2020-2021 Waitlist Support Thread

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.
Meowster007 said:
Just curious does anyone know the WL that will occur as of mvmt for MD vs DO? Just curious
Click to expand...
would assume the MD movement that starts tomorrow would have some sort of effect on DO Schools wouldnt it? If people are for example accepted to a DO school, and then they get off their MD WL, i would think that would open up spots on the DO schools too as most people do prefer MD schools.

btw my intent isnt to say one is better than the other, this is just what most applicants i know of are in this boat where they want the MD over the DO. me? i'd take either right now happily lol.
 
Studytrain said:
Bad year for 520s and 3.98s as well
Click to expand...
For all you high stat folks, so much will happen next week. You guys typically get the ball rolling and participate in the first wave. All else being equal, your stats are top 3.5% so top 2500 candidates. Remember, the cumulative matriculants at all T20s is about 3000 students. All T20s often go after the same top students which means many openings exist for WL movement, especially if they offered fewer As this year for fear of wrong yield prediction.

chins up.
as our friend likes to say...,
Ohmmmmm
 
Members don't see this ad :)
gonnif said:
As I said in my post:

“Each individual situation is different but generally do not reapply unless you have identified the weaknesses in your application and have addressed them”

Remember you were on the WL, so what do you think were your weaknesses, if any? What have you done to enhance your record? It is up to you and your judgement to decide to reapply
Click to expand...
what if you were perfectly fine and simply attribute the WL's to the fact that there were a record amount of applicants and seats remained the same? asking for a friend
 
is anyone here WL’d at Georgetown? If so what are your thoughts on WL movement this year? I think a few people got off the WL in March according to the Gtown thread, but I’m wondering if WL movement is done for the school?
 
Anyone have any idea on what the admissions will prioritize when going over a WL applicant? I understand they likely go over the entire file again, but I'm just wondering how much more they can extract out of an app after already seeing it pre-II and post-II. Maybe interview scores will have the most weight or something??
 
NoEyeEyeGuy said:
would assume the MD movement that starts tomorrow would have some sort of effect on DO Schools wouldnt it? If people are for example accepted to a DO school, and then they get off their MD WL, i would think that would open up spots on the DO schools too as most people do prefer MD schools.

btw my intent isnt to say one is better than the other, this is just what most applicants i know of are in this boat where they want the MD over the DO. me? i'd take either right now happily lol.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the thoughts and I am in the same boat as you rn just praying for an A rn! I was just wondering out of the two (AMCAS/AACOMAS) who sees more WL mvmt overall?
 
bluecar06 said:
Anyone have any idea on what the admissions will prioritize when going over a WL applicant? I understand they likely go over the entire file again, but I'm just wondering how much more they can extract out of an app after already seeing it pre-II and post-II. Maybe interview scores will have the most weight or something??
Click to expand...
I've heard that they might try to match demographics to those who withdrew to keep their class varied in that regard

Or we were just ranked below other people, such that when they withdraw they settle for us
 
Meowster007 said:
Thanks for the thoughts and I am in the same boat as you rn just praying for an A rn! I was just wondering out of the two (AMCAS/AACOMAS) who sees more WL mvmt overall?
Click to expand...
Hard to say given there isn't anything tying the two systems together. However, DO schools tend to have a large amount of movement given that they're losing applicants both to other DO institutions and MD institutions.
 
ohshizmyquad said:
is anyone here WL’d at Georgetown? If so what are your thoughts on WL movement this year? I think a few people got off the WL in March according to the Gtown thread, but I’m wondering if WL movement is done for the school?
Click to expand...
Should be a good amount left. There's going to be more people giving up their A's on 4/30, and the fact that they already started pulling from the WL likely means they burned through their overacceptance buffer.
 
Was wondering if anyone had any experience with this question, but I had a well-known faculty member for my top choice waitlist (who worked previously in admissions but not this year) look over my application and advocate for my waitlist position to admissions. At this point not sure if his support will influence my chances given I was waitlisted in the first place but was wondering if anyone had any opinions on this?

Edit: I was randomly able to connect with this faculty member after I was waitlisted, so he did not have influence in the initial waitlist decision if that information helps
 
NoEyeEyeGuy said:
what if you were perfectly fine and simply attribute the WL's to the fact that there were a record amount of applicants and seats remained the same? asking for a friend
Click to expand...
What if? The odds are high there are also going to be a record number of applicants next year, since a lot of people who don't succeed this year will end reapplying.

