Medical Schools in Wisconsin: How to Get In (2024)
/Learn how hard it is to get into medical schools in Wisconsin, including admissions statistics and strategies
Part 1: Introduction
Part 2: List of medical schools in Wisconsin: 2024 rankings, tuition, and admissions statistics
Part 3: Wisconsin medical school profiles
Part 4: Wisconsin medical school admissions strategies
Final Thoughts
Appendix A: Wisconsin medical schools by degree type
Appendix B: Wisconsin medical schools by institution type
Appendix C: Wisconsin medical schools by region
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Part 1: Introduction
Known for its long tradition of producing dairy delicacies, Wisconsin is renowned for being the capital of cheesemaking and the birthplace of the ice cream sundae. If that’s not enough to keep your spirits high amidst the daily grind of medical school, you’ll also have access to hundreds of miles of Great Lakes shoreline for rest and recreation.
If you plan to earn your MD in Wisconsin, you’ll have two schools and multiple locations to choose between: Medical College of Wisconsin has campuses in Milwaukee, Green Bay, and Central Wisconsin, while University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health is located in Madison.
Keep reading to learn more about Wisconsin med school admission statistics, as well as strategies for compiling resume experiences, essays, and interview responses that will help you put your best foot forward with adcoms. We’ll also lay out the specific degree programs and clinical opportunities available to med students at the various campuses of Wisconsin medical schools so you can start mapping out your path to a white coat today.
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Part 2: List of medical schools in Wisconsin: 2024 rankings, tuition, and admissions statistics
Medical College of Wisconsin
The oldest medical school in the state, Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) was founded in 1893. Although it’s currently unranked by the U.S. News and World Report, it has gained a favorable reputation over the past century for the quality of its medical education, growing to become the state’s largest private research institution. It has a slightly lower barrier of entry compared to top medical schools in the country, but the average GPA and MCAT scores of new matriculants (3.7 and 509, respectively) still make for an extremely competitive admissions process.
University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health
University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health (UWSMPH) tends to be even more selective regarding GPA and MCAT scores, with the average among recently accepted students being 3.75 and 511, respectively. The cost of tuition ($43,288 for in-state students and $60,968 for out-of-staters) is by no means cheap, but it’s a significantly more affordable option than the MCW—especially for Wisconsin residents.
The price tag and the school’s Tier 2 ranking from U.S. News and World Report, make it a highly appealing option for med school applicants. With so many students applying, you’ll need to work diligently to earn your spot among the 9% who are invited to interview—and your spot among the new entering class.
Keep reading to learn all you need to know about how to craft compelling applications for medical schools in Wisconsin.
| Wisconsin Medical Schools | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Medical College of Wisconsin | Unranked |
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| University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health | Tier 2 |
* Note: Wisconsin residents are automatically eligible for approximately $3,350 in financial aid.
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Part 3: Wisconsin medical school profiles
Medical College of Wisconsin
Since its founding in 1893, the Medical College of Wisconsin has expanded to three campuses: Milwaukee, Green Bay, and Central Wisconsin. Each campus offers a variety of clinical and research opportunities, so you’ll want to carefully weigh your options and spend a significant amount of time researching each campus when deciding where to apply.
Degree programs at Medical College of Wisconsin
MCW is home base to over 1,600 students across various programs within the healthcare field.
In addition to the MD degree, Medical College of Wisconsin also offers the following programs:
Doctor of Public Health Program (DrPH)
MA in Bioethics
MA in Biostatistics and Data Science
MD-MPH (Medical Doctor - Master of Public Health)
MD/MS in Clinical and Translational Science
MD/PhD - Medical Scientist Training Program
MPH Master of Public Health
MS in Anesthesia
MS in Bioinformatics
MS in Clinical and Translational Science
MS in Genetic Counseling
MS in Global Health Equity
MS in Healthcare Technologies Management
MS in Precision Medicine
MS - Physician Associate
PhD in Biochemistry
PhD in Biomedical Engineering
PhD in Biophysics
PhD in Biostatistics
PhD in Cell and Developmental Biology
PhD in Microbiology and Immunology
PhD in Neuroscience
PhD in Pharmacology and Toxicology
PhD in Physiology
PhD in Public and Community Health
Studying medicine in an environment that offers such a wide variety of degree programs is an ideal way to familiarize yourself with the ins and outs of the healthcare system. As an MCW student, you’ll have the opportunity to live, study, research, and serve alongside future pharmacists, scientists, and global health professionals as you learn to work together to improve the future of healthcare.
