<p>I'm aiming to get into the medical school in a different state than I'm currently in. I'm an Illinois resident and I'm trying to get into medical school in Washington state. I'm currently a sophomore. I have an aunt who suggested I get a drivers license under her address in washington, let a year pass, and apply as an in-state using that address. I realize that this could possibly save tuition cost as well as improve my chances. Any thoughts?</p>
<p>UWash? Pretty much no chance if you’re not considered an in state resident or from the surrounding states. Look into what the rules are for establishing residency there. Might not be as easy as what you’re aunt is saying.</p>
<p>[UW</a> Residency - Medical Student Applicants](<a href=“Medical Student Applicants - Office of the University Registrar”>Medical Student Applicants - Office of the University Registrar)</p>
<p>The only (slight) window for non-WAMI OOS students is for students that are underserved or want to serve the underserved.</p>
<p>Thank-you both!!! Here is what I found after some research:</p>
<p>*In order for University of Washington students to be considered residents for tuition purposes, they first must be able to prove that they are U.S. citizens, have U.S. permanent resident cards, or have a qualifying visa (A, E, G, H1, I, K or L).</p>
<p>To be classified or reclassified as residents, for tuition and fee purposes, students must establish a bona fide domicile in the state of Washington primarily for purposes other than education for the period of one year immediately prior to classification as residents.</p>
<p>Nonresident students who are enrolled for more than 6 credits a quarter will be presumed to be in the state of Washington for primarily educational purposes. Such period of enrollment shall not be counted toward the establishment of a bona fide domicile of one year in this state unless the students prove they have, in fact, established a bona fide domicile in this state primarily for purposes other than education*</p>
<p>Followup question: What if I transfer to a Washington state (or a state classified as “In-State”) university, and I start, say, living on their campus or nearby, will that count?</p>
<p>Whether you live on or off campus is irrelevant. If you are attending college, your presence in the state will NOT count towards establishing residency. Your presumptive state of residency (assuming you’re under 24 years of age and have not already graduated from college) will be that of your parents.</p>
<p>If you looked at entomom’s link, you’d see that you must provide proof of economic independence (by providing copies of your parents’ federal tax return as well your own), proof that you’ve been employed in the state of Washington for at least 1 year (and have filed a WA state tax return), as well as taking other necessary steps to establish WA state residency (lease, car registration, car & health insurance, voter registration, bank accounts etc).</p>
<p>Basically, what you want to do is game the system so you can be considered a resident of a state with a medical school you’d like to attend. Coincidentally or not, that state’s state school happens to be one of the best out there. Premeds are notorious for wanting to game the system.</p>
<p>What this translates to is that it’s not going to be easy to establish residency in Washington, as you can see from what WOWMom posted.</p>
<p>Are you SOL? Probably not. Will this be a lot more difficult than having your aunt get your a driver license? Almost certainly. Is it worth it? That’s for you to decide. </p>
<p>I think my first step would be to figure out why you just have to go to Udub for medical school. Is it their program? Their facilities? Their faculty? Their curriculum? Their clinical structure? Their match list (caution!)? Their location? </p>
<p>I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised to see how similar medical schools are to each other than they are different. If you want to go into primary care, sure it would be nice to go to the school that’s #2 for primary care (or whatever Udub is ranked now). But is that really necessary–so necessary that you’d uproot your entire life for it? Would a different school actually be just as good for you? (I imagine the latter is the case!)</p>
<p>OP, what is your home state now, and what is your reason for wanting to try to change it?</p>
<p>UWash? Pretty much no chance if you’re not considered an in state resident or from the surrounding states.</p>
<p>I’m curious about this statement as applicants from the WWAMI region are considered In-State and UWash matriculated 18 students from Out-of-State according to MSAR. MSAR also states, generally, less then 5% of the matriculating class is from outside the WWAMI region. Also, residency is not considered for MD/PhD applicants. Thus it is difficult but not impossible to be accepted to UWash as an Out-of-State student.</p>
<p>Right, it’s not impossible, but they accept so little oos that you’re probably wasting money applying unless you fit the criteria of what they are looking for in oos students. I believe when they reject oos people, it’ll say something like out of area candidate or something like that. Like entomom said, “The only (slight) window for non-WAMI OOS students is for students that are underserved or want to serve the underserved.”</p>
<p>Here are the numbers from us news: 3411 applied oos, 86 interviewed, 40 accepted, 19 enrolled.</p>
<p>UWSOM accepts very very few OOS applicants. If you are a student there who attended school in another state, professors will actually ask you how you got in! A current applicant who has something like 20+ interview invites from great schools was immediately declined a secondary invite.</p>
<p>If you want to genuinely attend UWSOM, call Dana in the residency determination area and figure out how to do it the right way. You could be a resident of any of the WWAMI states, though I believer AK, ID, MT, WY only add about 20 students a year and WA has about 120+ in each year’s class.</p>
<p>Move to that state and establish residence once you finish undergrad. Get a job, perhaps as a university research assistant so you are gaining related experience, and legitimately become a resident. BUT, be aware, they want to know if you are a resident when you apply, which is a year before school starts. It takes 12 months living in WA to become a resident, you would have a two year gap.</p>
<p>You cannot move to WA as a WSU/UW/WWU student and establish residency while a student. I do know a student who moved to WA in spring of year 1, not in school at that time, then applied for Fall year 2 and was able to be a resident, the residency form asked how long in WA and she called that school’s director (each school may have different policies) and was told 12 months at time of matriculation.</p>
<p>So, you could take a year off in the middle of your undergrad, establish WA residency, then continue on.</p>
<p>Using your aunt’s address will not benefit you as she is not your guardian, if your parents move to WA, and if you are dependent on their taxes, that would work.</p>
<p>UWSOM is a highly ranked school and our family’s experience with it have been positive, but IL has several schools, why the wish to change?</p>
<p>When I was applying to one of the public medical schools in my home state, the form not only asked about home address , previous addresses, and employment (for me and my parents), but also asked about things like voting registration and state taxes (for me and my parents). If I was claiming that I’d been a resident for less than three years, they wanted me to do something absurd like document every time I had been out of the state for more than five consecutive nights as well.</p>
<p>The bottom line is that state medical schools (and public universities in general) know that people would like to receive the tuition break and the admissions preference and are pretty adept at keeping people from doing so.</p>
<p>To OP: I strongly advise you to re-think this plan. Why? In your post, you say you’re an Illinois resident. There are many many more slots in Illinois state medical schools than there are in Washington, even factoring in the respective populations of both states. In addition, Illinois has several private medical schools that give a lot of weight to Illinois applicants-Rush, Chicago Medical, even Loyola/Chicago. The Annals of Internal Medicine had a breakdown of in-state preference a few months ago, so you can check that out. So if you’re looking to get into medical school, and want to get in-state preference in admissions, stay an Illinois resident. You’ll have a much better shot at getting in.</p>
<p>Cranky is right, UWSOM is the only school for 5 states, IL has numerous public & private schools.</p>