<p>JHS,</p>
<p>Your comments about o-chem professors and their disdain for pre-meds in the past is certainly accurate. When I attended UChicago, the phd and scholarly pursuits were fetishized, and anything “pre-professional” was often belittled. This wasn’t though, contained to pre-meds. Those going into business, law, engineering, etc. were, to a certain extent, also marginalized on campus. </p>
<p>Especially over the past 5 years, there’s been a real shift in approach at UChicago, at least from what I can see. Nowadays, students interested in business can (and are actually encouraged) to take classes at the Booth school, there is specific advising for all sorts of professions (from health to journalism), and there’s even an engineering institute on campus. From what I know, there has also been administrative push back to create more grade inflation on campus. The quality of students (at least in terms of test scores) has increased noticeably in the past 5 years as well. </p>
<p>I hesitate to say that the College has reached some form of stasis, but it appears to have stabilized a bit over the past couple years. However much professors might grumble about having liberal arts students take classes/modules in Financial Accounting or MS Excel, these offerings are now available to UChicago College students. Further, whether faculty like it or not, grades have probably trended up over the past 5-7 years. Additionally, average MCAT scores (and LSAT scores) for the college seem to have increased too.</p>
<p>All of this points to a good pre-professional support structure for UChicago College students. That’s not to say that, in the recent past, there weren’t myriad issues, it’s more to say that the College has changed quite swiftly - more quickly and more noticeably than any other top school out there. There could still be some consternation surrounding pre-med students, but as acceptance for biz/law/engineering/etc. has grown quite quickly, I imagine such sentiment is fading fast - to the point where now, I’d have no problem saying Penn and Chicago offer comparable experiences for pre meds, and fit is the most important factor. (Note, I would NOT have said this as recently as two years ago.) </p>