You weigh in: What medical school has the worst admissions staff and why?

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Kfire326

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Please don't just say which medical school you think has the worst admissions staff, but please say WHY. Specific bad experiences with them would be helpful. Lurkers applying next year should know what to expect :)

In my opinion, Drexel has the worst admissions staff ever, but please do not mention it again, since it was already pretty much done to death in this thread: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?p=4957075#post4957075 (EVMS was also mentioned)

And be sure to check out this thread: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=385695 for the "best admissions staffs"
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Rush: Almost impossible to get a hold of someone and FAKE interview invites. I hate them.
 
I don't know if Hopkins has the worst, but they definitely have the meanest. Just try calling them tomorrow to find out why.
 
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DrVanNostran said:
Rush: Almost impossible to get a hold of someone and FAKE interview invites. I hate them.
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I didn't personally have any problems with Rush, but I was pretty turned off by how the only way you could contact them was by email (even if you called, the message told you to use email). I declined my interview invite (the real one).
 
I interviewed their on october 18th and only found out I was waitlisted in february when i called them up to withdraw my application.
 
Hednej said:
I don't know if Hopkins has the worst, but they definitely have the meanest. Just try calling them tomorrow to find out why.
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I am intimated by admissions commitees. They scare the hell outta me.
 
Rush
 
I thought Baylor was rude over the phone. the lady just kept cutting me off by saying, "u can check ur status online." I wasnt even asking about my status! I was asked when the revisit weekend would be held???
 
Well, Rush did answer the one e-mail I sent them, and in a timely fashion, but it was fairly inconvenient that you couldn't get someone on the phone. Loyola also gave very specific dates and times when you could call, so that was kind of annoying too.
 
I guess no one here has ever worked in an admissions office. Many of these offices are usually short-staffed and the receptionist/secretary cannot spend all day answering hundreds of applicants' questions. They have other tasks to e.g. mailing out rejection/acceptance letters, organizing your interviews with faculty and students, etc. I am sure some probably need to take phone etiquette classes, but wouldn't you eventually get annoyed at answering the same status questions every day.
 
If you post anything on SDN that identifies who you are I would strongly encourage you not to post on threads such as these. I have been told by both the Dean of Admissions and the secretary of the Admissions Office at my school that they read SDN.
 
AmoryBlaine said:
If you post anything on SDN that identifies who you are I would strongly encourage you not to post on threads such as these. I have been told by both the Dean of Admissions and the secretary of the Admissions Office at my school that they read SDN.
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Ok Dad
 
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I vote Rush, who else has sent out fake interview invites.
 
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drc243 said:
I interviewed their on october 18th and only found out I was waitlisted in february when i called them up to withdraw my application.
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GW never even processed my withdrawl letter. I received a rejection a month after I officially withdrew!
 
Drexel, I never got complete status despite repeatedly submitting basically everything in my application. They were rude and basically acted like it was my fault. What a huge waste of money.
 
AmoryBlaine said:
If you post anything on SDN that identifies who you are I would strongly encourage you not to post on threads such as these. I have been told by both the Dean of Admissions and the secretary of the Admissions Office at my school that they read SDN.
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I agree. But, it also might be good for some med schools to know how there applicants are being treated. In all honestly, it seems like we are treated like dirt by some people.
 
U of MN, freaking slow and behind!
 
Not only did they send out fake interview invites, they deleted some ppls secondary apps after they completed them in the system, and then they posted people's sensitive information on the internet. I'd say there is no one even in Rush's league in terms of worst admissions this year. Incompetence is so much worse than mean phone etiquette
 
Tired said:
When a school sets up specific procedures, including times and methods, for getting questions answered, it is not unreasonable to expect to be treated respectfully if you follow those procedures. "Short-staffing" and "annoyance over having to answer the same question repeatedly" is not an excuse for being rude and unhelpful.

Students are paying good money to participate in the application process, and it is the responsibility of schools to ensure that their staff is behaving in a manner that represents their institution well. I would be extremely suspicious of a school whose front-line staff failed to behave professionally.
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My thoughts exactly. Considering the same few schools keep popping up, if the other 120 or so allo schools managed to have an organized admissions process and staff that behaves professionally, then I'm not that sympathetic for the schools that year after year don't have their act together.

