AMCAS; save $$ by picking the right schools

[Altius Premier Tutor]

Dear SDNers:
Here is an extremely insightful study conducted by our admissions team last year. Don't submit AMCAS without reading it first (easy 10-15 min read). This report will save many students thousands of dollars in wasted application fees and increase their acceptance rates across the board because they'll be applying to schools at which they actually have a legitimate chance.
Don't neglect the advice at the front to make phone calls and verify things like course requirements, geographic preferences, history of acceptance from your region, etc. ONE PHONE CALL to the admissions office is all it takes to get this kind of info and it saves TONS of headaches.
#shotgun application approach is so 1980s
SDN server says the file is too large to attach, so hopefully this link works instead: https://www.dropbox.com/s/b0jlzvfzp6i5id2/TrueOutofStateReport-R15.pdf?dl=0
Enjoy.

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[DokterMom]

A very informative read, and not a 'click-bait teaser'.

Worth reading applicants!

 

[GrapesofRath]

While some of the conclusions made from their analysis---particularly the top 20 schools for true out of state applicants---might be questionable the part about residency and how history of acceptance from your region and actually CALLING admissions offices is something that should be stickied on this forum.

 

[toffee_bloom]

Thanks for sharing this! It was definitely helpful. If only the MSAR did provide this kind of information, that would save applicants some money in not applying to certain schools.

 

[Jimmy Jones]

Thanks for sharing this! It was definitely helpful. If only the MSAR did provide this kind of information, that would save applicants some money in not applying to certain schools.

Yeah, the MSAR has been one of the most useless purchases I ever made

 

[northernlights15]

Yeah, the MSAR has been one of the most useless purchases I ever made

I think the MSAR is a fantastic resource.

 

[toffee_bloom]

I wouldn't say it's useless, it definitely has a lot of helpful info on there. It'd be impossible for it to have everything an applicant is looking on there, a lot of which could be found on the school's website. For stuff like this, I guess that's what SDN is for!

 

[Jimmy Jones]

I think the MSAR is a fantastic resource.

Hmm... It seems all the schools have tremendous overlap in their 10th to 90th percentile for stats, and almost all schools take students that did some form of research, and I don't know what else to take away from it. It doesn't easily allow you to compare schools at once and you can't filter by things that would actually be interesting to see (such as, schools that don't have a certain course as a prerequisite)

But ok. Glad you like it. It just hasn't been very useful for me.

 

[XxThaDoggxX]

^^ I completely agree...The information is so superficial..I want something that tells me the niches of the school and goes in depth about what differentiates this school from the others! That's what I pay for! Not data I could easily accrue off google.

 

[toffee_bloom]

I mean I feel like it does on their sections where they describe what sets the school apart in terms of the program they offer, what the city is like, whether students do some global trip, all the important dates, a breakdown of the student body by race/ethnicity, how much research money they get, their curriculum, whether research or volunteering is required...I don't know, I'm sure most of this stuff you can find off their website too, but it's nice how easily they organized it. I've gotten quite a bit of use out of it. Wanting to know specifics like that about a school is a good thing to ask about in an interview anyway.

 

[XxThaDoggxX]

I may end up making a separate thread about this...but is there any table or excel sheet of information that list small random things a school likes or heavily weighs?

For example Riverside in CA heavily favors the inland empire, Dartmouth loves Non-trads, etc.

Anyone happen to know of such a resource??

 

[jhg1232]

nothing show up when i open the link

 

[Altius Premier Tutor]

nothing show up when i open the link

I just double-checked it from a couple of our computers and it worked, and others see to have reached it. Try it from a different browser. If that doesn't work, pm me your email and I'll send it directly to you.

 

[HybridEarth]

http://phoenixmed.arizona.edu/2014

Why is this school on your top 20 list of schools that are typically OOS friendly? This link tells me otherwise...

 

[jhg1232]

I just double-checked it from a couple of our computers and it worked, and others see to have reached it. Try it from a different browser. If that doesn't work, pm me your email and I'll send it directly to you.

works for me now, thanks!

 

[ChrisMack390]

@Altius Premier Tutor thanks for posting this! Definitely helpful and I plan to call pretty much every school I am applying to to ask this and a few other questions (mostly their specific attitudes about graduate degrees).

Though the link that @HybridEarth just posted has me a bit concerned about following your specific school suggestions...

 

[ChillDawg]

If I'm reading this correctly, the Texas schools are OOS friendly...?

And Why is Oregon so high on the list? They explicitly state that they have a strong IS preference...

 

[XxThaDoggxX]

If I'm reading this correctly, the Texas schools are OOS friendly...?

And Why is Oregon so high on the list? They explicitly state that they have a strong IS preference...

For Oregon I believe they counter this by saying if you fit into one of their "Mission based groups", with one of them basically just being a highly competitive applicant stat-wise

 

[Chlorini]

@ChillDawg... Texas schools CAN be OOS friendly. It just depends on your app. You can guarantee your application will get looked at when you apply to a Texas school...only about 3000-5000 applications are received per school each cycle. Plus, there are 2 brand new Texas medical schools this year (UT Rio Grande and UT Austin) which should make things interesting. A lot of UT Austin kids will want to go to UT Austin (which is predicted to be the next UT SW) which may cause all the other schools to lower their stats a bit.

 

[ChrisMack390]

I'm tempted to apply to some Texas schools, but I"m a New Jersey resident and the idea of filling out a third application that is so low yield is really unappealing...

