And be aware that some colleges reduce their financial aid by the amount of outside scholarships recieved.
5 Likes
You said you have no cost constraints. Forget the small scholarships.
You are NMSF and maybe NMF.
If you want to offset costs - well you can go for free. Thatâs the ultimate offset. Youâll be $400k ahead of Vandy with the same opportunity to progress in your medical career.
Why waste your time with $500 here and $1k there you are unlikely to receive ?
Trust me, when you are a dr no one will care what undergrad you went to - and itâs likely the same for med school.
2 Likes
If you work hard on your essays and make them original & true to who you are without playing it too safe, I feel confident in saying you will get into at least one of the highly selected universities on your list. I look forward to you coming back and updating us when that happens.
2 Likes
A significant percentage (greater than 50%) of pre med students donât wind up attending medical school.
While hopefully you will wind up with both the eventual desire and opportunity to become a doctor it is hardly guaranteed. With this in mind you will have significantly greater optionality if you attend one of the higher rated schools you are considering and for some reason donât become a doctor.
As others have pointed out for med school undergraduate school doesnât have much significance but if you pivot to other career choices a Vanderbilt, Harvard, Yale, etc. will likely open more doors than schools not known for academic excellence.
While finances should be considered I wouldnât let it drive your decision in isolation and at the expense of broader considerations and fit.
2 Likes
Much higher than 50%. A recent study of freshmen pre-meds at 141 national universities across the US found than only between 15-18% of freshmen pre-meds even finished taking all the pre-reqs.
The median GPA for those completing all pre-reqs was 3.2-- so more than half them have GPAs too low to be serious contenders for med school. So even less than those 18% of freshmen pre-meds end up applying to medical school.
(And of those who do apply to med school, only 38-40% get even one acceptance.
https://www.aamc.org/media/5976/download?attachment)
3 Likes
In other words, the attrition of frosh pre-med students is:
- 0.15 to 0.18 (complete pre-med courses)
- <0.5 (with high enough grades)
- ? (actually apply)
- 0.38 to 0.40 (admitted)
Multiplying all of the above to get something no greater than 0.036 or 3.6% going to medical school, but probably significantly less, since the ? in the thirds step of attrition is likely much less than 1.
There were 52,557 USMD applicants for 2022-23 and 22,981 matriculants
Plus there were 22,708 USDO applicants and 8,290 matriculants =
31,271 students started med school.
There were approx. 2,300,000 college freshmen who began school in 2023.
I might be confused. I do not think that you can apply REA to both Princeton and Northeastern. Am I mis-reading this? Does this mean that you already submitted REA to Princeton and RD to Northeastern and EA to four other (public) schools?
If medical school is a possibility that you are considering, then you need to budget for a full 8 years of university. You do not want to take on debt for a bachelorâs degree if you can afford it, even at Princeton or Northeastern or another famous highly ranked school. Saving $$$ in the bank is even better. You can attend nearly any university in the top 150 or even top 200 in the USA and have a good chance at medical school, or at a different very good graduate program.
Premed classes are tough. You will see exams and classes that are significantly tougher than anything that you have ever seen up to this point in your life. Both daughters had majors that overlapped with premed requirements, and I have heard lots of stories of classes that were full of very strong premed students and exams with a class average in the 40âs or 50âs. You should not be in a hurry to double up on the toughest premed classes. This is not a race.
As one example we have heard some stories of university freshman who are already taking organic chemistry and are suffering (although we also have heard of at least one student who took it as a freshman and did well). Both daughters postponed organic chemistry until their junior year of university. One called it âthe hardest B- that I ever had in my lifeâ. She still did very well in acceptances to DVM programs. The other breezed through it with ease, but that is partly because she took her time and took the class only after she was very well prepared for it.
Also to get accepted to medical schools you are going to need to have quite a lot of experience in medical environments. This is going to take time and effort, and is another reason to not rush through your undergraduate degree. If you instead go for a PhD then research experience will be very important. Again this takes time and effort, which suggests that trying to be a bachelorâs degree in less than 4 years is not necessarily helpful. There will be good research options available at many, many universities, particularly if you take the time to get to know your professors while also doing very well in your classes. Letterâs of reference will be very important either way, and again it takes time to get to know your professors, and getting to know them can help with references. There might be more research opportunities available at Princeton or Stanford, but there will also be very intense competition for these research opportunities.
