Click here to go to the NEW College Discussion Forum

I'm wondering if its harder to maintain a 3.8 at a more prestigous university as compared to a regular public university. I'm gonna be transferring from Penn State (where I had a 3.8 cum), to Northwestern, and was wondering if it was actually possibly to keep a high GPA at a good school, I bet its gonna be about 20 times harder, but I guess I'm up for the challenge, but does this play a bearing when it comes to med school?

By Sar (Sar) on Tuesday, July 08, 2003 - 01:03 pm: Edit

Of course it's possible. But it's harder at a school where others are just as motivated to get that 3.8 as you are. Many students at regular public universities don't have high goals, and the professors know that, so they don't expect too much. You can get a 4.0 relatively easily. It's a good choice (good price) if you're extremely self-motivated and can push ahead of what's expected of you and make the professors as well as others (like important ppl you meet while you are volunteering or interning) notice you. Getting published is also a plus.

But if you can make it at a prestigious uni, it's definitely worth the hard work; you'd already be a step ahead of the public uni applicants. Though I wouldn't say it's 20 times harder. It depends on what you make of college.
Consideration of the friends you make: just as many successful people come from public universities as they do from more prestigious ones. And some public universities are pretty prestigious themselves.

Now, about med school. I think most prestigious institution grads with high scores apply to ivy or other prestigious med schools. State and city sponsored ones get the rest, and they're usually thrilled to have applications from prestigious universities. But if you ask any med school rep, they will tell you that where you come from doesn't count as much as what you did where you were. This could be true, but the same thing done in a public university looks more impressive when juxtaposed with "at [prestigious university]," unless everyone else from that same university did the same thing. Creativity counts...

ok, I can't think of anything else now.

By Ughstinkysocks (Ughstinkysocks) on Tuesday, July 08, 2003 - 09:57 pm: Edit

look into bs/md programs... these programs allow to get both degress... these programs are offered at many pretigious univ... but u dont have to worry as much about gpa b/c ure techically already in med school... just remember these programs are highly selective... check out aamc.com under combined degree programs for a list of schools that offer bs/md programs...

By Kimfuge (Kimfuge) on Wednesday, July 09, 2003 - 05:00 am: Edit

Obh100, if you had a 3.8 @ your community college, work your butt off to maintain that 3.8 @ Northwestern. In fact, aim for 3.9 or 4.0. If you aim it that high, you'll at the worst get a 3.8. And some people think that community and state colleges are less than rigorous, but in fact they're all similar with the exception of U of Chicago, Cornell, and MIT. Well, Northwestern admitted you cause you had the intelligence firepower to do the work, so I think you have a good shot at making it into a prestigious med school as long as you don't let go of that effort. I know this person from Northwestern who had a 3.7 and went to Duke med school. Goot luck!