivy colleges and other prestigious universities. Some of those colleges, like Carnegie Mellon, sends reps to the school for the sole purpose of recruiting Allegheny kids to go to their school.
I firmly believe if your daughter can get a decent scholarship, there is no reason to consider the other two schools.
Thank you all for the responses and feedback. My daughter has decided to go to Allegheny and we are very happy with her decision.
Congratulations!
@LiliVoss, Thanks for the response. Our views were the same after the Campus visit during the overnight stay for accepted students. We are happy that she finally decided to go to Allegheny.
Good Luck!
@UserJami congrats to your daughter. Allegheny is high in the running for my daughter. It left a great impression on us.