Wow thanks for all the responses(there were way more than I imagined).
What my friend thought was that going to a small school would equal less competition. That was the whole basis of his argument. Personally, I don’t think there’s a difference between a class with 19 valedictorians and 49 valedictorians. What’s gonna make a difference though is whether you get that tough physics question right or not. Just my opinion.
What’s going to make a difference if you and you alone get those tough physics, O chem, bio, etc etc questions right, do well on MCAT, get strong LORs, write an interesting and compelling PS, have solid and relevant ECs, and then if offered, do well in interview, with maybe a little dash of college attended, rigor added in.
"What’s gonna make a difference though is whether you get that tough physics question right or not. Just my opinion. "
-that is absolutely correct. Keep in mind though that many neglecting the fact that there is plenty of help available at college. Do not hesitate to use it, Your tuition is paying for it also, not just lectures. Use ANY help available, forget your pride, if you have a slightest doubt in your understanding, if you are only 90% sure while 10% is your doubt, ASK, see prof,. at office hours, attend supplemental instruction session, participate in informal group discussion. This part is also entirely UP TO YOU! The help is widely available, no matter what size of college that you are attending.
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What my friend thought was that going to a small school would equal less competition. That was the whole basis of his argument. Personally, I don’t think there’s a difference between a class with 19 valedictorians and 49 valedictorians.
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His logic is flawed.
Smaller schools don’t automatically have fewer Vals. Top schools, no matter the size, will have a LOT of high stats Vals…even if they’re a small school.
Being a Val, in and of itself, means nothing. Who’s afraid of a Val from a low-performing school?
I do think there’s a difference between being in a class with 19 Vals vs 49 Vals…but only if they’re strong students. A class size of 100 with 49 strong Vals will likely be more competitive.
If a student is truly looking to “lessen” competition for A’s, then go where your stats are top. Going to a school where your stats are good, but not top, just means more competition.
Yes, the fact is that 100% on a test is an absolute number, nobody can lower it to a B, it is a sure A. Again, self-reliance is a key, forget your competition, they do not exist when you have 100+ % (with extra credit) on your test. I doubt that you would get a B or A- even for 97-98%. So, forget the school size, irrelevant! Your friend may do whateer he wishes, it is his choice. Some people simply prefer a smaller school, he may be such a person.
@mom2collegekids Oh right, I haven’t thought about that. I just put all the vals in the same category without thinking about their quality.
Makes sense. If I choose my state flagship, my stats are at the top. However, if I choose a top school like say, Stanford… Well, bottom 25% for me according to SAT scores.
Lol… you will likely have more Val’s in your class at Swarthmore or Amherst or Pomona than you will at Michigan State, for example. And percentage wise, a bigger percentage than all but the tippy top colleges.
^Not sure about all those assumptions that there are more val’s in one place than another. The criteria for D’s Honors college was top 2% of HS class and ACT=31+, they accepted the top 200 kids. As far as I know from information meetings where applicants mixed with the current Honor student, practically everybody was valedictorian. Why? They were offered great financial packages that were hard to dismiss in the decision making. So much having more val’s at Pomona than at the in-state public. And more so, why pre-med will attend at the expensive UG, there is no reason whatsoever to do so. Well, there are people with unlimited resources. But for simple non-Trump type, there are plenty of colleges that would offer a full tuition Merit to valedictorian, save your family resources for the Med. School.
I’d be more interested in the idea of weed out courses and tough curves and the competition vs collaboration among students, if you would thrive in one atmosphere or the other.
There is always collaboration among students. Many benefit from explaining to others and many benefit from receiving such instructions. So, there are informal group studies going on. There are also hired Supplemental Instructors. The SI sessions sometime are huge, like 40 kids. Many benefit from them. The key is to seek help and not let things slide down to unmanageable levels. My D. was an SI for Chem. prof. and students loved her instructions. Sometime kids understand their peers better than prof.
I do not know much about curves. If the goal is an A, then one should not worry about curves, but rather strive for excellence. Set the bar high, very very high. And it will take much more effort than in HS.
@MiamiDAP You don’t think collaboration suffers when students are set up to compete with each other? Why would a student help or work with another student when there are a very limited number of As set by a rough curve? If the goal is to be better than everyone else in the class (or at least be in the top group in the class), not master the material and concepts, that seems like it would discourage collaboration.
Sometimes miami forgets to mention that she’s only speaking from the experience of her daughter. I have no idea what the kids were actually like at her daughter’s school so I’ll take her word for it, but you’re absolutely right @OHMomof2, the class dynamics are affected by grading scale. There’s a reason most med schools are pass/fail and no curve - and many of them flat out say it’s to strip away the competitive, non collaborative environment of pre-medical education.
Everybody forget to mention that they are speaking from their own experience. There is no other experiences person has but her own, unless we can exist in several bodies, that would be interesting experience…just a fantasy, LOL.
However, I am very very sorry to hear of “the competitive, non collaborative environment of pre-medical education.” that IWBB had to go thru. My D. enjoyed her UG experience very much, has fond memories of the place and the student body in general and her closer friends and Sorority sisters. She used to visit it a lot during MS1. She does not have anybody to visit there by now. But she would not mind just to walk a beautiful campus again.