 

[ChillDawg]

For Oregon I believe they counter this by saying if you fit into one of their "Mission based groups", with one of them basically just being a highly competitive applicant stat-wise

Sure, but the way Altius' list is ranked based on OOS probabilities for high numbers and borderline numbers, and even combining the probabilities, Altius lists OHSU as #6, which feels like quite a stretch...

 

[PatrickStarMDPHD]

I may end up making a separate thread about this...but is there any table or excel sheet of information that list small random things a school likes or heavily weighs?

For example Riverside in CA heavily favors the inland empire, Dartmouth loves Non-trads, etc.

Anyone happen to know of such a resource??

I would love to know this too. I have heard the same thing about Dartmouth, but I would love a centralized thread that discusses those little things that certain schools love.

 

[NeuResurgens]

"In one case of which we are aware, a school accepted a single applicant from a distant state, but that person just happened to have a 41 (523 on the new scale) on the MCAT, worked for two years in the White House, had multiple primary author publications, and had won a Silver medal in the Olympics - things that even the best applicants won't have to offer."

 

[ChillDawg]

I may end up making a separate thread about this...but is there any table or excel sheet of information that list small random things a school likes or heavily weighs?

For example Riverside in CA heavily favors the inland empire, Dartmouth loves Non-trads, etc.

Anyone happen to know of such a resource??

DO IT!

 

[DokterMom]

If I'm reading this correctly, the Texas schools are OOS friendly...?

And Why is Oregon so high on the list? They explicitly state that they have a strong IS preference...

Texas is OOS friendly if you really high numbers -- If you don't, save your money.

 

[Altius Premier Tutor]

http://phoenixmed.arizona.edu/2014

Why is this school on your top 20 list of schools that are typically OOS friendly? This link tells me otherwise...

Not having been involved personally in the survey, but I'm looking at that link and from what I know, it seems it could fit. AZ-P is accepting about 30% OOS, which is high. They favor CA heavily, but if you look at the map for the last four years they are regularly taking OOS from around the US, usually different 6-8 states each year. That may not seem like much, but they have a small class size so half a dozen students will add up quickly as a proportion of 30% of an already small class. I think I counted (very quickly) around 20 different states that are not neighboring states in last few years. This includes Midwest, Dakotas, IL, IN, MD, VA, NY, MD, VA, etc. So they're regularly taking from across all the US.

I think you may have been expecting big numbers, but on a nationwide map 1-2 per state would be significant. Even most schools accepting mostly OOS are going to have lots of zer0s or 1 for most states.

The main point of the report was that students are applying to schools where they have zero to infintessimal odds. AZ-P is showing they do accept coast to coast, while some schools if you saw a map like that 100% of non-neighboring states would be zero. That's the info which if you lack will cost you money.

 

[Altius Premier Tutor]

@Altius Premier Tutor thanks for posting this! Definitely helpful and I plan to call pretty much every school I am applying to to ask this and a few other questions (mostly their specific attitudes about graduate degrees).

Though the link that @HybridEarth just posted has me a bit concerned about following your specific school suggestions...

See my earlier reply regarding that AZ school. I think they are actually accepting OOS pretty regularly and they have a small class size, so you have to look at the numbers relative to the big picture. They have 80 students, 30% from OOS (which is generally pretty high, excepting the ultracompetitive almost-all-OOS schools), which is 24 students. Looks like they are accepting about 7 of those from non-neighboring states, fairly randomly across the US year to year. Compare that to many schools that accept 100% of their OOS class members from neighboring states.

 

[ChrisMack390]

I don't consider 6 / 80 great odds, especially when only 1 single student was truly distant from Arizona (the New Yorker).

Then again, who knows what the app pool looked like.

 

[Altius Premier Tutor]

If I'm reading this correctly, the Texas schools are OOS friendly...?

And Why is Oregon so high on the list? They explicitly state that they have a strong IS preference...

I think many, if not most, of the schools that are going to give OOS applicants the best odds are still going to have a strong IS preference. There are schools with OOS approaching 100%, but the odds are so severely low overall its not worth applying unless its your dream school and you want to just take a shot. This report doesn't give only schools that do NOT favor in-state. In fact, most of those types of school wouldn't make the list because their applicant pool is enormous and the acceptance rate is low single-digits. This takes into account your overall likelihood, which is often at a school that may take 20-40% out of state instead of 10%, 5%, or even less.

The way I read it, some of the TX schools are OOS friendly, one in particular they emphasize is not at all, but they included them all together because you apply to them all at once via a separate application.

As for OHSU, they have a decent OOS acceptance rate for a top tier school that is also a state school. OHSU is actually where I went to med school, so from my personal, non-scientific, anecdotal experience, I had classmates from Duke, NY schools, Ohio, Midwest, Florida, Midwest, pretty much random assortment from across the country. I did find this interesting comparison chart that says OHSU tends to interview an above-average number of OOS applicants: http://medical-schools.startclass.com/l/22/Oregon-Health-And-Science-University-School-of-Medicine. The bar for "all med schools" is going to be irrelevant because it will be invalidated in the same way this report points out the MSAR data is--by including neighboring states as part of the OOS %, when they may accept outside of those states next to never.

 

[Altius Premier Tutor]

I don't consider 6 / 80 great odds, especially when only 1 single student was truly distant from Arizona (the New Yorker).

Then again, who knows what the app pool looked like.

Right. And the main point is they are consistently accepting non-neighboring OOS students, and if you look at the last four years it isn't just NY, but Midwest, Dakotas, VA, kind of a random sample. So at least you know they are looking at you. The point of the list/report is to avoid schools that people are wasting money on that accept ZERO from non-neighboring states.

Looks like for four years they are accepting about 30% of their OOS students (7/24) from non-neighboring states.