And to be honest, if you *do* decide to work as a receptionist/secretary for an admissions office, you have to know that the annoying and frequent phone calls are part of the job. If someone is hired to answer the phone and provide information, I'm not going to shed many tears over the fact that they have to answer the phone and provide information. If you hate it or can't handle it, get another job. And before I'm accused of being a whinning premed, I think that's true for any industry, and when I was in college I was that assistant managing the application process for an internship/fellowship program, and I certainly would have been fired for some of the behavior described on this thread. I don't mean this as an attack on Drexel, I just think that in general, *any* school would be horrified to learn that it's staff is hanging up and/or lying to applicants and accepted students.

As to the original point of the thread, what school was it that sent out rejections with the subject line of "Interview at XXX SOM"? It wasn't one I applied to, but I nominate that school. :)
 
last year, i vote a tie between UCLA and columbia.
 
sheepunite said:
but it's true! last year, i had an admissions staff member call me up after she'd read something i'd posted in a school-specific forum.
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No doubt, some guy got rejected for a few schools last fall when his ex-girlfriend posted all over SDN about him.

Oh yea, and Rush sucks. Making personal information and AMCAS IDs public on the web, oops. :rolleyes:
 
Im going to have to say THE Ohio State University is by far the rudest.

When checking on my status over the phone, an admissions rep actually chuckled at my stats but bode me a wonderfully snide, "good luck" to end the conversation.
 
DPS319 said:
Im going to have to say THE Ohio State University is by far the rudest.

When checking on my status over the phone, an admissions rep actually chuckled at my stats but bode me a wonderfully snide, "good luck" to end the conversation.
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Interesting choice, considering your avatar. :thumbup:
 
i would agree and say U of MN. It was a great staff until they brought in this new director from John Hopkins...he brought his east coast attitude. He and the staff are definately not "minnesota nice." That and he is a lawyer and he has successfully NEVER answered one of my questions, but just beat around the bush and given me typical lawyer answers. He is not flexible at all, my application was put on hold for 3 months without me being informed or knowing about it. On top of that one of his stated goals is to make U of MN a more competitive/cut throat school...seems like and interesting goal.......

That and they are way behind this year
 
twick121 said:
i would agree and say U of MN. It was a great staff until they brought in this new director from John Hopkins...he brought his east coast attitude. He and the staff are definately not "minnesota nice." That and he is a lawyer and he has successfully NEVER answered one of my questions, but just beat around the bush and given me typical lawyer answers. He is not flexible at all, my application was put on hold for 3 months without me being informed or knowing about it. On top of that one of his stated goals is to make U of MN a more competitive/cut throat school...seems like and interesting goal.......

That and they are way behind this year
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Well, look at it on the bright side, you at at least managed to actually have a conversation with the director of admissions. For some schools, it's impossible to even speak to a human being. :laugh:
 
Last year Katrina destroyed my home and much of my city right in the middle of secondary applications. I had about half in and half still being written, but all of a sudden I was very very short on funds as I was forced to use alot of my medschool app/interview money to replace necessities and relocate. I contacted all of the schools that I still needed to submit for and had overwhelmingly nice responses from all but three, everyone else waived my secondary app fee and many sent me personal e-mails wishing me and my family well. Tufts and Temple nevery responded to any of my contacts and NYMC refused a fee waiver. I thought this was in incredibly poor taste considering the legitimacy of my situation.
 
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Oregon Health and Sciences University
You practically have to sell your soul in order to earn the privilege to even TALK to one of them on the phone.
(when you call, a message machine basically says, "If you are calling to check your status, you might as well hang up, because we're not going to talk to you about it.")
 
Rush--fake invites, no phone calls, replied to my email 5 WEEKS later.
 
1. UCLA/Drew - interviewed in December, never heard from them again. No waitlist, no rejection, no acceptance - just crickets. Every time I would call, I was told a "decision is still being made, just wait a bit longer." I eventually matriculated at another school - and never did get a final answer.

2. Rush. In addition to the aforementioned problems, they had horrible security problems that allowed people to get all kinds of info from google about your app.

3. Temple - I get that I am rejected, but do you really have to mail me podiatry school information with the rejection?
 
twick121 said:
On top of that one of his stated goals is to make U of MN a more competitive/cut throat school...seems like and interesting goal...
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The goal is to make the school competitive with other top tier public schools medical schools such as Michigan, UVA, and Ohio State. Not a bad goal at all.
 
foofish said:
Ouch. You'd think they could scrape up a little bit of kindness for their alums (or soon-to-be-alums).
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None.

