Reply to where would Williams and Amherst rank in the ivy league..

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Sure, I guess. But with such extraordinarily selective schools, who really cares?[/quote]

Williams and Amherst, and many other SLACS, are fantastic schools but they would rank lower than any of the Ivies in a head to head competition due to the lack of comparable science and engineering resources.  They aren't really comparable which is why they are separately ranked. [/quote]

Totally agree. Williams and Amherst can't compare with the ivy league because virtually all of them are much larger research institutions. [b]The academic resources of Princeton/Harvard/Cornell/Penn are light years ahead of Williams and Amherst.[/b][/quote]

And most of it has nothing to do with undergraduate study.[/quote]
I'd say having access to massive research institutes and facilities is pretty helpful in undergrad. DS does research at the school of Medicine and hasn't a day taken a course in the med school. Some people just use their resources better than others.[/quote]

Do R1 research universities have higher medical school acceptance rates than SLACs or higher percentages of students getting advanced degrees in STEM?  NO.[/quote]

Agree.

If you go outside the very very narrow range of HYS or WASP.  The second tier lacs (T5-T10) have much much better results than the second tier R1 research Us (Chicago WashU Emory Duke).  JHU is an exception in R1 Us, but you know JHU.  Your DC has to work 10x harder there.

Medical acceptance rate is one thing.  The more problematic issue is the weedout rate, which is invisible.
At liberal arts colleges the weedout rate is extremely low.  Same for HYS.

Once you go down to the second tier R1 research Us, the weedout rate is much higher.  Half of the incoming class at WashU want to pursue premed.  By sophomore, half of the premed kids are weeded out by Orgo.

In contrast, weed out rates at the second tier LACs like Wellesley, Haverford, Bowdoin, Barnard are much lower (near zero).[/quote]

On top of these, then you have the culture issue.

At R1 Us with huge premed population, the culture tends to be toxic, competitive.  
At lacs it's more collaborative.  [/quote]

Premed should be [b]viewed as an investment[/b], a huge one.  
Risk management comes in play when you are investing a large amount of capital.

What are they going to do at a R1 U when they are weeded out?  With a biology degree (most premed weedouts), you will be thinking research, perhaps a Ph.D down the road.  That's a rather poor investment for your 99K per year tuition.  That should be done in your in-state flagship then goes on to MIT for Ph.D., not at a private college.

Prestige matters very very little for premed.  Sure no one heard about "Haverford" and every one knows Harvard.  It doesn't matter once you have the M.D.[/quote]
As I just posted, the world doesn't end for biology grads at the top colleges. There's more to the world than graduate training.[/quote]

Another issue is that many (not all) premed kids are interested in a medical career, but not in a research career.  Some of them may feel miserable doing wet lab.  For these kids the research option is not a natural one.  Outside the very top colleges, premed weedouts more often switch to other pre-health fields such as PA and nursing.  Again, this is an investment decision.  Do you really want to pay 99K per year for a nursing degree, while your in-state flagship provides the same or higher quality nursing program?[/quote]
I can't help you with baseless assertions.[/quote]

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