I was mainly talking about this being excessive in regards to using it to measure engagement/interest in a school. I can understand the need for a program to maintain some level of records to potentially screen out rude and unprofessional applicants, but I feel like if this is about getting a sense of an applicant's interest level, it's not entirely clear how tracking the minutiae of interactions could meaningfully contribute to doing so, and even impact an admission decision. And this level of monitoring could make applicants uncomfortable. What about those who are naturally more cautious about engaging frequently but are nevertheless extremely interested and qualified? Does the system penalize them by making them seem "disinterested?"
I realize that at the high school >>> college level "demonstration of interest" by calling, writing, and visiting is stressed very heavily at certain colleges.Their marketing management system can even keep track of recruiting emails from the college to the high school student, and make note of things like: Did they open the email? Did they click on any links in the email to explore the department they said they wanted to major in? Did they take the time to answer the cutesy 3 question quiz we embedded in the email? Did they come to a campus tour? (less prominent post-pandemic).
I see a definite difference in the medical school application system and it's something to learn about.
A school will make their preferences known, if you read their admissions FAQ page. Some say no updates after secondary submission, some say email an update any time.
Med schools
don't give school tours to any/all applicants, but reserve their time, resources, and energy to offer visiting days to those who have made it past the interview phase.
I think the best course of action as an applicant to medical schools is to read the school's instructions and follow them, read each email from the school in its entirety so as not to miss deadlines, and save phone calls for time-sensitive things like: "My online interview is today and the log-in link you sent me is not working. Can you help me?"
I don't believe that medical schools track the number of calls to measure an applicant's interest level. As many of the experienced SDN advisors have said, "you show your interest by sending in your primary and secondary", after that it will be many months of waiting while they pore over those materials.