<p>Miami, do not think the evidence bears out your comment about MIT. S has many friends in med school who graduated from MIT; the key difference appears to be that they can major in virtually anything since the MIT core essentially prepares a student for the med school pre-req’s. The UROP program is another factor- starting as Freshman, students can work on a wide range of research projects for either $ or course credit, and so the pre-med piece that tends to trip up students (i.e. what have you done that demonstrates interest in medicine beyond the classroom) is almost automatic at MIT.</p>
<p>You can work in a chem lab develping composite materials for artifical limbs; a linguistics lab working on simulated speech for stroke victims; the very famous media lab trying to understand the connection between vision and writing, etc. There are hundreds of well funded research projects going on at MIT every day and it is easy to connect with one or two of them while you are an undergrad.</p>
<p>Not to hijack the thread… but the kids we knew at MIT have done exceptionally well in med school admissions- many of them having spent four years exploring other academic interests besides “pre-med”. I can’t think of a reason to avoid MIT if you’re interested in medicine- the place lives and breathes the scientific method and has phenomenal resources available to undergrads.</p>