VERY confused about Berkeley or UCI

sakky
Sat, 08 Apr 2006 23:18:25 +0000

There is one thing, though: UCLA has better access to the medical center, with the research and volunteering opportunities they have there.

It’s very important, if you want to someday be a doctor, to start interacting with patients early on



I agree that it is important to start getting medical experience as quickly as possible, but I doubt that the fact that UCLA has a medical center is really that big of a benefit. Is it a nice thing? Sure. But I don’t know if it’s THAT beneficial. After all, it’s not like Berkeley is completely bereft of medical facilities. Berkeley and Oakland are full-fledged cities and therefore have extensive health-care infrastructure. I am convinced that if a Berkeley student puts in the effort, he can find medical experience to be had.

Besides, I would point out that schools like Princeton have no medical school and are located in a small suburb far away from most hospitals, yet Princeton premeds seem to do very well. So do the premeds at the elite LAC’s, many of which are located in tiny little rural towns.

So while I agree that medical experience is quite important, I wouldn’t choose one undergrad program over another just because one has a nearby medical center. It seems to me that if you put in the effort, you can find that medical experience anywhere. It doesn’t have to be doing high-level clinical research.