* * 2010 - 2011 * * Secondary Applications Thread

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samuraiR said:
hey guys, this is going to be an epically ******ed question...

I just got verified in AACOMAS and I cannot find my gpa for the life of me. I looked in app summary, I looked in colleges/coursework, I just dont see my gpa listed? What am i doing wrong!?😕
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It won't show up until you are released to schools. A date will appear next to the school, and there will be a pdf that you can click on that will show your gpa.
 
Before anyone panics... I finished my RVU secondary and tried to submit it and its not working. I called the admissions office and they just turned in a request to IR to fix this issue. She said they are trying to fix it by the end of the day. 🙂 Yay!
 
cbrons said:
Did anyone download the secondary from http://www.vcom.vt.edu/admissions/application.html ?

The functionality of the document is a huge headache. Any tips for dealing with this? I wonder why they don't just have it up online in entry fields much like the primary application itself. LOL I bet they get lots of secondaries that are formatted differently
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I agree with the functionality. I wish they would have just made it a pdf with text fields.
 
Hey, I've noticed that a lot of these secondaries ask us to list healthcare experience. I already put all that stuff on aacomas, so do i need to re-list it?

If not, than why do they assume that we didn't already put everything on the primary application?
 
gatewasani said:
Hey, I've noticed that a lot of these secondaries ask us to list healthcare experience. I already put all that stuff on aacomas, so do i need to re-list it?

If not, than why do they assume that we didn't already put everything on the primary application?
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They want their own way of assessing applicants. Some schools ask for a CV and have semi-blind interviews where the interviewer is only able to see that, rather than a copy of your entire application. This allows for the interviewer to assess you as an individual, rather than by your numbers. Just my $0.02


Just finished MSUCOM's secondary. Evaluation forms have been given out. Everything will hopefully be in the mail by Monday!
 
I was under the impression that LECOM had some essays... I got them off of SDN a few months ago and completed them. But when I got the secondary invite today, there was no essay question and only a few demographic questions. Even though they took my money without even really asking me anything, Im still excited! 🙂
 
i just sent in the LECOM-Bradenton secondary... monies are already adding up 🙁. haha oh well. only need one!
 
ThrusH said:
They want their own way of assessing applicants. Some schools ask for a CV and have semi-blind interviews where the interviewer is only able to see that, rather than a copy of your entire application. This allows for the interviewer to assess you as an individual, rather than by your numbers. Just my $0.02


Just finished MSUCOM's secondary. Evaluation forms have been given out. Everything will hopefully be in the mail by Monday!
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So should I simple copy/paste?

or should I re-write the description? (not really sure what I would write differently
 
There are one of these questions on basically every school's secondary application.

You can take the question in one of two ways I suppose:

1. Why medicine, period?

2. Why osteopathic medicine, as opposed to allopathic?

Can I seriously answer the question as option 1 ^? That seems like I'm avoiding the question in way.

But, I can't really answer option 2, because I have no answer for it. A DO = MD to me. In my mind (and I hope your's, your patient's, and the public's), there is no difference between the two.
 
MedIsInMyBlood said:
There are one of these questions on basically every school's secondary application.

You can take the question in one of two ways I suppose:

1. Why medicine, period?

2. Why osteopathic medicine, as opposed to allopathic?

Can I seriously answer the question as option 1 ^? That seems like I'm avoiding the question in way.

But, I can't really answer option 2, because I have no answer for it. A DO = MD to me. In my mind (and I hope your's, your patient's, and the public's), there is no difference between the two.
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Eeeekkk! No, they usually want to know why osteopathic medicine specifically. I understand that you feel that DO=MD, personally I don't feel this way even though right now I don't care which school decides to take me, but that's not what the schools want to hear. Just like any school that wants you to be excited about applying there, the DO schools want to know that you want to be a DO. You better research it and come up with an answer fast... 😛
 
Wooo got my KCOM secondary request today! First one, so excited 👍
 
So I just got the KCOM secondary invite but I had two questions about it.

1. It asks you to list the DO letter and the pre-medical committee letter. I was just going to send the packet of letters that was compiled by my school. Should I list the name on the overall packet AND the DO or just the name on the packet (since they're not coming separately)?

