2012-2013 Medical College of Wisconsin Application Thread

Med School Insiders
This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.
Status
Not open for further replies.
Just withdrew my application & interview for january. Hopefully it goes to one of y'all!
 
okay, so I am new to this thread... but what is the small pool? I received am email saying...

"Committee has completed its initial review of your application. It has been moved to a pool of applicants who potentially will be invited to interview with us. That pool is still much larger than our interview schedule can accommodate. Candidates are selected from this pool to receive an interview invitation on the basis of strength of credentials and completion date of application. If and when we get to your application in this process we will be happy to email you an invitation. Any further review of your application will occur only if you are interviewed."

Is this small pool? Should I update them that I have added on cell bio for this coming semester and am thus graduating in spring '13 instead of dec '12. any advise?
 
addiekm07 said:
okay, so I am new to this thread... but what is the small pool? I received am email saying...

"Committee has completed its initial review of your application. It has been moved to a pool of applicants who potentially will be invited to interview with us. That pool is still much larger than our interview schedule can accommodate. Candidates are selected from this pool to receive an interview invitation on the basis of strength of credentials and completion date of application. If and when we get to your application in this process we will be happy to email you an invitation. Any further review of your application will occur only if you are interviewed."

Is this small pool? Should I update them that I have added on cell bio for this coming semester and am thus graduating in spring '13 instead of dec '12. any advise?
Click to expand...

Small pool = Good news. You can only receive an interview if you have been small pooled. (We all were)

After being complete, the next step is to be put into the small pool (which you just have been). Then from there, you can either expect an interview in the next couple months or you can expect a rejection toward the end of the cycle. If you get an interview , then the email will state whether you are interviewing for a seat in the class or a spot on the wait list; it will be very clear.

As for sending an update, I can't remember whether they accept updates or not. I think something like postponing your graduation might be important enough to want to bring up to them, but I'm not sure. Hopefully someone else has more to say

Good luck :xf:
 
Fivo, are you sure you can only be invited to interview from the small pool? I always thought the small pool was more like an "on hold for interview".

Also, it it just a numbers screen? Has anyone applied with high stats and not been invited for an interview or been smallpooled?

Thanks!
 
nabilesmail said:
Fivo, are you sure you can only be invited to interview from the small pool? I always thought the small pool was more like an "on hold for interview".

Also, it it just a numbers screen? Has anyone applied with high stats and not been invited for an interview or been smallpooled?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Yes, very sure about the small pool. For this school, the small pool is basically an additional screening process and interviews are granted from this pool only. Everyone who has interviewed had been small pooled first. And no it isn't just a numbers screen. Many high stat applicants have been rejected post-secondary this year. And if you look in the previous year's thread, I'm sure you'll see many that were rejected post-interview as well. Many won't even get the chance to interview.

So if you make it to the small pool, you should still be hopeful. As I mentioned earlier, if you receive an interview in the next month, maybe two, you will most likely be interviewing for a spot in the class. It's when you get invited for an interview around March (maybe late Feb?) that you could possibly be interviewing for a spot on the wait list; they'll let you know.

tldr; Interview invites come exclusively from the small pool. It's not a numbers screen. High stat and low stat applicants get rejected at various points in this process both this year and prior.

Good luck :xf:

*If anyone is more knowledgeable, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong*
 
FWIW, I was never small pooled before interviewing at mcw....this was a couple of years ago though. I'm sure my case is an anomaly, but I thought I should mention it just because that's what my experience was (even though it may be a cause for more confusion, oh well).
 
Sweet, i count the small pool as a plus for this cycle, therefore 1 interview + 2/10 chance for an interview = I have 1.2 II so far!
 
Anyone interviewed yet? Just wondering how it is in comparison to other schools??
 
premed767 said:
Anyone interviewed yet? Just wondering how it is in comparison to other schools??
Click to expand...

Did you not read? It's all over this tread. Chances are good if you get an interview compared to other schools. If they like you enough to give you interview there is nothing to worry about. No worries. If you have interview go in confident and relaxed and be yourself.
 
Getting pretty excited for my interview tomorrow. Will be my first, and most likely, most important one.
 
Just dropping in to wish everyone good luck on their interviews tomorrow!

If anyone has any questions regarding MCW, I'm always happy to help if I can. I'm not in the forums much but I will always return PM's.