I feel sorry for anybody whose UG experience is “the competitive, non collaborative environment of pre-medical education.”. It just tells me that the person did not select the college carefully enough. “Non collaborative environment” is NOT what one wants to have at college, pre-med or not. D. personally has helped a lot of students, she was told that by both students and her prof. who simply acknowledged the fact that she raised the grades in his Gen. Chem. class. She also was looking for help when needed and was able to get it without any problem. And that is how it should be at college.
Competition at Med. School is much greater. D. was at p/f Med. school. It does not mean much, the only meaning of it is that less of her classmates got AOA than at other med. schools. but AOA does not mean much at p/f schools anyway. The students who got AOA were all Hs and it is very hard to get all Hs, basically you got to play the system, which many refuse to do. They also know who does it, and these few are not respected. The competitiveness of Med. School is expressed in the fact that many are discouraged from applying to selective specialties or at least warned that they better have some kind of back up plan. I do not want to mention here what these very busy medical students are going thru and doing way beyond required to insure that they have enough to apply where they want to. This is not the place, we are not discussing the Med. Schools here.
No no no no. I did not experience that toxic environment. I have a whole thread on the brown forum about it. I was repeating what I had heard from administrators at multiple medical schools. If I was speaking about my experience I would have said that was my experience rather than what I said “many of THEM say”
And now that I have another incubation time to kill:
It is possible to speak about others experiences or to speak in more general terms for those of us who have access to said information. An example of how this can work:
My experience: my medical school is pass fail, people routinely email blast review sheets, tips, helpful resources to the entire class.
Friend 1 experience: different school but also pass/fail, same experience as mine.
Friend 2 experience: different school with grades (high honors, honors, pass, or fail). No one ever emailed out helpful things to the entire class for studying.
Similarly, for undergrad, I have friends and classmates who went to other schools. It is clear that their experience was very different from mine. The feeling of being in classes with people who have no desire to be there (gen ed requirements) or dealing with curves and resenting their classmates or being the one resented were all simply things I didn’t experience but can still talk about.
I think it is better if I stick to what I personally know the best. Sometime people just talk. Who knows their reasons. In addition, I do not care for internet statistics either. It is missing tons of detail personal factors and we do not use it in our family for decision making. Everybody can check internet statistics themselves anyway.
Now, in regard to your personal experience with your Med. School. First, we do not discuss a Med. School here. But to comment on your: “My experience: my medical school is pass fail, people routinely email blast review sheets, tips, helpful resources to the entire class.”, I have a question: “Did you go thru residency application?” If not, then your experience is NOT complete, because that is when the competitive nature of Med. School comes to life. Say, having 9 people applying to the same extremely competitive specialty from the same Med, School will put every one of these 9 at great disadvantage. I am talking about real situation here from my personal experience.
I never heard of bad UG pre-med experience, but granted all around my D. were accepted to Med. Schools, many graduated with Summa Cum Laude (which in D’s department meant to be above college GPA of 3.96). Also, granted, D. ALWAYS stays away from “intense” crowd that focuses too much on academics. It may be her personality and the personality of those that she surrounded herself with, that prevented this crowd from bad experiences, the crowd of non-intense people with many un-related interests who are always ready to help and never hesitate to ask for help if needed. People in this crowd were always striving for A in every class and they achieved it. If the grade is 100% or close, who cares about the curve?.
It seems to me you mostly post about your D’s experience, or whatever she tells you about it, which is also secondhand, no?
^Not really a secondhand. I do not know anything else though, I do not feel comfortable repeating what D’s pre-med friends saying, that would be a second hand. As a parent and grandparent, my kids and grandkids experiences are not secondhand to me. Others may feel differently though.
I’m going to guess that pretty much everyone is going to feel differently about the concept that you posting based on what your daughter tells you is not a secondhand experience of being a pre-med and medical student.
And while I personally have not been through the residency cycle, my class has, including 11 people applying to ortho, 9 of whom matched. I was referring to the first two years in my earlier post, especially since the clinical years at my school are not pass/fail and the NBME shelf exams are graded on curves, and yes, the competition intensifies.
@OHMomof2 “You don’t think collaboration suffers when students are set up to compete with each other? Why would a student help or work with another student when there are a very limited number of As set by a rough curve? If the goal is to be better than everyone else in the class (or at least be in the top group in the class), not master the material and concepts, that seems like it would discourage collaboration.”
I have an anecdotal reply for that-- My d goes to a competitive school with grade deflation. They do form study groups and check their work against each other. My D says it helps a lot. But it isn’t the whole class collaborating-- her bio 101 study group, for instance is made up of 4 or 5 students from her dorm who are taking bio 101. Some of them are in different sections and have different professors, even, but they are all learning the same material. They do collaborate in this way and my D was able to get the high score in her particular section partly do to collaborating with these peers. They do indeed concentrate on “learning the material” in a competitive environment and that leads to doing well on tests etc. There are lots of ways to collaborate. She would certainly study with someone in her own section if it was convenient.
This is not to say a competitive atmosphere or this type of set up is for everyone–luckily there is choice.