2. Also, the secondary essays have a limit of 500 words. Is it expected that you use most of the words (as was the case with the PS) or can these essays be shorter than the limit? How short would be too short (ie. what number of words should I be aiming for as a minimum)?
 
metalgirl14 said:
So I just got the KCOM secondary invite but I had two questions about it.

1. It asks you to list the DO letter and the pre-medical committee letter. I was just going to send the packet of letters that was compiled by my school. Should I list the name on the overall packet AND the DO or just the name on the packet (since they're not coming separately)?

2. Also, the secondary essays have a limit of 500 words. Is it expected that you use most of the words (as was the case with the PS) or can these essays be shorter than the limit? How short would be too short (ie. what number of words should I be aiming for as a minimum)?
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500 words is really not that much, just start writing and you'll probably end up with a lot more than that and have to trim it down. I would try to get as close to 500 as possible.
 
WOOOOO HOOOOOO! VCOM-CC Secondary invite!!!!!
 
So for all of the secondaries that ask for healthcare experiences, should we just copy/paste the descriptions from our primary app?
 
metalgirl14 said:
So I just got the KCOM secondary invite but I had two questions about it.

1. It asks you to list the DO letter and the pre-medical committee letter. I was just going to send the packet of letters that was compiled by my school. Should I list the name on the overall packet AND the DO or just the name on the packet (since they're not coming separately)?

2. Also, the secondary essays have a limit of 500 words. Is it expected that you use most of the words (as was the case with the PS) or can these essays be shorter than the limit? How short would be too short (ie. what number of words should I be aiming for as a minimum)?
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1. I put the committee letter as one, and the DO letter (that will be in the committee letter) as the other one. I did this because I dont want to get screened out if they think I dont have a DO letter. I think they will figure it out though.

2. I thought 500 was a TON. I used between 250 and 500 words depending on what they asked and what I had to offer.


metalgirl14 said:
So for all of the secondaries that ask for healthcare experiences, should we just copy/paste the descriptions from our primary app?
Click to expand...

I filled out an AMCAS since I am applying to other schools also. I used my AMCAS responses that were longer than my AACOMAS responses. Some of them were the same as or pieces of my AACOMAS responses, but I really don't want to rewrite them so I figured I wasn't going to. Don't know if this was a smart idea... But I had nothing else to say because I already said what I had to say. 😛
 
noshie said:
1. I put the committee letter as one, and the DO letter (that will be in the committee letter) as the other one. I did this because I dont want to get screened out if they think I dont have a DO letter. I think they will figure it out though.

2. I thought 500 was a TON. I used between 250 and 500 words depending on what they asked and what I had to offer.




I filled out an AMCAS since I am applying to other schools also. I used my AMCAS responses that were longer than my AACOMAS responses. Some of them were the same as or pieces of my AACOMAS responses, but I really don't want to rewrite them so I figured I wasn't going to. Don't know if this was a smart idea... But I had nothing else to say because I already said what I had to say. 😛
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I agree with this for both questions. The essay maximums are there to prevent people from writing pages upon pages of useless crap that an adcom would have to read through. If you can express everything you want to say clearly without using all 500 words don't stress about trying to fluff your essay, its not a 5-7pg essay where you are trying so hard to hit the minimum page from HS lol

As for the questions about medical experiences it depends on the phrasing. Some ask you just to list them, some ask you in essay form, some may just ask for short descriptions. Tailor your responses accordingly. I would try to make at least a few changes from your AACOMAS application though since you don't want to come off as being lazy :laugh:

Offtopic but Noshie you are quickly becoming the person I'm pulling for most this cycle lol Maybe its because you help everyone like I do and because your avatar makes me laugh for some reason.
 
FYI: if you type your essays into the RVU secondary and click "save and finish later" it will delete everything you had on that page so far🙁
 
DbDan said:
Offtopic but Noshie you are quickly becoming the person I'm pulling for most this cycle lol Maybe its because you help everyone like I do and because your avatar makes me laugh for some reason.
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Aww, that's very nice of you to say! 🙂 Thank you! You can't see the rest of the picture, but if you did you would laugh even more! It's a picture of me and two friends peeking around a very colorful paper mache horse... Good times...



joeDO2 said:
FYI: if you type your essays into the RVU secondary and click "save and finish later" it will delete everything you had on that page so far🙁
Click to expand...


