2010-2011 Med school applicants and their parents

Pre-Med & Medical School Pre-Med Topics
501

<p>Hi Steeler, Is UVA’s medical school inside the main UVA campus or next to it? In your gut feeling, will a kid with less stellar ECs but with a good number have huge disadvantage in applying to UVA medical school? DS has been trying to search high and low for any schools that would “forgive” him for his “laziness” and lack of talent in buiding up impressive ECs :slight_smile: DS is not like you because you have published before/during your application (I think), but he has been laboring in a lab since a few months ago though.</p>

<p>curm once mentioned her D visited “Steelville” on her interview trail, but I do not know he meant pitts or charlotteville. (It appears to be pitts.)</p>

502

<p>That would be both, mcat2. The old and new Steelerville. ;)</p>

503

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<p>With as much bang for the buck as you get with one application (6-8 schools) it really is worth the time and effort…</p>

<p>[About</a> TMDSAS](<a href=“http://www.utsystem.edu/tmdsas/moreAbout_tmdsas.html]About”>http://www.utsystem.edu/tmdsas/moreAbout_tmdsas.html)</p>

<p>I can’t help but think that you’d get interviews at multiple schools but be aware some schools may not offer interviews if you’re too far outside their “norm” of matriculants…it happened with my S who was only offered interviews at UT-SW. Interestingly, both his interviewers at UT-H talked about his stats during the interviews while it never came up at UT-SW.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.utsystem.edu/tmdsas/Final%20Statistics%20Report-EY09%20-%20Medical.pdf[/url]”>http://www.utsystem.edu/tmdsas/Final%20Statistics%20Report-EY09%20-%20Medical.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

504

<p>Kristin – I can’t help but worry that 34.5 is a little too high as a cutoff. I was thinking more in the range of 33 or maybe even 32.</p>

<p>How do the percentages look this year? 4% was the cutoff I used, but that was a logical breaking point because there were a bunch of schools around 6% and then a few around 3%. That might not be the case anymore.</p>

<p>And if BU’s admissions percentage has risen since 2005, then by all means we can move it back into the main pool. I just didn’t want you doing so blindly.</p>

505

<p>Mike–34.5 was only one of those schools (can’t remember which, right now); one or two 33s, and the rest were 32 or below. I went with 34 over 33 after curmudgeon mentioned that average for girls can often be a full point lower than published averages, so I included that point to end up with 4 MCAT points to your initial suggestion of 3. I’ve also heard that in borderline cases, writing subscores can indeed influence decisions, so with an S it seems like I’d perhaps get the benefit of the doubt there. Does GPA work in my favor at all?</p>

<p>BU’s up to 4.5% and I agree that there seemed to be a break about where you mentioned, which is why I left my cut at 4. </p>

<p>So. 13 schools–6 or 7 matches, 6 or 7 reaches. Maybe–just maybe!–can I start putting the finishing touches on my list?!</p>

<p>EDIT: the 13 with average MCAT totals
Boston (32.1), Creighton (30), Duke (34.2), Georgetown (31.5), Harvard (35), Loyola (31.5), Mayo (uknown), Mizzou (30.3), Northwestern (34.5–this was the one that convinced me to write <34.5), Ohio State (33), SLU (32), UT-Southwestern (33) (or Drexel (30.6)–I don’t know if I want to do TMDSAS), UVA (32.8)</p>

<p>So if Creighton, Loyola, Mizzou, Ohio State, SLU, UT-SW/Drexel, UVA are my “legitimate schools” then only 3 of those–OH State, UT-SW, UVA–are pushing my limits, not accounting for the sex difference. And replacing UT-SW with Drexel would further put the numbers in my favor.</p>

<p>And Duke, Harvard, and Northwestern are pushing the MCAT envelope the most, but I’m tempted to believe they’re pushing the MCAT envelope for most people, and <em>if</em> I were to get interviews at any of them, hopefully come interview time MCAT would matter less and all those intangible things would matter more.</p>

