By: Savvy Pre-Med Staff

If you didn’t already know, medical schools tend to prefer students who live in-state or have clear ties to their area/region.

Just looking at this breakdown of data will show you the difference in acceptance rates for in-state vs. out-of-state applicants at medical schools, sometimes as large as a 30 or 40% discrepancy. 

So, the area, state, and school you choose for your undergraduate years could have a significant effect on your eventual medical school destination.

Plus, it’s just fun to make rankings and lists!

With that in mind, we thought it would be an interesting exercise to rank the best colleges for pre-meds in each of the four regions denoted by the U.S. News and World Report: North, South, Midwest, and West.

For these lists, we’ll be drawing upon our brand new Best Colleges for Pre-Meds Search Tool, which conveniently allows you to filter your search by region.

Read more about how we gathered our data for these rankings and our search tool.  

The 10 Best Colleges for Pre-Meds in Every Region

Top 10 Pre-Med Colleges in the North Region:

Includes 11 states: New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland/DC, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Delaware, Vermont, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey

1. Johns Hopkins University (overall rank: #1)

2. Columbia University (overall rank: #3) 

3. Princeton University (overall rank: #4) 

4. Bowdoin College (overall rank: #5)

5. Bryn Mawr College (overall rank: #9)

6. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) (overall rank: #10)

7. Brown University (overall rank: #11)

8. Bates College (overall rank: #14)

9. Dartmouth College (overall rank: #15) 

10. Swarthmore College (overall rank: #16)

Top 10 Pre-Med Colleges in the South Region:

Includes 12 states: Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee

1. Vanderbilt University (overall rank: #6)

2. Tulane University (overall rank: #22)  

3. College of William and Mary (overall rank: #24)

4. Duke University (overall rank: #25)

5. Davidson College (overall rank: #30) 

6. Emory University (overall rank: #31)

7. Rhodes College (overall rank: #37) 

8. Centre College (overall rank: #48)

9. University of Richmond (overall rank: #53)

10. Furman University (overall rank: #56)

Top 10 Pre-Med Colleges in the Midwest Region:

Includes 12 states: North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio

1. Northwestern University (overall rank: #7)

2. University of Chicago (overall rank: #8) 

3. Carleton College (overall rank: #12)

4. Grinnell College (overall rank: #29)

5. Washington University St. Louis (overall rank: #33)

6. Macalester College (overall rank: #43)

7. Kenyon College (overall rank: #46)

8. Case Western Reserve University (overall rank: #47) 

9. Oberlin College (overall rank: #57)

10. University of Notre Dame (overall rank: #66)

Top 10 Pre-Med Colleges in the West Region:

Includes 15 states: Washington, Oregon, California, Idaho, Nevada, Arizona, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, Texas, Oklahoma, Hawaii, Alaska

1. Stanford University (overall rank: #2)

2. Rice University (overall rank: #13)

3. Claremont McKenna College (overall rank: #27)

4. Scripps College (overall rank: #38)

5. California Institute of Technology (overall rank: #39)

6. Loyola Marymount University (overall rank: #40)

7. Harvey Mudd College (overall rank: #42)

8. University of Southern California (overall rank: #61)

9. Trinity University (overall rank: #64)

10. Occidental College (overall rank: #69)

So, how did your college(s) rank?

Have any questions about the best colleges for pre-meds? Let us know in the comments below, and we’ll respond to you personally!