When you are finalizing your high school experience and trying to apply for college, this can become quite the stressful process. That stress can easily be doubled if you are on a pre-professional track such as pre-med or pre-PA, which can make college essentially a three-year proving ground. If you are a parent, you may also be feeling this because you want what’s best for them. When I was younger, my parents were definitely on this journey with me through both the highs and the lows.
Today, I’m going to explain how you as a parent can help your student pick the best pre-med school for them without fixating on which schools have the “best” reputation or ranking. As you work through that decision, Parenting for College has a helpful guide on how to help your teen make the final college decision that looks at the bigger picture of fit, cost, and long-term success.
Choose a College for Pre-med Based on the Opportunities It Offers
The pre-med process requires a handful of important experiences that each student should ideally have by the time they apply. These include shadowing hours with one or more physicians, direct patient care or clinical experience, an MCAT score, a solid GPA, research, and volunteering. Those are really the big categories, and you can argue that you don’t absolutely have to have research, but I’d recommend having it.
When thinking about a potential college, you need to look at whether it can provide these big experiences. Is there a pre-medical advising department? How many pre-medical students do they have coming in as freshmen each year, and how many of them end up applying to medical school three years later? Are there pre-medical societies such as Alpha Epsilon Delta? These are just some of the questions you should be asking. If you are touring the campus, be sure to check out questions to ask on a college tour which can help you look beyond what is included in the admissions presentation.
Here’s a more comprehensive list of questions:
- What is the faculty-to-student ratio in the pre-medical classes?
- What is the pre-medical advisor-to-student ratio?
- Are there pre-medical summer programs?
- Is the pre-med advising website of that college well developed? If not, do they have a private page they offer to students with this information?
- Do students who attend that school go on to M.D. and D.O. programs after graduation?
- What percentage of students who apply to medical school get in?
- What percentage of pre-medical students take gap years?
- Is there a healthcare sector or major hospital near the college?
I want to now highlight some specific things colleges may offer that I feel don’t get pointed out often and, looking back as a current medical student, I think made a difference.
Consider Colleges With an Attached Medical School
The university I attended had a medical school on the campus directly neighboring the science building. This was a big deal because this is where I reached out to try and get a research position when I first arrived on campus. I was very fortunate, and one of my best mentors was a faculty member there who later became a letter of recommendation writer for me. Medical schools often are major facilitators of biomedical and clinical research, so this is a fantastic opportunity to get involved in research that is patient-focused. When you get to medical school one day, the research you did as an undergraduate can still be relevant!
It’s a direct link to being able to meet faculty who may either help you get into that medical school or become your letter writer one day. Additionally, my school held events at the medical school such as Q&As, meet and greets, conferences, and more, and I was able to attend almost all of these, even if they started minutes after a class ended.
Having the science and medical school buildings right next to each other was also super helpful because I could pop over and work on a research project, have a meeting with a mentor, or ask a quick question in between classes. Where else could you find that?
Look for Colleges With Pre-med Summer Research Programs
Summer breaks are great times to get lots of application hours racked up while also learning great skills. Many colleges offer summer research programs where students get paired with a mentor and a research project that they work on for 4–10 weeks. If you aren’t able to get a mentor during the year, this is a great way to get a spot with one. If research is new to your student, I think it’s important to learn what undergraduate research is and how it fits into the pre-med journey.
Even better, these summer programs are usually more favorable toward their own college’s students. So, your best chance may be to get into the program at your home institution rather than at another. If the college doesn’t have one, it’s one less opportunity your student may have to be accepted somewhere for the summer!
Choose a Pre-med College Near Hospitals and Healthcare Opportunities
Having a hospital system nearby is extremely important. Why attend a college for pre-med when the college is one hour away from any healthcare facility? Your student will have to make the drive anyway, but why not go to a college where they’re minutes away?
Better yet, go to a college where there is a healthcare sector. Not just one medical office or small group of practices. You want a hospital system and then a block or two of medical facilities, private practices, and other healthcare facilities. This is where you can find so many more opportunities!
Hospitals are full of paperwork and red tape before you can even step foot in the door as a volunteer, worker, or shadowing student. For me, it took months to finally be able to step in the door after many visits and lots of paperwork. In private practice, I often just texted the physician who owned it and was standing there shadowing the next day. This is just something to think about, but you want both because hospitals offer a lot of things private practices won’t and vice versa!
A Smaller College Can Sometimes Be Better for Premed Students
I think I realized this as time went on and I got closer to graduating. Sometimes, big colleges that are considered “the best” and “prestigious” will have lots of very competitive students. More importantly, there may be hundreds of pre-medical students vying for spots in research labs and at the local health facilities. At a smaller college, there may be only 100 pre-medical students.
If you find a college with the hospital, a healthcare sector, and only a moderate number of pre-medical students, your student may have a better chance at getting positions. It’s a balance! Too small and you may have fewer resources, and there may not be enough pre-meds for funds to be diverted toward that program. Too large and you may be competing for very few spots on campus and in the community. Find your sweet spot, and only you all can decide what that is.
Consider College Cost and Undergraduate Debt Before Medical School
Lastly, I want to bring up something few do because it matters so much at my stage of training. Medical school is expensive! College is expensive! You will not get paid, unless you voluntarily work a job throughout school, until you are a resident! That’s eight years of schooling at tens of thousands of dollars per year with no full-time physician income. As a result, it’s important to consider whether you should go to an expensive college for pre-med or not.
Yes, you can have loans, scholarships, and other support, but I am trying to point out that you should be smart with your money. Does this college offer everything I’ve detailed above? Yes? Great. Is there another college that offers everything too, but is cheaper? You get the idea.
When you are discussing colleges with your student, try to consider in-state versus out-of-state costs. The in-state public school, if it is a state-funded school, may offer many of the same opportunities that the out-of-state public school does. It is cheaper too! The public school in your state may offer as many or more opportunities than the private school does. Even if it doesn’t, you should weigh whether the extra money spent per year makes up for it. Parenting for College has additional resources on understanding college financial aid and what families should consider when worrying about paying for college, which can help when you are comparing the actual financial picture between schools.
If the private school is $10,000 more per year compared to the public school, this is $40,000 by the end of schooling and more if accounting for loan interest if that applies to your student. Are the opportunities offered worth $40,000? That’s up to you, but that should also be part of the discussion! If you and your student are balancing multiple acceptances, choosing the right path among multiple college offers is another important topic to learn about.
I personally went to a private university for my undergraduate degree, but this was cheaper than my public state university thanks to scholarships. I think both schools offered similar activities, but the institution I attended was going to have way fewer pre-medical students to compete with. It also came with a medical school on campus. So, that all factored into my decision.
The Best College for Pre-med Is the School Where Your Student Can Thrive
Sometimes, the “best” school is a combination of a lot of these factors and is much more than just a rank. My hope is that some of these concepts will help you and your student better approach the college choice and ease some of the worry behind going to the “best” school. Thank you to each and every parent who is working with their child toward attending college, and I wish you all the best in that journey!
Author Bio: Ryan Brownlee is a 3rd Year Medical Student at Medical College of Georgia & Founder of AspiringMD.com. Before medical school, Ryan attended Mercer University majoring in biochemistry and molecular biology. He will pursue a career in internal medicine once his medical education is completed.