506

<p>So your six matches are probably:</p>

<p>BU
Mizzou
SLU
Drexel?</p>

<p>It’s hard for me to imagine that the OOS publics (OSU, UT-S, Creighton) are friendly enough that it’d work. What’s the OOS interview rate at these places?</p>

507

<p>Creighton’s actually private (another Jesuit school–the other 3 are Georgetown, Loyola and SLU–yep I want to apply to all 4!). It interviews 13% of nonresidents and accepts 49% of those interviewed, or around 6%. It only interviews 10% of residents and its in-state acceptance rate remains around 6%.</p>

<p>Ohio State, while clearly not my state and another state’s public, interviews 13% of its nonresidents and accepts 65% of those interviewed, or around 8% total. Compared that to its residents: interviews 24% and accepts (some number that I didn’t record), or around 18% total. </p>

<p>UT-SW interviewed 15% of its nonresident applicants and accepted a whopping 89% of those interviewed. </p>

<p>Comparatively, BU interviewed 10% then accepted 50%; Mizzou interviewed 57% then accepted 53%; SLU interviewed 25% then accepted 93%; Drexel interviewed 13% then accepted 48%; UVA interviewed 18% then accepted 64%.</p>

508

<p>In response to a question from a poster who will remain nameless (blue bayou), here are the gender gap MCAT numbers from AAMC 2009 charts. </p>

<p>Applicants </p>

<p>Male- 29.1
Female-26.7
All-27.9</p>

<p>Matriculants</p>

<p>Male- 31.6
Female-30.1
All-30.8</p>

<p>So, to be statistically accurate, it’s 1.5 as to male and 0.7 as to all.
Matriculant numbers are the most important and have been the same for 3 years.</p>

509

<p>kristin,
D. overlaps with your additional 13 - 2 schools. She did not get NW secondary, maybe she will not get it.</p>

510

<p>I don’t know OSU very well, but I’m hesitant to endorse UTSW as a reasonable shot for an OOS candidate. It’s a very selective school – high MCATs, heavy research emphasis – even in-state, and I know that the OOS applicant pool is very strong.</p>

<p>As a general rule, I just can’t endorse using OOS publics as safety-type schools. Even OSU has a 2x gap in the interview rate – that’s not horrible, but it’s hardly promising, either. Are there no private schools you’re interested in? What about Tufts, Wake Forest, etc.?</p>

511

<p>thanks for the stats curm. Since women have achieved med school parity, I’m surprised at the mcat disparity, particularly since the sGPA is nearly identical (3.59 male, 3.61 female), as is overall (3.65 male, 3.67 female).</p>

512

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<p>MiamiDAP, I am sure your daughter will get NW secondary. They are slow downloading the AMCAS applications and they do it in batches. The website says they do not screen.</p>

513

<p>MyOpinion, thanks!<br>
I always get answers here, everybody is so helpful.</p>

514

<p>School GPA sGPA MCAT LizzyM</p>

<p>Tufts University 3.69 3.68 33 69.9
Boston University 3.74 3.72 32 69.4
Creighton University 3.74 3.72 30 67.4
Drexel University 3.62 3.57 31 67.2</p>

<p>Loyola University Chicago 3.65 3.59 30 66.5</p>

<p>I ran into this calculator that some students have used to get an idea where they are at, numbers wise, compared to the schools. LizzyM mentions it as another tool that could be helpful. It seems that it is less accurate for a student at either extreme- high GPA -low MCAT, low GPA- high MCAT. But for the rest, looking at students posting their results in terms of interviews, acceptances and rejections there is some general approximation when you are mostly at or below the school’s LizzyM score.</p>

<p>kristin, with a 3.8 and a 30 MCAT, your LizzyM is 68 (GPA*10 + MCAT )</p>

515

<p>Good to know, thanks for the data MyOpinion. Would it be reasonable to say that a 68 would fit with each of the schools you listed? I’m not sure how rigid that 68 is–ie, can I fudge numbers a little bit and be OK at schools closer to 70 (like Tufts), or should I stick with <68?</p>