:luck: Best of luck! :luck:
 
TheWeeIceMan said:
Thanks! Just got back from the social. Everyone seems very friendly at MCW.
Click to expand...

They really are. One of the biggest reasons I chose MCW was because of the atmosphere there. Students are always willing to help one another out and the faculty is incredibly helpful. The school promotes cohesiveness and students do not compete with one another. (some friendly competition aside, of course! 🙂 ) From the moment I set foot in there on my interview day to the present, I was, and continue to be impressed by MCW. I hope that you were able to experience this as well, and likewise I hope that you had a great set of interviews.

Best of luck on the result! :luck:
 
MedMusclez said:
They really are. One of the biggest reasons I chose MCW was because of the atmosphere there. Students are always willing to help one another out and the faculty is incredibly helpful. The school promotes cohesiveness and students do not compete with one another. (some friendly competition aside, of course! 🙂 ) From the moment I set foot in there on my interview day to the present, I was, and continue to be impressed by MCW. I hope that you were able to experience this as well, and likewise I hope that you had a great set of interviews.

Best of luck on the result! :luck:
Click to expand...

👍
 
MedMusclez said:
They really are. One of the biggest reasons I chose MCW was because of the atmosphere there. Students are always willing to help one another out and the faculty is incredibly helpful. The school promotes cohesiveness and students do not compete with one another. (some friendly competition aside, of course! 🙂 ) From the moment I set foot in there on my interview day to the present, I was, and continue to be impressed by MCW. I hope that you were able to experience this as well, and likewise I hope that you had a great set of interviews.

Best of luck on the result! :luck:
Click to expand...

Thanks! I appreciate that. The interviews were great. Just as relaxed as they assured us they would be. Everyone I talked to said something similar. I'm crossing my fingers for good news next week.
 
I am a current M4 at MCW. Feel free to PM me with any questions you have. I am on the interview trail right now, so it may take me a bit to respond. Best of luck to you all.
 
cubssox2000 said:
I am a current M4 at MCW. Feel free to PM me with any questions you have. I am on the interview trail right now, so it may take me a bit to respond. Best of luck to you all.
Click to expand...

We all hear about the positives of a school, but could you share what you found to be some negatives at MCW? Anything you wish you knew about before enrolling? Especially about the clinical years, since it seems that most of the points of view we get during the interview day is from M2's who haven't started their rotations yet.

edit: My interview is in 2 weeks, haven't actually been to MCW yet.
 
Clichebomb said:
We all hear about the positives of a school, but could you share what you found to be some negatives at MCW? Anything you wish you knew about before enrolling? Especially about the clinical years, since it seems that most of the points of view we get during the interview day is from M2's who haven't started their rotations yet.

edit: My interview is in 2 weeks, haven't actually been to MCW yet.
Click to expand...

I went through the traditional curriculum at the time when everything was in flux. It was a pretty rough time transitioning to the new curriculum. The transition was so big with the administration, I do wish that they had paid more attention to the current students. That being said, I don't know what the current M1s think of their curriculum.

I personally have enjoyed the clinical years a lot more than the first two years. From what I have heard from students and attendings from other hospitals, MCW is recognized for its clinical years. I have heard multiple times that MCW students are very well prepared for internship. We do put in more hours and more work than a lot of other programs, but that all goes into getting a good education. A couple of things that we do that I have found students at other programs don't:

- We follow PGY-II work hour limits, meaning we follow the 80 hours a week over 4 weeks rule. Some rotations you will have to keep an eye on your hours because it can get close.
- We take multiple overnight call shifts as a third year on medicine, surgery and OB/GYN rotations.
- Our lectures are set up to maximize clinic time. Some programs will have lecture every day, pulling you out of clinic time. At MCW lectures are generally one morning a week, so it does not disrupt clinic time.
- We take both a medicine/pediatrics/FM and surgery sub-internship during 4th year. Many programs require only one.

Hope this answers your question.
 
Also, an interesting article from a couple years ago.

http://annals.org/article.aspx?articleid=745836

If you are interested in primary care, we most certainly match well into FM, IM and Peds, and by no means do we discourage people from going into those fields. It is just something to think about. And honestly, being ranked with Northwestern, UCI, UPenn, Columbia, Duke, Stanford and Hopkins makes it seem more of a positive in my eyes.
 
cubssox2000 said:
Also, an interesting article from a couple years ago.

http://annals.org/article.aspx?articleid=745836

If you are interested in primary care, we most certainly match well into FM, IM and Peds, and by no means do we discourage people from going into those fields. It is just something to think about. And honestly, being ranked with Northwestern, UCI, UPenn, Columbia, Duke, Stanford and Hopkins makes it seem more of a positive in my eyes.
Click to expand...