I think that you are doing very well. However, I do not think that your stats (particularly unweighted GPA) are all that different from what you are going to find for many of the other students in premed classes even at schools that are ranked somewhere around about 100 by US News.
By the way, one daughter got her bachelorâs degree at a university that is ranked very, very close to UTK in the US News rankings. She got a great education, and is currently in her fourth year in a âtop 5â DVM program. She has friends who were premed that she met as an undergraduate student who have done well in medical school. One is currently an MD and is doing his residency. Another is in medical school and should get her MD about the same time (give or take a week) as my daughter gets her DVM. You are likely to save a ton of $$ at UTK that you can use to pay for medical school, and you can get a great education there. If you decide to do something other than medical school, then again there are many universities that can prepare you very well, including UTK.
I think that you are likely to be looking at multiple acceptances in the near future, and I think that you and your parents should think hard about the value of attending a highly ranked university versus the value of leaving some $$$ in the bank for some form of graduate or medical school.
And of course you will get in to some good universities, as I am sure that you know.
4 Likes
No, one canât. Princeton is quite clear:
Princeton Universityâs single-choice early action program is a nonbinding process. If admitted, you have until May 1 to notify us about your decision to matriculate. If you apply single-choice early action on Nov. 1, you may not apply to an early program at any other private college or university within the United States.
https://admission.princeton.edu/apply/first-year-application-dates-deadlines
OP, I advise you to change your Northeastern app to RD ASAP. You do NOT want Princeton nor Northeastern to find out what you did (both would be highly likely to cancel your apps.) I assume your HS counselor hasnât noticed this either, which is another risk.
4 Likes
Hereâs my advice. Of all of the premed hopefuls coming out of high school, very few of them actually decide to go to medical school. College is a maturation process where you find your real passions. Choosing a school for âpremed prestigeâ is very likely a setup for 4 years of misery. My recommendation is a school like UTK. If you donât decide medical school, itâs very affordable and there is a large selection of majors. If you do decide medical school, youâre in a great position because your best chances for med school are in your home state. Also, graduating from a honors program is a tangible accomplishment you can put on a medical school application.
2 Likes
Sure but most entering college freshmen have no interest in medical school even if they could meet the requirements if they were to pursue them. Itâs like saying there are only some number of professional NHL players - sure but most people never even cared to try out for a hockey league even in elementary school.
1 Like
Agreed. 
I set it to RD when I applied(I also submitted REA to Princeton before RD to Northeastern, and there wasnât a spot to submit EA to any of the other colleges so I assume that the Common Application just takes away that possibility automatically.)
2 Likes
Hey yâall! My results come out for Princeton and Georgia Tech within the next 2 weeks⊠I might be cooked haha
You have 3 affordable and assured admissions on your list.
Youâll be fine.
You, not your school, will make your success in life.
You have a great profile - so I suspect youâll be fine with more than the three.
Best of luck.
Good Luck on your SCEA to Princeton I think you can never go wrong with a liberal arts degree or school. If you have not finished your apps to the other Ivies yet I would spend a lot of time on the short answers and essays. Make them specific to why that individual school (program, professor, local activities/opportunities) Make the AO really see you as a great addition to their class. Also take the time to make a narrative of your ECâs and how they and you have progressed. I think this will help you stand out. Advice from a mom of 2 Ivy kids
1 Like
This.
Update: I got rejected from Princeton, accepted to UTK and Bama. Now working on RD!
4 Likes
I feel very confident that, when all is said & done, you will be accepted to an institution that is worthy of your profile and accomplishments.
1 Like
He already has been.
OP check into the McCoullough Medical Scholars program at Bama.
Congrats on two fine admissions that also recognized you financially. You will not be alone.
And good luck with the rest of your decisions.
5 Likes