<p>Mike, I originally excluded Wake Forest (small acceptance percentage, <4%) and Tufts (MSAR gave me 33 or 34 MCAT, and its tuition is >$50k) but revisited them with USN numbers. Wake only interviews 6.8% of its appliacants (434/6371) and consequently has an acceptance percentage of 3.2%, so (while I think Wake’s a great school!) for numbers purposes it doesn’t seem like the best bet.</p>

<p>Now, Tufts’ numbers from USN are notably different from MSAR, which could push Tufts back into the “think closely about this one” category. Plus, Tufts is in Boston, and I’ve heard wonderful things about Boston–to the tune of one guy even saying, “EVERYONE should have a chance to go to school in Boston at some point.” Tufts’ average MCAT from USN is 31.8 (much more in my range than 33+, correct?), they interviewed about 11% of their applicants (730/6700) and then accepted 61% of interviewees for a total acceptance rate of 6.6%. From a USN numbers perspective, Tufts looks like it has TONS of potential–thanks for suggesting I take another look!</p>

<p>If I add Tufts, which would you remove? (I have a feeling you’ll say OH state or UT-SW)</p>

516

<p>“I always get answers here, everybody is so helpful”</p>

<p>Couldn’t agree with you more, Miami. This thread has been priceless for me–I don’t doubt for a second that I’ve gotten more solid advice from some of the posters here than from anywhere else I’ve looked. To me, CC is med school admissions’ best kept secret! Rock on guys, and thanks!</p>

517

<p>MY suggestion, again, if you do apply to any TX school, just do them all. The base fee is the largest amount, then $10 to add each other school. I don’t think any or maybe 1 had any secondary that required writing. The basic TX app required secondary like writings.</p>

<p>DD got 2 interviews and they were not necessarily the schools that we predicted.</p>

518

<p>I’ve heard that same advice, somemom, from other sources too–so if I go the Texas route, then I plan to take it! Still debating whether or not to include any Texas schools. If I take out the “grrr another application” side (because let’s face it, I’m sure a secondary or two would be at least as much work), then it’ll really just come down to numbers and what seems to work for my set of credentials. I don’t know anything about Texas schools right now (besides the potentially favorable numbers of UT-Southwestern) since I’d been avoiding them (figured–“It’s Texas! They don’t like nonresidents!”) in MSAR and research. Looks like, at the very least, I should check into them. I’ll keep ya posted.</p>

519

<p>DD did AMCAS first, then moved on to TX.</p>

<p>She squeezed this in between graduation week, a family celebratory trip on which nothing productive occurred and a new job a 15 hour drive away…so, she graduated in one state, packed up all her stuff, drove to another (2-3 days) state for the vacation, then drove (another 2-3 days) to our home to unpack college stuff and pack grown up stuff for a new life. </p>

<p>What’s the point of all that info? She had several occasions of thinking to drop the entire TX app simply due to the hassle, especially as this was all unfolding the last week of June, about 5 weeks AFTER all the early birds had submitted their apps.</p>

<p>The worst things about doing TX: you use the same PS, but you have to edit it down to fewer characters and since when DD did it she had not received any secondaries, the extra essays seemed frustrating…HA! Little did we know they were ‘nuthin’ compared to some secondaries.</p>

<p>That is another thing to consider, some schools have 2-3 questions, some have 10-12 (KS/MN etc), so if you are at the flip a coin stage, you might check the questions on SDN. DD tried to keep the attitude that the more they asked her, the better chance she had to be more than her stats. And once she’d done a few secondaries she’d pretty much covered all the potential questions</p>

520

<p>kristin UT-SW is not the best school for you in Texas, admissions-wise. But, thankfully, they are also not the only attractive med school in Texas. There are several in your range.</p>