I actually agree with you. I think it just shows the range of specialties people are able to match into from MCW other than the primary care fields. Thanks for your feedback, much appreciated.
 
Clichebomb said:
We all hear about the positives of a school, but could you share what you found to be some negatives at MCW? Anything you wish you knew about before enrolling? Especially about the clinical years, since it seems that most of the points of view we get during the interview day is from M2's who haven't started their rotations yet.

edit: My interview is in 2 weeks, haven't actually been to MCW yet.
Click to expand...

I'm another M4, and I can honestly say that there are currently some negatives to the clinical years (mostly related to scheduling) and that they are actually working on fixing those to the point that it won't be an issue for anyone currently applying. More on that in a sec.

Overall, our clinical experiences are awesome. Being the only med school in Milwaukee (though UW does have some rotations at local clinics), we have a lot of close connections with almost all the area community hospitals as well as the local VA, leading to exposure to a number of practice settings. We're allowed a much more hands-on experience than some other medical schools I have friends at, and by the beginning of 4th year, I'd say most of our classmates were feeling a hell of a lot more confident due to the third year experience.

We get pretty comprehensive overall exposure to everything in the core specialties (med/surg/peds/ob-gyn). There's a few concerns people have had regarding inter-site variability for a few of the rotations, but the clerkship directors are all pretty active in responding to student concerns, and I think that's gotten a lot better over the years. There's a few standards that help with that: Everyone will spend at least one of their medicine months working on a ward team with MCW residents at Froedtert or the VA, everyone will have an inpatient pediatrics rotation at Children's Hospital of WI, etc.

One of the biggest strengths of MCW is that we're one of the few schools in the country that gives everyone an anesthesia rotation during the 3rd year curriculum. I think it was an extremely valuable opportunity, especially considering we have one of the top 10 anesthesia departments in the country. (Last year, we had ~15% of the class go into anesthesia. Though that was a ridiculous year even for us) Even for those of us that don't go into anesthesia, I think everyone regards it as a great experience.

An issue a lot of us had is the limited availability of elective time in the third year, leading to more crunch time in the beginning of 4th year. I don't know anyone that had a real problem with getting the electives they needed for specialty exploration/letters of rec/whatever in the end, but it was definitely a bit frustrating when trying to plan an ideal schedule. But by the time you're 3rd years, it shouldn't be an issue at all. There's a committee currently working on the changes (which aren't finalized yet), but the proposals include a substantial increase of 3rd year elective time (double or more compared to the current 1 month), a substantial increase in the number of available electives for 3rd years (compared to a reasonably limited selection now), a change to 4 week blocks rather than 1 month blocks (adding a 13th "month" to the year), and a reformation of the 4th year requirements (changing 1 medical+1 surgical subi to 1 critical care+1 other subi, more in line with other med schools around the country).

Basically, in ~2 years when those changes go through, every single concern I've come up with in the last year and a half related to scheduling will no longer be an issue. Our clinical experience is awesome, and it's only getting better.
 
Last edited:
Wow. Many thanks to cubssox2000 and Raryn for the clinical years info today--really answered a lot of my questions, as well as got me even more excited for this school.
 
I just got an interview invite for Feb. 15th. I was wondering if someone drops out of an earlier interview spot do they contact you to let you know? Or would I need to call to see if there is any earlier interview spots available?
 
You would need to call to find out. When I moved my interview back to Feb. 15th they told me that they tend to overfill interview days so its pretty rare to get an earlier date. Good luck though.
 
Interview invite today - the email noted that those who attend will be competing for a few remaining class spots and then it's all about interviewing for waitlist spots. Will probably withdraw, but good luck to those who attend! Seems like a solid school.
 
eefen said:
interview invite today - the email noted that those who attend will be competing for a few remaining class spots and then it's all about interviewing for waitlist spots. Will probably withdraw, but good luck to those who attend! Seems like a solid school.
Click to expand...