This is my second cycle applying. I was hoping for at least a mercy interview. Sort of a,"Hey, you have no chance at a seat but we'll buy you lunch and listen to your stories anyway" type deal.

No dice.
 
Stanford admissions staff is extremely rude, just try calling them and you'll get attitude.
 
out of the ones i had the most contact with i'd have to go with... NYU. they never responded to any emails, answered any questions on the phone, and... yeah... but overall, i really didn't have any bad experiences... they were just the one i liked the least.
 
Baylor. What other school do you know that hasn't given out all of its acceptances yet AND no one still has any idea when they might be given out???
 
Flopotomist said:
1. UCLA/Drew - interviewed in December, never heard from them again. No waitlist, no rejection, no acceptance - just crickets. Every time I would call, I was told a "decision is still being made, just wait a bit longer." I eventually matriculated at another school - and never did get a final answer.
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I think you should call now and ask if they've made a decision yet. :laugh:
 
DrVanNostran said:
Rush: Almost impossible to get a hold of someone and FAKE interview invites. I hate them.
Click to expand...

Easiest question I've ever answered on SDN. Rush Medical College was awful, maybe not the staff persay, but the admissions department as a whole was terrible. They never responded to my emails, which was the only way to reach them. Their IT was horrible and disorganized, and am not confident my application was handled effectively.
 
AmoryBlaine said:
If you post anything on SDN that identifies who you are I would strongly encourage you not to post on threads such as these. I have been told by both the Dean of Admissions and the secretary of the Admissions Office at my school that they read SDN.
Click to expand...

I have no problem with Drexel knowing that I think their admissions staff sucks.
 
twick121 said:
i would agree and say U of MN. It was a great staff until they brought in this new director from John Hopkins...he brought his east coast attitude. He and the staff are definately not "minnesota nice." That and he is a lawyer and he has successfully NEVER answered one of my questions, but just beat around the bush and given me typical lawyer answers. He is not flexible at all, my application was put on hold for 3 months without me being informed or knowing about it. On top of that one of his stated goals is to make U of MN a more competitive/cut throat school...seems like and interesting goal.......

That and they are way behind this year
Click to expand...

There is a reason that guy is no longer at Hopkins. I'm not certain, but I don't think it was a personal choice of his to leave, if you catch my drift.
 
Without a doubt, Baylor has the WORST admissions process and least friendly staff. I have interviewed there over 5 months ago without an update. They refuse to update you on your status, whether it be accepted, waitlisted, or rejected. Their admissions office personnel have no problem being extremely rude with you on the phone. As a Texas resident, Baylor went from being one of my top choice schools to my absolute last choice school. Am I bitter? Yes. Do I care anymore? No. I'm holding acceptances at 4 top tens.

Who has the BEST admissions staff? University of Michigan by FAR. Ask any applicant--their 100% transparency, excellent communication, and online stats tracker make applying there a pleasure.
 
anonymous101 said:
Without a doubt, Baylor has the WORST admissions process and least friendly staff. I have interviewed there over 5 months ago without an update. They refuse to update you on your status, whether it be accepted, waitlisted, or rejected. Their admissions office personnel have no problem being extremely rude with you on the phone. As a Texas resident, Baylor went from being one of my top choice schools to my absolute last choice school. Am I bitter? Yes. Do I care anymore? No. I'm holding acceptances at 4 top tens.

Who has the BEST admissions staff? University of Michigan by FAR. Ask any applicant--their 100% transparency, excellent communication, and online stats tracker make applying there a pleasure.
Click to expand...

Let them know here: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=385695
 
learss79 said:
I guess no one here has ever worked in an admissions office. Many of these offices are usually short-staffed and the receptionist/secretary cannot spend all day answering hundreds of applicants' questions. They have other tasks to e.g. mailing out rejection/acceptance letters, organizing your interviews with faculty and students, etc. I am sure some probably need to take phone etiquette classes, but wouldn't you eventually get annoyed at answering the same status questions every day.
Click to expand...
Does this mean it's okay for doctors to get annoyed at their patients for having the same disorders as the patient before them? "Damnit! Stop coming in with diabetes and hypertension! I just don't care any more. Try something more unique, like <insert 300 types of tumors here>."
 
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Chapel Hill 100%. They told me I had an interview and then neglected to call me. When I called back a month later they informed me I was rejected pre-interview
 
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