2015-2016 Baylor College of Medicine Application Thread

Agree entirely with "safe" just above..."Jimmy Jones" is indubitably trolling...just another vacuous gadfly provocateur. Ho hum.

But for the serious people coming here, a few thoughts--

My argument about supposed rankings goes below the prima facie surface and fundamentally questions the methodology of USNWR which has aggrandized itself into the supposed "source authority" for ranking medical schools. It is a long-established magazine which engendered a new schtick for attention/notoriety, but ANY purported ranking system deserves careful, critical scrutiny.

Simply read what USNWR says about HOW they arrive at their rankings, which are based on aggregated hearsay and suspect assumptions, including weights assigned to very subjective perceived relevant criteria:

http://ift.tt/1EjJHP4

Fully 30% of USNWR's "primary care" rankings are based on the average percentage of graduates of any particular medical school entering primary care...per their definition---> FM, Peds, or I.M.

BUT, these are NOT the more competitive residencies, so is it necessarily even a plus that a school might be ranked highly in "primary care" by USNWR?!

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To the prospective medical student, several considerations would seem to be most relevant and telling about any medical school:

Can I get into this medical school?

What is the net affordability?

Will I get bang for my buck-- will they prepare me well to be a fine doctor AND to do well on the Step 1, the litmus test for obtaining competitive residency interviews and residency matches?

Finally, do their match lists demonstrate the success of their students?

BCM RIGHTLY bills itself as, "the most affordable private medical school in America."

Better still, its net tuition bests even MANY public schools, even for instate applicants.

Even if you get a 50% scholarship to many other schools (e.g., Harvard, Washington U, Hopkins, Stanford, Vandy, Duke, Emory), you can STILL pay a lot more! There are stories of STAGGERING levels of medical school debt. Scope out the average debt levels of graduates of any school you consider.

Second, with Lizzy M score averages among the top handful of schools, acceptance alone to BCM speaks volumes. Side note: MCAT scores, on average, do not much correlate with Step 1 scores (~ 30%). The latter purports to test what you learned and remembered during your first 2 years of preclinicals/classes, whereas the MCAT tests recall (sometimes several years later) of often first year college sciences.

Third, BCM Step 1 score averages have been at the very top, or right there, among all 130+ schools.

Finally, those nation-leading Step 1 score averages @ BCM, in turn, lead to competitive residency interviews and impressive match lists.
Res ipsa loquitur...the facts speak for themselves.

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2015-2016 Baylor College of Medicine Application Thread