+1
 
Question for any mcw students: do you know if any of your in state classmates chose to come to mcw after being accepted at uw? I am facing this decision and i was confident in choosing mcw but it seems that whenever i share this with people theyre totally surprised.. ultimately ill decide completely on my own but it has made me second guess myself when people keep reacting like this


Edit: just to clarify the people who've reacted like this are not well versed in medical schools so im trying to just let it in one ear and out the other, but it does have me thinking
 
Last edited:
1289 said:
Question for any mcw students: do you know if any of your in state classmates chose to come to mcw after being accepted at uw? I am facing this decision and i was confident in choosing mcw but it seems that whenever i share this with people theyre totally surprised.. ultimately ill decide completely on my own but it has made me second guess myself when people keep reacting like this


Edit: just to clarify the people who've reacted like this are not well versed in medical schools so im trying to just let it in one ear and out the other, but it does have me thinking
Click to expand...

I didn't get forced to make a decision as Madison made it easy and gave me the boot, but my cousin who was accepted to both, as well as other oos schools chose mcw due to how the class was run and the way he felt when talking to people (stuck up, relaxed, welcoming, friendly, etc.) Not saying I wouldn't have a hard time choosing myself but he told me he was happy with his decision, no regrets.
I wouldn't be suprised if you chose mcw and I'm sure many others wouldn't either. Like you said you have to go where you felt you fit best in order to be happy.
 
1289 said:
Question for any mcw students: do you know if any of your in state classmates chose to come to mcw after being accepted at uw? I am facing this decision and i was confident in choosing mcw but it seems that whenever i share this with people theyre totally surprised.. ultimately ill decide completely on my own but it has made me second guess myself when people keep reacting like this


Edit: just to clarify the people who've reacted like this are not well versed in medical schools so im trying to just let it in one ear and out the other, but it does have me thinking
Click to expand...

Among my friends who don't know, yup, I get the same response as you. Professors and medically inclined contacts seem to hold them in equal regard. I also have a friend who is an undergraduate at UW and remarkably thinks less of UWSMPH than MCW. Personally, I think that UW has the edge for its tuition, but MCW seems like a more intimate atmosphere.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2
 
1289 said:
Question for any mcw students: do you know if any of your in state classmates chose to come to mcw after being accepted at uw? I am facing this decision and i was confident in choosing mcw but it seems that whenever i share this with people theyre totally surprised.. ultimately ill decide completely on my own but it has made me second guess myself when people keep reacting like this


Edit: just to clarify the people who've reacted like this are not well versed in medical schools so im trying to just let it in one ear and out the other, but it does have me thinking
Click to expand...

I think I heard something like 8-9 people in our M1 class were accepted to both and ended up choosing MCW. (I was one of those people.)

If someone is fortunate to have multiple acceptances my advice is to choose the school that you will feel the most comfortable with - environment, other students, location, etc. If one school felt like a better fit than the others, trust your gut. Med school is tough and stressful and if you aren't happy with the feel of a school, it can make it that much harder.

Feel free to PM me if you'd like to chat more about anything. Whatever you choose, I'm sure you'll have a great education.
 
Just accepted to MCW!!! So excited I can barely breathe but best of luck to everyone in this cycle!
 
Also just got accepted!!! Very excited about MCW.

Congrats to everyone else accepted today too.😀
 
DH410 said:
Just accepted to MCW!!! So excited I can barely breathe but best of luck to everyone in this cycle!
Click to expand...

And to all who are recently accepted make sure to join the mcw facebook page linked on earlier pages. 🙂 looking forward to seeing all of you!
 
doctorluv19 said:
Question: Is the interview open or closed file?
Click to expand...

Open, both my interviewers seemed familiar with my app, but relatively few qs on that. Be sure to have a few of your own questions for them, that was one of the first things i was asked. Good luck! :luck:
 
would someone who interviewed at mcw cycle what types of questions and how the 30 minute interviews go? thanx
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

wysdoc
2024-2025 Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW)
11 12 13 14 15
Replies
722
Views
191K
FightingHawk123
F
chilly_md
2023-2024 Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW)
13 14 15 16 17
Replies
849
Views
223K
ClashRoyaleKing
ClashRoyaleKing
wysdoc
2024-2025 Medical College of Georgia
11 12 13 14 15
Replies
737
Views
160K
luckysquid
luckysquid
wysdoc
2024-2025 Wisconsin
5 6 7 8 9
Replies
423
Views
95K
MoveUp221
M
wysdoc
2024-2025 New York Medical College
9 10 11 12 13
Replies
603
Views
201K
HelpMeAhhHelp
H
Top