Re-applicant Zits

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Hi everyone,

I will be a third time re-applicant this cycle and have been looking for advice and found this from Ohio State concerning personal statements:

"You have an excellent opportunity to take the negative and turn it into a positive. Since being rejected from medical school, what did you learn about your perceived shortcomings? What have you done to improve upon them? In the interval between your medical school rejection and your reapplication, what did you learn about yourself? Maybe you learned that you are an "overcomer," a person with resilience and persistence, someone who simply will not give up on his/her dreams. All of this is GOLDEN material for your essay -- use it. Many applicants in this position never mention that they were rejected the first time around. I understand this; it is not a pleasant memory, and it is easy to ignore, or at least not dwell upon."

Here's the link if you wish to read the whole thing: http://medicine.osu.edu/students/adm...ges/index.aspx

My question is: would taking this advice and writing about being a reapplicant be considered a "zit" as LizzyM says? Should I wait to potentially be asked these questions in an interview rather than offering them up in an essay as the OSU guy says? What he says makes sense, but it also seems to contradict LizzyM's advice, and I'm inclined to trust her over others. What do you think?

Hmmmmm... I thought this was going to be a "Zits" comic about reapplying...

For starters, it would help if you gave your stats (gpa/mcat) as well as how many schools you were screened at, interviewed, rejected, waitlisted, etc..


If your previous Personal Statements allowed you to get, say, 5 interviews which didn't lead to an acceptance, then your PS isn't the problem.

I thought it would be about breaking out due to teh stress of being a reapplicant. A seemingly normal individual transforming into a grotesque bundle of pus....




Just be honest. I'm sure they're looking for you to answer this question:


What is new about you (metrics or perspective wise) that makes you a better applicant than the one we (all med schools) failed we to see value in before?

Osu... are you shooting too high?

I'll be writing about my re-applicant status when it comes time to reapply, but I never made it to interview. You may not have such an easy and uplifting time explaining your growth since your last application, depending on your particular circumstances. For those who were shot down early in the application process, I think the personal statement is a great opportunity to showcase your growth, but for those with multiple rejections after interview, I'm not sure I'd recommend the same.

It is how you spin it. If you are going to write about being rejected and realizing that you were weak in a, b and c and that the reasons you were weak were d, e, f and that you really, really have a passion for medicine and just need one school to give you a chance.... that's a zit.

If you are going to write that you were rejected, knew that you needed more experience with x, y and z and went out and did that (lots of description) and learned so much (more description) and are so grateful for having had the last __ year(s) to explore x then that is not a zit.

See the difference?

I find myself only thinking about pimples while reading this thread.

I've got a c3.5 and s3.0 at a "public ivey" and a 29R. I'm planning on retaking in the next couple of weeks. I decided to go with a Kaplan tutor and class and I think it is making a huge difference.

The first time I applied, I was in the Peace Corps and had to hook my computer up to a car battery to write my PS. My wife talked me into applying that cycle in case we ended up coming back to the US earlier than expected. As it turned out, I was kidnapped a couple of weeks later and decided to return early. I didn't apply until the deadline in November and I only applied to 3 schools.

The second time I really boosted up my ECs, but after talking to the schools, they said the ECs were good, but I was "an academic risk" and needed to improve either gpa or MCAT. So that's what I'm working on now. I'll be able to get my application in in late July, which isn't ideal, but better than November and I'll apply much more broadly. I really didn't understand the process until this year, to be honest. I certainly wouldn't be nearly as far along in understanding how it works without SDN!

I didn't (and won't) apply to OSU because I'm out of state. I just found that after Googling "med school reapplicant advice" or something along those lines. My real question is: should I bring the fact that I'm a reapplicant at all or is it a blemish on my application that I shouldn't call attention to?

Originally Posted by JoeM

I've got a c3.5 and s3.0 at a "public ivey" and a 29R. I'm planning on retaking in the next couple of weeks. I decided to go with a Kaplan tutor and class and I think it is making a huge difference.

The first time I applied, I was in the Peace Corps and had to hook my computer up to a car battery to write my PS. My wife talked me into applying that cycle in case we ended up coming back to the US earlier than expected. As it turned out, I was kidnapped a couple of weeks later and decided to return early. I didn't apply until the deadline in November and I only applied to 3 schools.

The second time I really boosted up my ECs, but after talking to the schools, they said the ECs were good, but I was "an academic risk" and needed to improve either gpa or MCAT. So that's what I'm working on now. I'll be able to get my application in in late July, which isn't ideal, but better than November and I'll apply much more broadly. I really didn't understand the process until this year, to be honest. I certainly wouldn't be nearly as far along in understanding how it works without SDN!

I didn't (and won't) apply to OSU because I'm out of state. I just found that after Googling "med school reapplicant advice" or something along those lines. My real question is: should I bring the fact that I'm a reapplicant at all or is it a blemish on my application that I shouldn't call attention to?