This wasn't a problem for me when I filled it out on Friday, however they are trying to fix some glitches and it may be occurring now because of this. I still am unable to submit mine, I hope by Monday they will have this issue resolved!
 
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I have a question:

How much did you guys write for the "Why do you want to attend our school?" questions that many schools have on their secondary? 2-3 paragraphs? Less? More?
 
DrDre2001 said:
I have a question:

How much did you guys write for the "Why do you want to attend our school?" questions that many schools have on their secondary? 2-3 paragraphs? Less? More?
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What is the max word limit? I'd fill it up.. but I have a way with making things relevant and I would venture to guess that my writing skills are above average. So to edit what I previously said, I would encourage you to fill up to the max word limit as long as your comfortable with what you produce, in that longer essays that are meaningful show great care and commitment to the specific program. The downside to that is if you cannot write well or if you start to ramble; then less is always more. If you find yourself saying, "Wow I need to delete that paragraph... and that one too..." because you are getting repetitive then shorter is always better.
 
Just received the UNECOM secondary. Essay prompts have a limit of 2000 characters including spaces.
Prompts:
Describe your particular interest in attending the UNE-COM and any contact you have had with UNE-COM students, alumni, faculty or clinicians, admissions/student affairs staff members, etc. How did these interactions influence your decision to apply

Please explain any gaps in education or employment. Indicate any changes/additions in education, employment, experiences, research, etc. since submitting your AACOMAS application

Please explain any academic difficulties you encountered during your academic career. What insight or knowledge have you gained from these experiences that you will bring to your studies at UNE-COM?

Describe how you see the role of physicians in society (outside the direct practice of medicine). What experiences have you had that demonstrate your readiness to meet these future role expectations?
 
I've been waiting for secondaries and nothing has shown up yet. After you were verified how long did you have to wait to get the secondary applications?
 
ChemMed said:
I've been waiting for secondaries and nothing has shown up yet. After you were verified how long did you have to wait to get the secondary applications?
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I submitted june first, received first secondary on june tenth. It depends also on what schools you applied to. Only a few have sent .
 
Is anyone else still having a problem submitting the RVU secondary? Still getting error messages, but I figured it would be fixed by now...
 
cbrons said:
What is the max word limit? I'd fill it up.. but I have a way with making things relevant and I would venture to guess that my writing skills are above average. So to edit what I previously said, I would encourage you to fill up to the max word limit as long as your comfortable with what you produce, in that longer essays that are meaningful show great care and commitment to the specific program. The downside to that is if you cannot write well or if you start to ramble; then less is always more. If you find yourself saying, "Wow I need to delete that paragraph... and that one too..." because you are getting repetitive then shorter is always better.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the input.

There is no limit (for RVU's atleast). Also, I'm having a hard time finding anything to talk about. I found a thread on here about the school (RVU) where some posters talk about some interesting courses given in the first two years at the school. Then, I just talked about how I like the location and environment of the school. It totals up to 300 words, and 1,600 characters.

Since most schools with limits have their limits at 300 or 500 words, that is pretty much what I am for when I do essays for schools with no limits. Good idea?
 
ChemMed said:
I've been waiting for secondaries and nothing has shown up yet. After you were verified how long did you have to wait to get the secondary applications?
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It's not even about when you are verified. When you get verified, it will say that "release dates appear next to schools". But, they won't appear next to the school for about a week or so. When you do see them, it will be quick (a few days), before secondary invites are emailed to you.

Submitted: June 1
Verified: June 5
Released: June 17
 
noshie said:
Is anyone else still having a problem submitting the RVU secondary? Still getting error messages, but I figured it would be fixed by now...
Click to expand...

Yep, still not working...they called me this morning though and said that they should get this all fixed by the end of day today and that they'd call me when it was fixed.

Ill try to post something when I hear back from them
 
How many secondaries have people gotten so far?

My app has been released for almost a week now and I only have ATSU-MO and AZ and RVU despite applying to 16 schools and having pretty good stats. Im starting to obsess, this med school thing can't be good for life expectancy :scared:
 
gatorfann14 said:
How many secondaries have people gotten so far?

