2015-16 Med School Applicants and their Parents

<p>“Why apply to an OOS public?”
-Just because it is OOS public, you would not apply to places like U of Mich?
Well, it is everybody’d choice. As I have mentioned many times, the cost of our in-state publics is about one car price less than privates (because of high cost of 3-4th year, which many people do not see for some reason). After seeing that, I said, who cares, I can skip buying another car for awhile, we are OK with what we have.</p>

<p>I have a question about establishing residency. What is required? Massachusetts state schools seem to accept only residents. Son is in UG in MA now and has a lease on his name. So by the tine he will be going to med school he’ll have a lease for.2 years. Is that enough to make him a MA residents? But we will still claim him on our income tax so does it make him a NJ resident. Can he be a resident in both states?</p>

<p>@momworried That is something that you should ask the school, different schools may have different rules. I would imagine that being registered to vote and having a car registration in that state would also help. And, it may hurt if he is listed as a dependent on your tax return. Ask the school, though, as they get the final say.</p>

<p>He is dependent if he is covered by your medical incusrance. I do not know the way around it. Our D. (who will graduate from Med. School in May of 2015) is our dependent, she is on our tax returns and she is covered by our medical insurances.</p>

<p>That question is a perfect one to ask the med schools in Mass. Sometimes the med schools have different residency requirements than the undergrad side of things. You should be able to find this info on the med school’s website. If not, you could get in touch with the financial aid person at the med school who certainly will know all the requirements! </p>

<p>D went to UG in mass, I remember they were very strict about residency…no OOS except those that are in MD/PHd</p>

<p>From UMass SOM admission website–</p>

<p>Residency criteria;

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<p>^^</p>

<p>Sorry about the triple post. (Could one of mods delete the duplicates for me?) Computer connectivity issues at work.</p>

<p>But based upon UMass’s published residency criteria, I doubt momworried’s son would qualify for in-state status at UMass.</p>

<p>Note that the other MA med schools-- BU, Tufts and Harvard are all private-- so state of residency really doesn’t matter for those.</p>

<p>Thanks everyone. It doesn’t look like he will qualify. </p>

<p>So I guess I will join this group. Since DS began school, I have been pushing for a gap year, but after three years, he is still resisting it.
DS will begin submitting his LORs to the committee in March and will be taking he MCAT in May or June (depending on if he decides to go EDP). </p>

<p>D is a senior and planning her gap year. She will take the MCAT in January and start applications over the summer. She has a list of 10-15 schools that she has told me she wants to apply to. I am guessing she has more that she hasn’t told me about because she has said she may apply to up to 20 schools. Maybe she just hasn’t decided what others she may want to apply to.</p>

<p>One of the schools on her list is our in state public, another is an instate private, and a third is her undergrad school, an out of state private.</p>

<p>I am wondering if she will have any edge at her UG school because of already having a relationship with them?</p>

<p>The adcomm at her undergrad’s med school will be familiar both with her recommenders and the rigor of her coursework. How big of an edge this is – YMMV. </p>

<p>BTW, until your D has a MCAT score, creating a list is pretty much a waste of her time.</p>

<p>Unless her all parts of her application are absolutely impeccable, she should apply to at least 15-25 schools; fewer than that and she risks not getting enough interviews to garner an acceptance–esp given how competitive it has become in the last few cycles. </p>

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<p>first her stats have to be competitive in her own school before they will consider her other attributes. In general, some private takes 10% of their own, if you are in the top 10% in the UG with a PBK key, it is very likely.
She will be most competitive in her IS public, out side of CA that is.</p>

<p>thanks for the responses.</p>

<p>@wayoutwestmom she made her list upon her premed advisors recommendation. I am not one to argue with advisors, they are paid to know more than I know. I would hope that the conversation would have included advice to drop or add particular schools later, based on her MCAT score, or to drop the dream altogether if the score is below a certain number. </p>

<p>I also know that based on her health issues, a school in the south or west is better than a northern or Midwestern school. So, if our instate school (Midwest) is the only one she is accepted at, then she will have some serious thinking about if her health can handle following her dream. And, knowing what the southern schools she is interested in requires on the MCAT will give her motivation to study enough to do her best to get that score.</p>

