<p>“Graduate adcoms and medical colleagues will not care about any wait-list conspiracy theories that have been tossed around by a few uninformed CCers.”</p>
<p>Absolutely true. But they will also not care that an undergraduate applying to medical school is doing so from a college affiliated with a well ranked medical school. One could apply from Rice, a great institution with NO medical school and be at absolutely no disadvantage whatsoever when applying. I get tired of trying to debunk the misinformation promoted by certain universities and their boosters in this regard. To argue that “few schools rival WashU” for “pre-med” (an ugly way to describe four years of college) is the sort of statement emblematic of which I speak. ALL quality undergraduate institutions are rivals, rivals absolutely on equal footing to med school adcoms.</p>
<p>As far as academics at the two schools are concerned, I (and my “friends”) will acknowledge strong programs at both schools. But at Northwestern they are across the board, many absolutely top national standouts (chemistry, economics, journalism, sociology, communications, music, theater, education, material science, nanotechnology, business, law, et al). Wash U still has some weaknesses in need of shoring up in its academic disciplines, most notably in engineering.</p>