Doctors Ask Medical Schools to Drop MCAT Tests During Pandemic

[Dave_Berry]

"A professional society of 163,000 physicians, trainees and fellows of internal medicine in the United States is asking medical schools to waive the entrance exam because the COVID-19 pandemic has made testing unmanageable. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.

The American College of Physicians (ACP) suggests the schools look at applicants holistically – considering factors including grades and experience – and dispense with the Medical College Admission Test – known as the MCAT - for entrance year 2021." …

https://www.voanews.com/student-union/doctors-ask-medical-schools-drop-mcat-tests-during-pandemic

[WayOutWestMom]

AAMC responds:

August 6, 2020

An Open Letter to MCAT Examinees and Our Community

Making the MCAT optional for the 2021 cycle, as some have argued, may be a workable option for some medical schools, but it would not result in a fair or equitable process across-the-board at this point. Of the 50,000 expected applicants to medical school this year, MCAT scores for 37,000 have already been transmitted to medical schools. Encouraging schools to waive the MCAT exam will introduce inequity into the review processes that are already underway at many medical schools and could ultimately disadvantage students from underrepresented and lower socioeconomic backgrounds by taking away their opportunity to take the exam and meaningfully compete with other applicants. AAMC data show that at least 3,600 examinees from these backgrounds who have already submitted their medical school applications are scheduled to take the exam on the remaining dates in August and September. The AAMC cannot in good conscience disadvantage these applicants based on little to no evidence of actual safety risk to examinees.

Full text of response here:

https://students-residents.aamc.org/applying-medical-school/article/open-letter-mcat-examinees-8-6-20/