<p>Just a heads up to the peepz applying this year.</p>
<p>I thought I would get a 3-4 week hiatus b/w the submission of my primary and having to fill out secondaries but alas that was just a pipe dream. Submitted primary on June 11th. First secondary invitation: today (June 22nd).</p>
<p>What schools are you applying to?</p>
<p>The usual suspects:</p>
<p>All the CA schools except for Loma Linda</p>
<p>The usual lottery schools: Harvard, Columbia, JHU, and such</p>
<p>Some match schools: George Washington, Georgetown, NYU, BU, Tufts</p>
<p>Some safer schools: St. Louis, Drexel, Jefferson</p>
<p>Don´t forget that secondaries are often "out" without any notice. That is, you have to dig around on their websites to discover that secondaries have been released. Columbia, Hopkins, WUSTL, and Baylor come to mind.</p>
<p>norcalguy:</p>
<p>If your GPA is 3.7+ and your MCAT score is 35+ (ie. you think you have a serious shot at Harvard, JHU, etc.) forget Jefferson, Drexel, George Washington, and Georgetown. They won't bother interviewing you since they'll think, "No way this guy is going to come to our school. He'll get in somewhere more prestigious."</p>
<p>Drexel is everyone's safety school so I'm sure they're quite used to playing that role. As for George Washington and Georgetown, they're local and easy to interview at. If I take out all those schools, I will basically only have reach schools left lol</p>
<p>When you said your safety school was St.Louis, does that mean Washington University in St.Louis?</p>
<p>norcalguy:</p>
<p>I'm just speaking from personal experience. :) Since you're local, Georgetown and GWU might give you an interview. GWU put me on hold for 6+ months, told me that might interview me in April, and then finally rejected me. Total waste of time and money, for me.</p>
<p>shades: I'm working at the NIH and will have a rec from my PI. Hopefully, that will have some pull (although I probably should get an interview regardless).</p>
<p>BlueElmo: Yes. I have a 4.3 GPA and a 44 MCAT. That puts WashU's 3.9, 37 average to shame.</p>
<p>I just don't get it, what is so special about the medical school at Washington University in St. Louis?</p>
<p>Chingy:</p>
<p>Someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think I am.</p>
<p>By GPA and MCAT score, WUSTL could be considered to be "the most difficult medical school to get into" in the US. However, since the average GPA and MCAT score for the accepted WUSTL student are so high (higher than Harvard, Yale, Duke, Stanford, or any other med school) very few students apply, which means its "acceptance rate" is around 10-12%, I think.</p>
<p>I am aware that WUSTL is, by numbers, the most "competitive" medical school in the country. But, my question remains; what is it that attracts such outstanding students to WUSTL in the first place?</p>
<p>What attracts outstanding students to Harvard, Columbia, and Duke?</p>
<p>Yes, so why then do the most qualified applicants apply to WUSTL?</p>
<p><em>slaps forehead in frustration</em></p>
<p>My point was that the things which attract applicants to Harvard or Columbia also attract them to WashU: a high ranking, lots of prestige, a lot of research $$$ and opportunities, state of the art facilities, and location in a major metro area. In addition, WashU is the pinnacle of med schools in that region much as Stanford/UCSF standout out West or Harvard/JHU standout in the Northeast. It draws heavily from the top talent in the Southern region of the United States among applicants who want to live in that area (yes, not everyone wants to live in CA or in the Northeast). </p>
<p>WashU doesn't have a stronger applicant pool than Harvard or Stanford. It has the same applicant pool. It is just more of a numbers whore (just like its undergrad) than other med schools. It chooses to accept applicants who are very strong numbers-wise but perhaps a little weaker in terms of the other facets of their application. An applicant with a 3.9 GPA, 37 MCAT, and weaker intangibles is not necessarily a stronger applicant than someone who is 3.8, 35, with strong EC's, LORs. Hence, you can't say that WashU has stronger students than Harvard.</p>
<p>What I am trying to get at is to move beyond the numbers. Is it a coincidence that all the high achievers apply to WashU or is there something distinct in their program that draws the top applicants to the institution in the first place? I'm sorry if my question is causing frustration to some of you, but anyone willing to share I'd like to hear. :)</p>
<p>norcalguy,</p>
<p>I appreciate your straightforward responce.</p>
<p>Apparently, University of Michigan is now sending invites for auto interviews and it's only June 25th.</p>
<p>Don't apply to 25 schools unless you're prepared to fill out 25 secondaries. :(</p>