2017-2018 Loyola University - Chicago (Stritch)

Started by Lucca
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Is anyone concerned about the financial state of Illinois? I applied here and to a few others in Illinois but as enticing as the programs are I just can't get past the fact that this could be a junk state. . . I am contemplating not completing my secondary here and I already withdrew (pre-secondary) from another Chicago school.
 
H_Scheck said:
Is anyone concerned about the financial state of Illinois? I applied here and to a few others in Illinois but as enticing as the programs are I just can't get past the fact that this could be a junk state. . . I am contemplating not completing my secondary here and I already withdrew (pre-secondary) from another Chicago school.
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Illinois finally just passed a budget, so....hopefully things are on the upswing.
 
For those whose school does not do a committee letter, are you getting an adviser letter? I'm a bit confused on how to address Ques 10B: If you waived your right to an advisor letter, please indicate to us why you chose not to seek a letter from your premedical advisor. For example, if your undergraduate school did not have a pre-med advisor, let us know.
I did have an advisers, and sought help from multiple ones because I come from a public school. I didn't think their letter would add much value to my application so I didn't request one. Can I say something along the line of that in terms of I saw multiple advisers and the adviser I valued most changed jobs (true story)..I don't know :/
 
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aspiremd84 said:
For those whose school does not do a committee letter, are you getting an adviser letter? I'm a bit confused on how to address Ques 10B: If you waived your right to an advisor letter, please indicate to us why you chose not to seek a letter from your premedical advisor. For example, if your undergraduate school did not have a pre-med advisor, let us know.
I did have an advisers, and sought help from multiple ones because I come from a public school. I didn't think their letter would add much value to my application so I didn't request one. Can I say something along the line of that in terms of I saw multiple advisers and the adviser I valued most changed jobs (true story)..I don't know :/
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I'm pretty sure advisor letter = committee letter. You can just say your school doesn't do a committee letter and that's obviously the reason you don't have one.
 
mellie0 said:
I'm pretty sure advisor letter = committee letter. You can just say your school doesn't do a committee letter and that's obviously the reason you don't have one.
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Thank you for your response! I initially thought the same thing, but when I moved to another page, it has two options for adviser letters:
Premedical Committee
Chairperson:
School:
- OR -
Advisor
(Optional)
Seeing this made me think about individual adviser letter. I think I'll just saw something along the lines of your initial suggestion that my pre-med advisers don't do a committee letter.
 
aspiremd84 said:
Thank you for your response! I initially thought the same thing, but when I moved to another page, it has two options for adviser letters:
Premedical Committee
Chairperson:
School:
- OR -
Advisor
(Optional)
Seeing this made me think about individual adviser letter. I think I'll just saw something along the lines of your initial suggestion that my pre-med advisers don't do a committee letter.
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I see. That sounds strange. I haven't gotten my secondary yet, so I wasn't sure of how they had phrased it. Try calling the Admissions office and asking?
 
mellie0 said:
I see. That sounds strange. I haven't gotten my secondary yet, so I wasn't sure of how they had phrased it. Try calling the Admissions office and asking?
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Gotcha! I ended up calling admissions, and they said it referred to specifically getting a separate letter from an adviser (non-committee). I guess I'll just say that I'm a non-trad student who utilized many different resources than just my advisers and I didn't have a meaningful relationship with my pre-med adviser as I ended up seeing 3 different ones coming from a public school. Such a strange thing to focus on.
 
Does Stritch only send secondaries once your primary app was verified? I received Dartmouth's even though my app isn't verified yet, but I wasn't sure if Stritch does this as well.
 
What is the consensus around question 6? Should I just write about some random challenge or leave it blank as I have had no sort of academic issues.
 
I submitted my secondary and in the instructions they said to limit the reponses to two paragraphs. I designated which paragraphs by double spacing (which is also what the instructions indicated) and when I submitted, for some reason, some of my longer responses showed up as 3 paragraphs. Idk if this is a huge deal or not, as the word counts are all within the specified limit, but this is one of my top choices and I don't want something small like this to reflect badly on me.
 
TheWhiteWolfMD said:
What is the consensus around question 6? Should I just write about some random challenge or leave it blank as I have had no sort of academic issues.
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I'm most likely going to leave it blank. Especially because it already asks about a personal challenge, so it would seem like overkill to try and force something.
 
aspiremd84 said:
Gotcha! I ended up calling admissions, and they said it referred to specifically getting a separate letter from an adviser (non-committee). I guess I'll just say that I'm a non-trad student who utilized many different resources than just my advisers and I didn't have a meaningful relationship with my pre-med adviser as I ended up seeing 3 different ones coming from a public school. Such a strange thing to focus on.
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My school has a pre-health advising committee but no individual pre-medical advisors, would I be in the right putting that my school has no pre-medical advisor, but a pre-health advising committee so I looked at external resources in order to get it pre-med information and thus did not form a relationship with anyone in the pre-health advising committee?

