Tuesday, July 30, 2024

KOREA

Top 1% of natural science students enter medical, and pharmaceutical schools

기자명 Kim Ju-yeon
Published 2024.07.29 
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Most of the top-ranked high school students in natural science went to medical and pharmaceutical schools last year, a study showed. With the increase in the medical school enrollment quota from next year, the trend will intensify, according to experts.
A study has found that the top students in the natural sciences are increasingly gravitating toward medical school. (Credit: Getty Images)

On Monday, Jongro Academy, the nation’s largest private educational institute, released the results of last year's scores of students admitted to natural science colleges on the Korean Council for University Education's college entrance examination information portal.

The results showed that all 125 students admitted to universities with scores within the grade-point average (GPA) of 1.06 in last year's entrance exam went on to study medicine and pharmacy. Of the 125 students, 93, or 74.4 percent, went on to medical school, while 25 (20.0 percent) went to pharmacy school, four (3.2 percent) to veterinary school, and three (2.4 percent) to oriental medicine school.

None of the test takers went on to study general natural sciences, including engineering.

Even when the institute expanded the GPA scope to Grade 1, many students went on to study medicine.

Of the 157 students who scored a GPA of 1.07, 153 went on to study medicine and pharmacy, and 121, or 77.1 percent entered medical school. Only four (2.5 percent) went on to study general natural sciences.

Of the 1,246 students who scored within a 1.23 GPA, 1,137, or 91.3 percent, went on to study medicine and pharmacy, including 70.1 percent who entered medical schools.

A similar trend emerged when it expanded the scope to students accepted into universities with a GPA of 1.57 or lower. Of the 3,793 students accepted into natural science colleges last year, 2,670, or 70.4 percent, were admitted into medical and pharmaceutical sciences and 29.6 percent into general natural sciences. Among them, 1,432, or 37.8 percent, entered medical schools.

When the institute expanded the GPA threshold to 1.72, 2,888, or 60.6 percent, of the 4,766 accepted students went into medicine and 1,878 (39.4 percent) went into general studies in the natural sciences. Among them, 1,480 students entered medical schools, accounting for 31.1 percent.

The skewing to medicine was also seen among students at the top of the college scholastic ability test (CSAT).

According to the academy, all 488 students who scored within 98.62 points on average, the top 1.38 percent of the percentile in the language, math, and exploratory sections of the CSAT last year, went on to study medicine. Of these, 427, or 87.5 percent, entered medical schools.

Of the 918 students who scored in the top 2 percent with a mean CSAT percentile score of 98.0, 778, or 84.7 percent, went on to study medicine, while only 140, or 15.3 percent, went on to study general natural sciences. The number of students who entered medical schools was 640, accounting for 69.7 percent.

Lim Sung-ho, CEO of Jongno Academy, said there is a skewing toward medical schools among top students, which will intensify as medical school students increase from the 2025 academic year.

“As the recruitment capacity of medical schools expands in 2025, students in the top tier of both the CSAT and GPA will be more likely to apply for medical and pharmaceutical schools instead of selecting general majors,” Lim said.

Lim noted that natural science students with a 1.5 GPA will likely enter medical schools.

“The expansion of medical school enrollment quota may lead to a ‘medical school hyper-concentration phenomenon' and cause a larger drop in the admission scores of general science majors than that of medical majors,” Lim added.

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