For applicants looking for a more accelerated MD program, the three-year programs at the Green Bay and Central Wisconsin campuses offer an alternative to the standard four-year program at the Milwaukee campus. However, condensing the rigor of an MD program into just three years may prove to be quite a challenge. It will also significantly limit the amount of time you have to explore your options and settle on your specialties of choice before applying to residencies.
Whichever path you choose, you’ll want to take a magnifying glass to the curriculum so you can start envisioning what the next few years of your life will look like as a med student in Wisconsin.
Curriculum at Medical College of Wisconsin
As a med student at the Medical College of Wisconsin, you won’t need to wait until you get your white coat to start making an impact. The MCWfusion curriculum (launched in July of 2023) offers a balanced blend of academics, research, and clinical experience that directly impacts the community.
All MCW medical students are required to take on a Scholarly Project before graduating, which often results in published research. As one of the National Science Foundation’s Top 100 Research Universities in the country, Medical College of Wisconsin places a strong emphasis on both lab- and community-based research, investing over $338 million worth of funds from the Advancing a Healthier Wisconsin Endowment toward community health initiatives in 2023-24.
It’s a rigorous program, but the results are promising. The most recently available data on residency matches reveals a 97% match rate for med students graduating from the Milwaukee campus and a 100% match rate for Green Bay and Central Wisconsin campus graduates.
University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health
The University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health was founded in 1907 and began conferring its 4-year degree in 1925. Several decades later, in 2006, It was the first school in the country to offer degrees across various areas of healthcare in order to foster collaboration and integration between medicine, pharmacy, public health, and policy—a mission now shared by Wisconsin’s only other medical school, MCW.
Degree programs at University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health
All five of UWSMPH’s healthcare degree programs place a heavy focus on public health and community outreach across the state of Wisconsin:
Doctor of Medicine (MD)
Doctor of Medicine - Master of Public Health (MD-MPH)
Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT)
Interdisciplinary Biological and Health Sciences Consortium (with concentrations in Biomedical Data Science, Cancer Biology, Cellular and Molecular Pathology, and six other areas).
Master of Genetic Counselor Studies (MGCS)
Master of Physician Assistant Studies (MPA)
Master of Public Health (MPH)
MA in History of Science, Medicine, and Technology
MS in Biomedical Data Science
MS in Biostatistics
MS in Biotechnology
MS in Clinical and Health Informatics
MS in Endocrinology and Reproductive Physiology
MS in Epidemiology
MS in Medical Physics
MS in Molecular and Environmental Toxicology
MS in Population Health
PhD in Biochemistry
PhD in Biophysics
PhD in Biostatistics
PhD in Cellular and Molecular Biology
PhD in Genetics
PhD in History of Science, Medicine, and Technology
PhD in Medical Physics
PhD in Microbiology
PhD in Neuroscience
PhD in Population Health
Curriculum at University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health
UWSMPH’s ForWard curriculum reflects its unique approach to medical education. Rather than spending two years learning foundational science followed by two years of clinical experience, as a med student at UWSMPH, your education will be separated into three phases:
Phase 1: Your first three semesters will span several focus areas including (but not limited to) patient-centered care, professionalism, public health, nutrition, the building blocks of the immune system, genetics, and neuroanatomy. Throughout this phase, you’ll work on a Patient-Centered Education Case (PaCE) in small groups to help apply what you’re learning and integrate it with clinical skills.
Phase 2: Over the course of four 12-week blocks, you’ll increasingly focus on clinical experience within the following areas: OB-GYN, pediatrics, chronic and preventative care, acute care, and surgical and procedural care.
Phase 3: For the final 16 months of your medical education, you’ll begin to narrow your interests as you move toward choosing your specialty. You’ll gain even more advanced and practical clinical experience and develop skills in tasks that will prepare you for your internship—such as patient handoffs, discharge summaries, and the development of management and treatment plans.
Although UWSMPH only has one campus in Madison, the university’s Statewide Campus system opens the door for medical students to gain experience at affiliated clinical locations all over the state, including Milwaukee, Marshfield, Green Bay, La Crosse, and Ashland. Two particular programs designed to help students gain essential hands-on experience beyond Madison are Training in Urban Medicine and Public Health (TRIUMPH) and Wisconsin Academy for Rural Medicine (WARM).
In addition to its diverse opportunities for clinical experience, UWSMPH also provides a robust environment for research, having received $641 million in grants for extramural research in 2022-23.
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Part 4: Wisconsin medical school admissions strategies
Medical school admissions is a difficult process by nature, but the best way to increase your odds of gaining acceptances is to ensure that your essays and interviews are carefully tailored to fit the unique culture and mission of each school to which you’re applying.
