2015-2016 Boston University Application Thread
Started by Ismet
Get help with your application
Use all the free resources available to you from SDN: articles, guides, expert advising, forums discussions, and school research.
Have any of you figured out how to resolve this issue? I think this section is required to be filled out in order to submit, right?
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
No, preferences can be updated anytime and are separate from the secondary.
BU is working on fixing the glitch - I called 🙂
Last edited:
IE should do the trick. Firefox too
BU said it's working on it! 🙂
Yeah, I was thinking the same, but neither worked.
Yep! Now that I know it's not a required section at the moment, I plan on omitting it until post-submission.
I got the "Pre-Registration" email, which I completed. I then received the "Initial Contact" email, but have yet to receive the "Web Account Registration" email, which they said would be received in "up to 3 hours." But if they're having this many technically difficulties, I'll give it some more time before contacting them.
Anyone have any idea if anatomy/physiology/medical sciences faculty satisfy the "biology" letter requirement? It'd be ridiculous for me to ask a prof from 5 years ago who taught me Bio I in a room of 1000 to write a letter...
Only their office could tell you for sure, but since anatomy and physiology are basically a subset of biology, I would assume so.
Check spam. Mine went there.
Thanks, yeah, I just hate being a bother on the admissions staff, "here's another *******".
great call. Never would have thought to check that, given that the others went straight to my inbox. Oh technology...
I just went to my emails spam filter and allowed all .edu domains through, works like a charm, other than the odd Ross email.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
So people have been submitting, despite the inability to enter/save "preferences"?
i had trouble too but i literally just kept spamming the button and it worked
that being said are the preferences so important? the rest of the app saves fine. people should be able to do without it lol BU is already addressing us as Mr/Ms so..
Last edited:
Thanks! I might wait until tomorrow to see if it's fixed, and if not, just go ahead and submit regardless and keep them guessing about my preferences 😉
On the prerequisite grid, are we supposed to include future courses that we haven't taken yet? Sorry if this is obviously answered somewhere on the secondary; trying to navigate the website is giving me a headache with their mix of fonts and colors.
EDIT: Just kidding, found it.
EDIT: Just kidding, found it.
Last edited:
Received and submitted yesterday (I pre-wrote) - now the waiting game! anyone know last year how long it took between turning it in and IIs?
the "most students don't" is what finally pushed into the no direction
Haha I think I'm about to go in that direction as well.
Awesome! I ended up writing something in that space to describe substitutions to clarify.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
Still not working for me. I think I'll just submit regardless; the personal preferences section isn't technically part of the secondary anyway. The welcome page even says to complete/submit secondary before updating preferences.
I ended up doing the same and emailed them about the preferences, and they just said to send them in a message and they would add them to my file.
Has anyone submitted the secondary, but had the "MCAT Received" category as "No" even though the scores show up in the MCAT Status section of the Supplemental Elements?
I'm a re-applicant here, received interview last cycle, was rejected. I was thinking of using the additional info section to describe what has changed about my application, but it may be redundant with the gap year essay. To include or not to include?
With them being so adamant about that section being optional, unless you have something that's pretty important, I would not write it because being redundant in a truly optional essay could hurt you.
If you start with a large photo and crop it to 400x400, the photo size should become <1 mb. I have a 480x480 pixel photo that is 175 kb.
Thanks. I guess they can figure out for themselves what has changed? That's what I pay them $100 for!
Unless there's some area in the gap year essay you didn't quite touch on as much as you would have liked? I don't want to give you a definitive answer because I don't know your specific situation, but I feel like it could go either way as to if you should write that essay depending on your gap year essay and how much you wrote there.
Yeah I just re-read my gap year essay, and it's pretty much a timeline of what I did since last applying soooo..... it would be redundant to write about it again.
EDIT: I just noticed they have an optional essay specifically for re-applicants.
Last edited:
Use an iPhone
I just submitted and it also shows "NO" on the application status but I clearly saw my MCAT score in the secondary and chose not to defer a decision since I was happy with my score and will not be retaking. Maybe a glitch?
This is the jankiest portal I've used yet!!
I have the same issue.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
@rachiie01 @ahoffmann16 I emailed admissions about this. It's a glitch.
Just like the rest of the portal
they are asking for everything you've taken in those categories
So the consensus is that it's really truly not necessary to write anything for the "optional essay." However, is it bad to not write anything for the educational timeline essay? i've never been abroad and have no advanced training the arts. I'm not sure what they mean by "worked in a field that has contributed to understanding of people unlike yourself though." Like what?
Well, for the truly optional one, I just pasted a diversity essay i wrote for another secondly. Shouldn't hurt... i hope.
