When deciding which medical school you might want to go to, consider each school's grading system. Most schools have some kind of "Pass/Fail" system. At many schools, this means that they've replaced letter grades A, B, C, and D with Honors, High Pass, Pass, Fail. Which is like relabeling lard as "all-natural organic butter alternative!"
At some schools, students enjoy a true Pass/Fail system, which means your final grade in each course is either a P or a(n) F. Nowhere on your transcript does it say what your final exam score was, whether it was above or below the mean. It doesn't matter whether you barely passed or got the highest score in the class, all that anyone sees is a "P." Or, you know, an F. :/
P/F reduces stress and makes life more manageable. A,B,C,D and its many variations mean that there will be constant pressure to stay on your toes, to never fall behind, and to compete with your classmates as well as your own inertia.
Here's a scenario: You have two exams in the next 10 days. In Class A, you're maintaining an average in the low 90's, you find the material relatively easy, and you've been doing well on all the problem sets. In Class B, you barely passed the last midterm, and you're pretty sure your professor thinks that you're mildly retarded. With a pass/fail system, you can feel good about putting all of your efforts into making sure that you pass both your classes. You do what you have to do, which in this case probably means you spend 9 days poring over Class B's material until your eyes bleed, and skimming Class A's the night before the test. Of course, you want to learn as much as you can, and you'll need to learn it all for the boards later and for medical practice, blah blah blah. Whatever. Failing sucks, and a pass is a pass. Ideally, we'd all learn everything and be able to ace every exam. In reality, some stuff will always fall through the cracks. You can keep your transcript pristine and full of P's by budgeting your time and efforts to make sure that your grades are always good enough. You do the best you can, you learn as much as possible, and then you move on. As we like to say, P = MD.
P/F means that getting the flu a week before the final so you're too sick to study but not so sick that they'll let you postpone your test date doesn't mean you have to make excuses for your low grade when you're applying to residency three years later. It means that your transcript doesn't have to reflect those two weeks after you got dumped when you skipped class to eat Haagen-Dazs and watch all seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
I'm a big proponent of P/F for the first two years of med school. It just makes life better. When you're comparing schools, you should definitely look into what kind of grading system they employ and think about how it will affect your day-to-day life as a student.
P = MD. Learn it, live it, love it.