Strategy 1: Develop strong secondary essays for Wisconsin Medical Schools.
You’ll want to give yourself a significant amount of time to write your secondary essays for medical schools in Wisconsin. But to avoid doing more work than necessary in an often overwhelming process, it’s wise to adapt the essays you’ve already written for other schools rather than writing brand new essays from scratch.
Make sure you know which specific degree program(s) at each school match with your individual career goals, and then take every opportunity to mention specific programs or features of the curriculum that complement those goals.
In addition, we strongly advise that you demonstrate your fit for Wisconsin medical schools by researching their official institutional values and telling stories that illustrate those same qualities in yourself. For example, MCW’s institutional values are stated as:
Caring
Collaborative
Curiosity
Inclusive
Integrity
Respect
And The UWSMPH’s institutional values are described as:
Integrity and Accountability
Compassion
Diversity, Equity, Inclusivity
Excellence
Depending on the prompt, the stories you tell in your essays don’t always have to be directly related to medicine—as long as they provide further evidence about your reasons for applying to medical school, your fit with a particular school, or your unique skills and strengths.
| Wisconsin Medical Schools | |
|---|---|
| Medical College of Wisconsin | |
| University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health |
Looking for secondary essay examples? Click below to access sample secondary essays for every prompt required by every MD and DO program in the United States and Canada. 1500+ essays and counting.
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Strategy 2: Prepare for interviews at Wisconsin medical schools.
Being selected for an interview at Wisconsin medical schools means that you’ve already caught the adcom’s attention and progressed further in the admissions process than most other applicants.
If you’re invited to interview, the adcom is already extremely interested in your past experiences and future goals. Heading into the interview, you don’t need to worry too much about proving yourself or winning the interviewers over; you just need to give them a reason to trust that you are who you say you are.
Although you can’t ever be sure of which questions you’ll be asked during your interview, you can prepare yourself as thoroughly as possible by replicating the interview environment and practicing your unscripted responses to common interview questions until you’re confident in your ability to discuss any topic.
Similar to your secondary essays, your interview responses should be filled with anecdotes from your life. That way, rather than just telling the interviewers that you’re great med school material, you’ll be able to prove it by providing concrete examples.
Invited to a med school interview? Congrats! Learn how to prepare for any question the interviewers throw your way using the resource below.
Gain instant access to the most common traditional and MMI interview questions, plus sample responses for each, to help you craft responses that lead to acceptances. Subscribe today to lock in the current investments, which will be increasing in the future for new subscribers.
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Final Thoughts
If your sights are set on medical schools in Wisconsin, you have two great options to choose between. Headquartered in the state’s two largest cities—Milwaukee and Madison—with multiple campuses throughout the state, you’ll have the opportunity to serve the community in whichever capacity best aligns with your future career goals. Both schools confer a wide variety of degrees within the health professions, so your time as a med student will be enriched by your surroundings as you interact with students and faculty from various disciplines.
There will be plenty of hurdles to clear throughout the competitive application process to both Wisconsin med schools, but by following our optimal medical school application timeline, researching each school’s institutional values and unique opportunities, and tailoring your secondary essays and interview responses to demonstrate your fit for each school, you’ll be well on your way to achieving your dreams of attaining a medical degree in Wisconsin.
About the Author
Dr. Shirag Shemmassian is the Founder of Shemmassian Academic Consulting and one of the world's foremost experts on medical school admissions. For nearly 20 years, he and his team have helped thousands of students get into medical school using his exclusive approach.
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Appendix A: Wisconsin medical schools by degree type
Allopathic medical schools in Wisconsin (MD)
Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW)
University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health (UWSMPH)
Osteopathic medical schools in Wisconsin (DO)
There are no osteopathic medical schools in Wisconsin.
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Appendix B: Wisconsin medical schools by institution type
Public medical schools in Wisconsin
University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health
Private medical schools in Wisconsin
Medical College of Wisconsin
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Appendix C: Wisconsin medical schools by region
Medical Schools in northern Wisconsin
Medical College of Wisconsin’s Green Bay campus is located in northern Wisconsin.
Medical Schools in central Wisconsin
Medical College of Wisconsin’s Central Wisconsin campus is located in Wausau, WI.
Medical Schools in southern Wisconsin
Medical College of Wisconsin’s Milwaukee campus is located in southeastern Wisconsin.
Medical Schools in Madison, Wisconsin
University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health is located in Madison, WI.
Medical Schools in Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Medical College of Wisconsin’s Milwaukee campus is located in Milwaukee, WI.
