It depends on what kind of competitiveness you're looking at. If you look at GPA, MD schools are more competitive. If you look at overall acceptance rate (total matriculants vs total applicants), it's easier to get into MD school than dental school. The average MD applicant has about a 43% chance of getting into at least one school out of those they apply to while the average dental applicant has about a 41% chance. That's going off the 2013 MD application numbers and 2010 dental numbers which, at the time I made the comparison, were the closest two years of data I could find–I don't think I was able to find more recent than 2010 for dental or farther back than 2013 for MD, though those stats may be available somewhere now.
I got an email from the AACOMAS application service itself since I have an account. I got the email at 10am this morning, it is definitely confirmed that there is no more grade replacement.
Right, which is why we'll have to wait and see if the 3.5's they've been getting in the past are all from grade replacement, or if most of them aren't. It would be kinda of scary to see a COM's average matriculate drop to something like 3.3 or 3.2. Maybe the more competitive D.O applicant will be more aggressively pursued, who knows. It's certainly an advantage to have done well the first time you take a course. I'm personally very fortunate to not be in the sub 3.5 bucket, but my gpa would still be better with replacement.
Why? They're too dumb to be doctors? Honestly it just comes down to hard work and experiences that allow you to relate to your patients. If someone takes a scenic route to medicine that is absolutely fine. They bring additional things to the table. Medicine is about the people and crazy 4.0 GPA+ 520+ MCAT automatons are a dime a dozen. DO schools seem to be cognizant of that fact and it's part of their "brand". But since DO/MD are virtually indistinguishable in practice these days, I guess this was to be expected.
That set of standards is known as the medical boards tests (comlex etc), and those scores currently include students who've utilized grade replacement. I doubt that there is any data which shows that replacement students score less than traditional students, or have less chance of passing the boards. If there isn't a way to distinguish pre/post replacement DO's in practice, then this move won't do anything to add to the credibility of the DO profession, but adding research and better clinical rotation sites or wards based rotations to the education would help DO students appear more competent come residency audition time.
If I recall correctly from AMCAS statistics, there is a statistically significant relationship between mcat and board scores, however uGPA is not a significant predictor of board scores and passing. Although this may just be for allopathic schools and not relate to comlex boards, I would bet this holds true. So, uGPA just becomes a screening tool and mcat performance predicts board passing. Maybe since DO schools have less high standards for mcat, this could be why their board pass rates are lower. Furthermore, the education during the first two years is less than standardized between schools, hence why USDE/Coca are cracking down on accreditation as a whole.
http://journals.lww.com/academicmed...rgraduate_institutional_mcat_scores_as.5.aspx
I remember reading somewhere that their committee is made up of DO school deans, I also heard that these deans voted for this change in order for it to get approved.
But what the correlations show is that there is a correlation between MCAT scores and board scores, however a much weaker correlation between uGPA and board scores. So I don't understand how getting rid of grade replacement could of been the motivator for attempting to improve board success.
Well no one who has taken the new MCAT has taken boards yet. And sure I agree that pre-clinical grades would be the best predictor for board performance but that can't be evaluated prior to matriculation. My point was that uGPA doesn't have as much of an indication of board success, and thus shouldn't be weighted as heavily as the MCAT for admissions decisions.
can you link me to those articles? for some reason I find this stuff super interesting too hahaTrue, I may have overlooked that you specifically talking about uGPA. I don't think the best way to determine which is more valuable of those two data points is via board scores though. It might be better to figure out of those two data points which correlates more heavily to better pre clinical grade performance, as that data point is more correlated to board performance? I really don't know just bouncing ideas around because I think it's an interesting topic
Edit: I did see that statistic but a quick google search pulled up quite a few scholarly studies that directly contradict that stat.. so who knows
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