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<p>The question at hand isn’t whether med schools consider the academic reputation of the undergrad (they do, but moderately so). The question is whether attendance at “high status” medical schools (e.g., Harvard, Johns Hopkins, WashU) confers additional economic benefit on graduates compared to “lower status” medical schools. And the point that I’m making is that, generally speaking, the answer is no, because the medical profession is not like law or business where there are “golden” grad schools that get all the cool jobs. There are a lot of reasons to want to go to an excellent undergrad. There are a lot of reasons to want to go to a top law school (e.g., T-14) or top b-school. The landscape in medical school is simply flatter. The T-14 graduate will have access to firms that the “lower law school” grad won’t have. The top b-school grad will have access to companies that the “lower b-school” grad will have a lot harder time getting access to. Medical school is different. It just is. It’s not good or bad, it’s just different, and if Pascarella et al think otherwise, they are just not dealing in reality.</p>