My app has been released for almost a week now and I only have ATSU-MO and AZ and RVU despite applying to 16 schools and having pretty good stats. Im starting to obsess, this med school thing can't be good for life expectancy :scared:
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Released: June 17th

Applied to 15+ schools, and have only received RVU and ATSU secondaries.
 
God dam it lol so jealous u guys are already at that stage. Im counting down the days when I get my final grade for a course retake and then can send my transcripts to get converted.

Any Canadians on here know how long it took to get ur transcripts converted and sent to AACOMAS?
 
gatorfann14 said:
How many secondaries have people gotten so far?

My app has been released for almost a week now and I only have ATSU-MO and AZ and RVU despite applying to 16 schools and having pretty good stats. Im starting to obsess, this med school thing can't be good for life expectancy :scared:
Click to expand...

Submitted: June 1st
Verified: June 1st
Sent out: June 6th

I applied to about 19 schools and have received secondaries and submitted them from:

KCOM
SOMA
LECOM
RVUCOM (submitting today)
UMDNJ
UNECOM

There are some secondaries that I found online and just filled them out. If your waiting for some to be sent to you, it may be good use of your time to find these and get a head start. I won't be submitting them until asked however... They were from:

LMU-DCOM
NSU
NYCOM
VCOM


You got one from AZCOM already? Still waiting for that one... 😛
 
noshie said:
Submitted: June 1st
Verified: June 1st
Sent out: June 6th

I applied to about 19 schools and have received secondaries and submitted them from:

KCOM
SOMA
LECOM
RVUCOM (submitting today)
UMDNJ
UNECOM

There are some secondaries that I found online and just filled them out. If your waiting for some to be sent to you, it may be good use of your time to find these and get a head start. I won't be submitting them until asked however... They were from:

LMU-DCOM
NSU
NYCOM
VCOM


You got one from AZCOM already? Still waiting for that one... 😛
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gosh I applied to all of those except VCOM
 
working on my first secondary! VCOM...although looking on here, seems several people have already been doing secondaries for a few days now! Hm, although, I guess there's no point in submitting a secondary immediately if your pre-med committee letter won't be written for a few weeks, right?
 
Received UNE-COM today! Looks pretty time consuming. For those of you waiting i'll post my dates as well.

Submitted: June 1st
Verified: June 1st
Sent to Schools: June 6th

I have received
LECOM
KCOM
MSU-COM
UNE-COM

(VCOM said they got my app but are reviewing)
 
ciruelo said:
working on my first secondary! VCOM...although looking on here, seems several people have already been doing secondaries for a few days now! Hm, although, I guess there's no point in submitting a secondary immediately if your pre-med committee letter won't be written for a few weeks, right?
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You should submit every thing as early as ****ing possible

what kind of pre-med committee doesn't have pre-med letters done by early May? I'd be piiissseeedddd...
 
cbrons said:
You should submit every thing as early as ****ing possible

what kind of pre-med committee doesn't have pre-med letters done by early May? I'd be piiissseeedddd...
Click to expand...
damn, I didn't really think about it, until now I'm seeing that I could have everything that I personally need in soon, while I'm still waiting for something outside my control (committee letter) for another few weeks...
 
FutureDoc1988 said:
That's really weird because I just received their secondary.
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I'm so pissed. How is it that I, cbrons, could have all my shiznit in to aacomas the first 2 minutes of the 1st day that you could submit it and I'm not at the front of line!!!! ARrrtGGHHHHH!!!!!

What is the CCOM prompt?

And everyone who has received a secondary, can you please go post it in the School specific discussion pages for 2010-2011
 
cbrons said:
I'm so pissed. How is it that I, cbrons, could have all my shiznit in to aacomas the first 2 minutes of the 1st day that you could submit it and I'm not at the front of line!!!! ARrrtGGHHHHH!!!!!

What is the CCOM prompt?

And everyone who has received a secondary, can you please go post it in the School specific discussion pages for 2010-2011
Click to expand...

Two essays both are limited to 1,500 characters:
1. Why do you believe CCOM would provide you with the type of Osteopathic Medical Education you are seeking?
2. Why should CCOM accept you into this years class?

I submitted the first day too. Maybe yours will come later today
 
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