Schools will know you are a re-applicant, whether you talk about it or not. If the story is important to you and you think you can spin it properly, I'd encourage you to write about it. If not, you can safely take a different direction. The choices have been presented; it's up to you now.

Originally Posted by JoeM

I've got a c3.5 and s3.0 at a "public ivy" and a 29R.

Care to elaborate? Some Ivy League schools (Cornell) actually have public colleges, but I assume you mean something else.

Originally Posted by DOCBERT

Schools will know you are a re-applicant, whether you talk about it or not. If the story is important to you and you think you can spin it properly, I'd encourage you to write about it. If not, you can safely take a different direction. The choices have been presented; it's up to you now.



Care to elaborate? Some Ivy League schools (Cornell) actually have public colleges, but I assume you mean something else.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Ivy

Originally Posted by Stumpyman

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Ivy

Thanks. I have honestly never heard of this before.

JoeM, you don't need to mention anything about being a reapplicant, that information is on your application.

Your PS should cover why you want to be a physician, how you've tested that interest, and the evidence that you can succeed in the pre-clinical years (academic work). That last one is crucial because you are non-trad with MCAT and gpa (particularly sgpa) that is well below average among matriculants (at many schools).

Originally Posted by DOCBERT

Schools will know you are a re-applicant, whether you talk about it or not.

Only the schools you applied to previously will know you are a re-applicant (because you have to indicate that on the primary when selecting the school). But if you plan to apply to a lot of new schools (recommended), I wouldn't talk about being a re-applicant in your PS because the schools who would otherwise be without this knowledge might wonder "why didn't other schools take this schmo last year?"

For the specific schools that you re-apply to, there might be good ways to address improvements to your new application through their secondary essays (that's what I experienced with a few of my re-applicant schools).

Ugh, thanks everyone, I'm still suffering from the break out from my MCAT and all I can think about is acne now

Also, I'm pretty sure all schools can see you're a reapplicant.

Originally Posted by PreMedOrDead

Ugh, thanks everyone, I'm still suffering from the break out from my MCAT and all I can think about is acne now

Also, I'm pretty sure all schools can see you're a reapplicant.

That's at least not what I heard. For example: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=902312 Unless, a schools secondary addresses whether you previously applied to ANY medical school, which I never encountered.

And at least for me, I was only asked about my reapplication at two interviews which happened to be at schools I applied to previously, but never at the schools that were new the second time around.

Maybe an actual AdCom member could clue us in

Originally Posted by Beekachu

That's at least not what I heard. For example: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=902312 Unless, a schools secondary addresses whether you previously applied to ANY medical school, which I never encountered.

And at least for me, I was only asked about my reapplication at two interviews which happened to be at schools I applied to previously, but never at the schools that were new the second time around.

Maybe an actual AdCom member could clue us in

I could have sworn the primary application I just filled out asked specifically if I had applied in the past...

But maybe they don't see that.

Originally Posted by PreMedOrDead

I could have sworn the primary application I just filled out asked specifically if I had applied in the past...

But maybe they don't see that.

When you add each individual school to the AMCAS, it asks, "Have you applied to THIS school before?" You check Yes or No. So the school you re-apply to will know right off the bat you are a second-timer. However, since the schools don't know what other schools you are currently applying to until later in the cycle (I could be wrong about that, though...?), I wouldn't expect them to know your answer to all those individual questions either.

Originally Posted by Stumpyman

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Ivy

lol shocked northeastern wasn't on that list, and miami (ohio) was.



JoeM, you need to be realistic and should be in a SMP. Why the heck are you applying to OSU with those stats? You are literally throwing money into a toilet and flushing it.



Look at the MSAR... It will do you major favors. And also be sure to apply DO

Originally Posted by JoeM

My question is: would taking this advice and writing about being a reapplicant be considered a "zit" as LizzyM says? Should I wait to potentially be asked these questions in an interview rather than offering them up in an essay as the OSU guy says? What he says makes sense, but it also seems to contradict LizzyM's advice, and I'm inclined to trust her over others. What do you think?

I was a reapplicant, and focused on that aspect of my application heavily when I wrote my PS and secondary essays. I talked about how my first rejection led me to reexamine my goals in life, and how I went about looking at other careers. I talked about how I ultimately turned down a program in another medical field to reapply to medical school, because I honestly thought it was the best fit for me.

Of the schools I reapplied to, a couple continued to not offer me an interview, one that previously had invited me to interview didn't, one accepted me, and one rejected me (again). I'm going to a school that I didn't apply to the first time, was my first interview of the new season, and hence gave me my first acceptance. The other school that accepted me, I focused on being a reapplicant and the things I learned during my interview, and I got an acceptance the next morning.