EDIT: I also see on the next page that you have to option of marking "Pre-med" or "Academic" as far as advisor goes, so is it acceptable to list my general academic advisor?
 
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So, I noticed on the Loyola Med website, there is an updated part near the Letter of Recommendation requirement that says it allows the applicant to decide what letters he/she wants to submit. However, at the end of the secondary application, it says that it requires one non-science faculty letter? I do not have a non-science professor. What should I do?
 
Secondary Received! How do I format pictures to be 2"x2"? I didn't realized online pictures have dimensions besides pixels.

" Mandatory 2”x2” digital photo (jpg format only) of yourself must be uploaded to complete your
supplemental application. The photo needs to be under 2MB in size."
 
MedSchoolHopeful12 said:
Secondary Received! How do I format pictures to be 2"x2"? I didn't realized online pictures have dimensions besides pixels.

" Mandatory 2”x2” digital photo (jpg format only) of yourself must be uploaded to complete your
supplemental application. The photo needs to be under 2MB in size."
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Learning how to look up things on google is a valuable skill!
 
ChemYoda said:
So, I noticed on the Loyola Med website, there is an updated part near the Letter of Recommendation requirement that says it allows the applicant to decide what letters he/she wants to submit. However, at the end of the secondary application, it says that it requires one non-science faculty letter? I do not have a non-science professor. What should I do?
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I am in the same boat. In the secondary invitation letter, under the Letter of Recommendation Section, it says,

"We strongly recommend at least one letter from someone who has taught you in a science
class. We suggest two science faculty letters and one non-science faculty letter."

It appears they have some flexibility. At least that is what I am hoping! Good Luck!
 
How are people answering question 4 about bringing your app up to date. The only thing I can think of is to add the rest of my volunteer activities but I'm not sure how to talk about them. Would listing them be a bad idea?
 
Sixsuit said:
I thought this was odd as well. I went with what was on the prompts (500 words)
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So you wrote more than two paragraphs? I also kept my essays in 3-4 paragraphs but under the 500 word limit. It made my essays look terrible and not "flow" to have in only two paragraphs and they are the only school to have this requirement. Think it's ok???
 
Anybody want to trade secondary responses for peer editing? I'm mostly concerned about my first two, so less reading for you if you're down! Also, my first prompt is currently super short so it wouldn't take long to edit that bad boy.
 
milestoMD said:
So you wrote more than two paragraphs? I also kept my essays in 3-4 paragraphs but under the 500 word limit. It made my essays look terrible and not "flow" to have in only two paragraphs and they are the only school to have this requirement. Think it's ok???
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I accidentally submitted my application with some of my essays being 3 paragraphs instead of 2 and I started freaking out because this is one of my top 3 (I'm also just a nervous mess) so I emailed admissions and they were really nice about it. They said not to worry and it wouldn't impact my application 🙂
 
Loyola reached out to me, and said they would waive my secondary fee, and "expedite" my application should i chose to apply. Has this every happened to anyone before?
 
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tiramisucheese said:
Are you URM? I've read about that happening in other schools.
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Yea I am actually lol! Most schools send out the generic, "come check out our program" emails but I might actually apply to Loyola now that they're gonna waive my secondary fee
 
daxlo said:
Yea I am actually lol! Most schools send out the generic, "come check out our program" emails but I might actually apply to Loyola now that they're gonna waive my secondary fee
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I emailed them back and they waived my fee. It's real!!!
 
Bubbles0523 said:
Goodluck everyone! I'm a rising M3 and happy to answer any questions!
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What's your favorite aspect of the program? Least Favorite?
Does the administration seem to value students and their feedback?
How happy are you to be done with step 1? 🙂
 
For people with FAP, were you ever prompted to email the admissions office? Their instructions say "Applicants must email the admissions office if they are FAP awardees so the fee waiver can be processed", but I was never asked about payment of any kind and it seems like my application is complete O__O
 
COMMANDER CLOWN said:
For people with FAP, were you ever prompted to email the admissions office? Their instructions say "Applicants must email the admissions office if they are FAP awardees so the fee waiver can be processed", but I was never asked about payment of any kind and it seems like my application is complete O__O
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I didn't last year or this year


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile
 
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Have you guys been separating all of your secondaries into paragraphs? Mine are all just huge blocks of words so that I don't dip further into character count...
 
doggiebag said:
Have you guys been separating all of your secondaries into paragraphs? Mine are all just huge blocks of words so that I don't dip further into character count...
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I had to break the 2 paragraph rule. I prewrote most of Loyola's and condensing ~500 words into 2 paragraphs was just poor writing. I called and they claimed it wasn't a big deal and the 500 word is what mattered for what it's worth.
 
For #6, would taking a couple of gap years after completing undergrad count as a gap in education? I have been working and volunteering to gain more experience.
 
I believe anything over two years would be considered a gap in education. The best thing would be to check with the school's admission to be sure.
 
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