Is an Ivy-league educated doctor better than a doctor who went to a state college?

Question

Obvioulsy it's MUCH harder to be accepted into University of Michigan than Michigan State, so therefore wouldn't a doctor from U of M be better/smarter than a doctor from MSU in the same field? Wouldn't a Harvard grad be better/smarter than a doctor who graduated from Central Michigan University?

Answer 1

Personally, I'd rather have a doctor from a top school, including a top medical school; one who interned/was a resident at a top hospital. The chances are better that this is a doctor on top of his/her game... and, yes, the chances are better that this is a smart person.

Though many super-intelligent people go to schools that are NOT top-ranked, virtually all students at the top-ranked schools are highly intelligent. The odds are simply better that you'll find a bright person at a top school.

And I'd rather have a highly-qualified doctor than one less-so, all things being equal.

Answer 2

The have some better researc doctors and research programs (and you usually have to get on such a team) so you might be exposed to some cutting edge concepts. Also they often have state of the art equipment.

You get, however, the same basic education.

What you might be able to do is attend a 500 seater seminiar at Harvard given by a Harvard team that the U of M doctors are also coming to hear and you hear it first hand instead of second hand.

This is not, however, to say Harvard is foolproof and some graduate fellow with a bright idea got turned away and U of M took them on and now Harvard is coming for a ground breaking seminar. It happens, just not as often at never at MSU as a general rule.

I will say, however, in providing research and historical tools to colleges around the country we came on a new tool and a new person and talked to all the colleges and most penciled this in for September except for ONE Ivy whose teach said

I don't have time to change my syllubus. It took two years for him to update his undergraduate class! So kids at the 2 year College of Staten Island were getting a more up to date history for $2K a year than were his Ivy students at 40K a year

I won't say who, other than to tell you it Wasn't Havard Nor Yale

Answer 3

Not really. As long as you have an MD, it doesn't matter where you went. Though, I will admit that sometimes going to an Ivy League does help, not because of the name, but because of the connections. The children of important people go to Ivy Leagues and you make some awesome connections. My friend goes to Stanford and though it's not an Ivy, it's a top school. She's rooming with the daughter of some CEO and the daughter of an ambassador. Obviously the people you went to college with or roomed with will become your friends and they'd be more willing to give my friend favors rather than someone they don't know.

It has nothing to do with smarts, though. No one is smarter than someone else just because they got into Harvard. It just usually means they worked a lot harder than everyone else. Not to put down people that don't go to Ivies, though. I'm sure lots of hard-working people don't get in, but people that go to Ivies just had something amazing I suppose that made the admissions office pick them.

Answer 4

Well, first of all, I don't think Central Michigan has a medical school. What matters is the medical school they went to, not the undergraduate program, although it is easier to get into most medical schools from an elite school than it would be from a state university. Although there are exceptions, you are generally correct. In addition to the the quality of admitted students, the other thing which can make a difference is the ability someone at an elite school has to work in well-furnished labs with the most respected of medical school professors, an opportunity which those at lesser schools don't have.

Answer 5

What do you call a doctor who got a C average at school....... A Doctor. It makes no real difference.

Schools at state level use the same text books as ivy schools. It is the person and their residency that makes the difference in "smarts."

Actually some of the State schools are more respected than Ivy schools. Ex. Iowa, Illinois, Chicago, Mich, Texas to name a few.

Answer 6

I have had doctoral professors who graduated from Stanford, some place in Michigan, Harvard, Chapel Hill, Boston College, local SUNY schools, and everywhere in between, at my CUNY &SUNY experiences.

I have found the ones who went to non-Ivy, or tops, to be more progressive, innovated, and interested in their work; the others are usually overwhelmingly stiff and self-interested, which killed my desire to listen to them.

So for the betterment of your personal academic background, and not for the progression, of you teacher's study, the answer to your question would be: No.

Answer 7

Not necessarily. Lots of people just aren't fortunate to get accepted at an Ivy League school or don't even want to consider going to one.