@texaspg
Mayo handles their applications differently than just about every other school. Mayo specifically says NOT to send LORs unless they request them. In fact, sending letters to Mayo prematurely can get your app tossed for not following directions.
@seekingknowledge
Pretty much what I’ve heard too. Mayo especially likes significant community service/community activists since IIRC all of their med student earn a simultaneous MPH during med school.
@moonpie
It’s still very early. Don’t start worrying about not having IIs until the end of December. For now–PRN adult beverages! This process is full of “hurry up and wait.”
OTOH, D’s application at a big name school in Missouri is waiting for recommendations to show up from AMCAS to complete the app (they must get delivery via Antartica network wires or something since it has been about 3 weeks). Annoys me a great deal since it is one of the very few secondaries D chose to complete so far!
Instead assuming that AMCAS is horribly inefficient (which is often true), there are other possibilities:
the SOM hasn’t requested them yet (LORs don’t get passively downloaded to all schools; a school must first send AMCAS a list of students applying and ask for LORs)
your D’s app is currently low on the list for LOR download because she just now sent in her secondary. (there is a hard limit to the number of letters a school can download in each data transfer; there’s is also a limit on the number of downloads per week each school is allowed–so no one school “hogs” the bandwidth) Don’t worry her name will eventually rise to the top of the list as those who completed their secondary sooner than she are processed.
the SOM has received them and hasn’t updated the student’s application portal yet (Admissions offices are busy, busy places right now and some are scandalously slow to update applicant portals–like 3-4 weeks backlogged.) This is very common since admission office are seriously understaffed.
the LORs have gotten lost betwixt and between (doesn’t happen often, but isn’t unheard of)
@seekingknowledge , he has the high GPA, plenty of ECs. I feel his research is a little light, but has two years of psychology research and one summer of chemistry research full-time. He may be a little too cookie-cutter, but it seems to me that Mayo like.
@texaspg, yes that Missouri school is taking its sweet time downloading letters. A certain Atlanta school is also having issues with their downloads.
I was just looking at SDN profiles of kids that have interviews. There really is no rhyme or reason to this process. Kids with amazing stats got interview in Johns Hopkins for example but not NYU. Some New York residents got SUNY upstate but not Stony Brook. It seems like ADCOMS just put their hand in a pile of apps and pull some out.
Just curious, if the kid doesn’t get early interview at a high tier school like Johns Hopkins is he/she out of the picture for that school? I thought they only send early interviews to the superstars. Do the “common” people still have a chance later on?
Lots of reasons why Kid A get an interview at School M not School T–
the adcomm thinks they’ll probably matriculate someplace else (why waste an interview on a kid you know will go someplace else–esp true for TX residents everywhere outside of TX and high stats applicants at mid- and low-tiers)
while the stats may be amazing, maybe there’s something in the other parts of the app that isn’t posted/visible to outsiders, the adcomm wasn’t thrilled with (weak or bland LOR, awful essays, wishy-washy “why this school”, too little clinical experience, too little community service, too little research, an IA/arrest/ethics issue)
SIDE NOTE: kids who post profiles always think their ECs are great --but they may not be. Just like kids always think they’ve done great on their interviews when the reality is the opposite. Often a student is the worst judge of this aspect of their app.
kid doesn’t match school’s mission (including state residency/ties to the region for both publics and privates)
have a ton of kids with identical/similar profiles applying so the adcomm is looking for the something “special” to move the applicant into the interview pile (esp true for schools that get 5,000+ applications like NYU)
Superstars get interviewed first, but high tier schools know that any superstar is going to have multiple acceptances and not all of them will matriculate–so they’ll be interviewing more “average” students later on. IIRC, Lizzy M (who is an adcomm at a high tier research oriented school) said her school accepts 3 students for every 1 seat available
If you look at the list, the highest yielding schools are all public state U (all with very budget-friendly COAs) --except, of course, for Harvard which is among the most generous when it comes to FA for med students.
But all of the schools on the list have yields above 75%.
@WayOutWestMom …I am so new to this process since my D only decided this past Oct that she wanted to apply to med school! (yikes!)
Why would being a Texas resident hurt her chances at out of state schools? My D is very interested in several out of state schools and this made my heart drop for her…
There’s a presumption among adcomms that TX residents will stay in-state for med school due to a combination factors:
low in-state tuition costs
very strong in-state preference in admissions/high likelihood of admission for residents
very highly ranked in-state med schools (UTSW and Baylor)
A few schools (think Harvard, Yale, Stanford, JHU, WashU) won’t be discouraged by these factors, but other schools will be.
Med schools are very risk-adverse, and accepting students who don’t matriculate hurts their national rankings.
TX residents need to either have a prior affiliation with the school (like attended undergrad, did research with med school faculty, etc) OR be extra, extra convincing on the “Why School X” essay.
D has one Interview and one Reject. The Reject came before the II and you know what that does. All secondaries are in now the waiting on the rest 27 to see what happens begins.
University of Tn (our home state)… based on what others are saying and the past few years : ) no actual science involved! Some say Wednesday, some say Monday… but generally have gone out this week in the past. I cannot ask my D so I stalk the forums for info
@mayacollegeapps University of TN… but this is based purely on forums of past : ) no actual science here! I cannot ask a lot of questions to my daughter because it stresses her out, so I stalk forums! They have sent secondaries this week in the past couple of years, some say Monday, some say Wednesday… hoping for good news!
DS has one rejection and two II. He is complete everywhere but that special school in St. Louis, even though his letters have been there for a while. I honestly thought he would have a few more rejections already-namely U of Chicago. I guess he is close close enough stat and EC wise that they may be reading his application after all.
D has still about 12 secondaries to be filed including Chicago. She has 3 instate interviews lined up and none of them even needed a secondary. Those who did seem to be reading her essays over and over or else it shouldn’t be too hard for them to make that invitation.