<p>She does know that med school acceptance is a crapshoot and does have a good back up plan in case of no acceptances. (she has a public health minor and wants to do a dual MD/MPH. If she is not accepted at a school she wants to go to, she will do the MPH alone and reapply to med school.)</p>

<p>Um… some pre-med advisors are surprisingly ill-informed. Especially when dealing with medical schools outside of their own region. The health professions office at D2’s undergrad knew East Coast schools and a few midwestern schools, but weren’t particularly informed about southern, western or most midwestern med schools. (In fact, she got some pretty inaccurate advice about one school in particular.) </p>

<p>IOW, don’t assume your D’s health profession advisors are always right. Verify using school specific websites and the MSAR. You might also consider lurking on school-specific threads over on SDN to see what kinds of people are gaining acceptances this cycle at her target schools.</p>

<p>BTW, speaking as westerner–they are mighty slim picking for allopathic med schools for OOSers in the west. Most allo schools are public and most are extremely protective of in-state applicants. The situation is brighter for osteopathic schools since most of the western DO schools are private–except for Texas. </p>

<p>I agree with @WayOutWestMom‌ mom about advisors. My son just met with his. She told him that he can pretty much get into any med school he wanted to and there is no need to apply to more then 10. She based this only on his GPA and MCATs and didn’t ask him about his ECs, research or anything else he’s been doing for the last couple of years. He goes to a really good private UG that is known for its great premed advising. So it makes me wonder. I’m not the trusting kind and like to do my own research. I don’t like the fact that she instilled all this confidence in him and now he’s fighing me about applying broadly. Don’t get me wrong, confidence is great. But I prefer that he was realistic. </p>

<p>In 2013 48k+ applicants applied, 20k+ matriculated. Besides number of seats available, why did 28k not make it? I suspect you’ll see some posts here shortly disagreeing with D’s advisors and her strategy of less than 10 apps. As food for thought may I suggest following two alternative links:</p>

<p><a href=“how medical schools pick applicants : | Student Doctor Network”>http://■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/threads/how-medical-schools-pick-applicants.1085339/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Above is link to SDN thread “how medical schools pick applicants” Although I find the entire thread helpful as to this topic as it offers comments from many respected SDN posters/adcoms (Law2Doc, gyngyn, LizzyM, Ismet, Goro), below are two of the posts: </p>

<p>Law2Doc (posts 37, 43)</p>

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<p>Here is another on point link/quote</p>

<p><a href=“http://■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/threads/no-interview-invites-for-md-admission.1103125/page-2#post-15780733”>http://■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/threads/no-interview-invites-for-md-admission.1103125/page-2#post-15780733&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Goro (post 55)

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<p>As indicated above, there is much more (ECs, LORs, PS, Interviews) to a successful med school admission than just numbers. D may want to reconsider her strategy of limiting app number to less than 10.</p>

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<p>I see people saying this about the undergrad applicants and med school applicants and I am not sure why people would automatically assume that those who pay attention to their grades and tests are ignoring their ECs. It is more than likely that those who have an issue getting into schools assumed they can concentrate on reach schools rather than apply broadly or got some really bad advice along the way like momworried’s son is currently getting telling them they will get in everywhere…</p>

<p>I didn’t think poster’s second quote assumed that a 4.0/40 has ignored ECs at all. I interpreted the second quote to only further poster’s first quote that med school admission is simply not about who has highest numbers. Every component of an app is important. I think OP’s S confidence that it’s just a numbers game is in fact misplaced.</p>

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<p>I don’t think people are assuming that high stats applicants are all blowing off their ECs, but that quote is in the reference to the many high stats applicants over on SDN who whine they have X GPA and Y MCAT and still got passed over for someone with lesser stats (but had better ECs, was a better match to the school’s mission or target population, or offered increased diversity or that something “special” the school was looking for.) </p>

<p>Med school is not just about numbers. If it were, a computer program would be selecting who gets accepted. </p>