I don't want to bring the support thread down by mentioning this, especially since I truly believe a lot of people here are going to be fine in the next few weeks, but, the elephant in the room is that reapplicants statistically have a more difficult time than first time applicants. There are a number of reasons for this, but @gonnif's advice is golden here. Whatever the reason, if you end up without an A, your application is demonstrably weaker than those who were accepted, even if it's a subjective judgment, and even if your application would have been good enough in a previous cycle.

I am going to try to find his post and link to it. A bunch of schools specifically advise to skip a cycle to make an application stronger. If you choose to ignore that advice, you just shouldn't be shocked if your result doesn't change.

Often, just having an extra year's worth of ECs is enough, or creating a more realistic school list fixes the problem (remember, you are not a reapplicant to schools you haven't previously applied to), or having better grades, or a better MCAT, etc. But, if you don't change your application at all, and just apply to all the same schools again hoping the second time will be the charm, you might very well end up disappointed, at least according to @gonnif's compendium.

Edit: @gonnif's post: Possible Reapplication Advice and School List Help
 
Last edited:
Members don't see this ad :)
paul30 said:
When people withdraw, are offers automatically made to WL people or do adcoms decide to hold off on that until more people withdraw?
Click to expand...
People have been withdrawing for weeks, but tomorrow is the deadline for most people, so there really is no "more" to come after tomorrow, other than people who have extensions or people who will be called off one or more WLs in the next few weeks and will have to drop a school if they have more than one after being called off a WL.

There is therefore nothing to hold off for. That said, nothing is "automatic." Each school has a process. Some have already started making calls. Others will kick into gear tomorrow, over the weekend, or sometime in the next few weeks. Additional waves will be created by people turning them down, or withdrawing after being called off someone else's WL.

Just keep in mind that adcoms' jobs are to fill seats with the best possible candidates. This is not facilitated by "holding off" with empty seats while the competition is snapping up the most desirable WL candidates. So, no, no one is sitting around waiting for things to calm down. Some schools just take longer than others, and some schools have a process that contemplates significant WL movement while others do more over accepting on the front end and end up with fewer empty seats to fill this time of the year.
 
1 DO acceptance so far but holding out hope for my 3 MD waitlists... honestly I think half my problem was that I applied super late in the cycle, like oftentimes right on the day of the ”deadlines” lol I’m quite bad at being proactive and submitting early. My interviews were all January - April, no post-II Rs, only WLs.
 
thehippiestudent said:
1 DO acceptance so far but holding out hope for my 3 MD waitlists... honestly I think half my problem was that I applied super late in the cycle, like oftentimes right on the day of the ”deadlines” lol I’m quite bad at being proactive and submitting early. My interviews were all January - April, no post-II Rs, only WLs.
Click to expand...
Same. My undergraduate school took 5 months to write the committee letter so my app was complete sometime in October with MD interviews in late January and late February. I strongly believe this is the main factor in my WLs. I'm not sure how to address this if I had to reapply. Any thoughts? (Yes, I would apply earlier, but this is not necessarily a "weakness" I could show that I improved upon.) I'm sure that my app could've been better no matter what, but I truly think this was the biggest factor.
 
I’m pretty sure there’s not gonna be many calls today, people still have until the end of the day to drop As right? And it’s Friday, so maybe adcoms will wait until Monday to see how much their yield changed. In previous years do calls actually go out on April 30th?
 
Randompremed7 said:
I’m pretty sure there’s not gonna be many calls today, people still have until the end of the day to drop As right? And it’s Friday, so maybe adcoms will wait until Monday to see how much their yield changed. In previous years do calls actually go out on April 30th?
Click to expand...
You nailed it. The process is not binary, either no calls or all calls. There has been a trickle of calls since March, or even before. That has really started to pick up in the last week or so, as reported in various school specific threads, and a bit right on this thread.

Yes, people have until midnight tonight, but, believe it or not, people have been dropping all along, so it's not like things are going to drastically shift all over the country at 11:59 tonight. Schools have been planned WL movement for weeks now. As I said, some calls have already begun, there almost certainly will be some calls today, but not a ton.

History suggests the bulk of the movement will come in the next two weeks or so. After that, it still will not be a binary process, and it will not end. Things will slow down but continue right into June or even later, as schools fill in empty seats here and there created by last minute changes in plans for some people, as well as by the secondary waves caused by people who receive an offer from a preferred WL school drop an existing A, or by them turning down the WL call when it comes.
 
Hey guys I'm on 7 WL:

WVU
Pitt
Geisinger
Rosalind Franklin
Quinnipiac
SKMC
Drexel

I'm a PA resident. I'm in this limbo on when and if to start reapplying. I am planning on holding off until mid-May to do revisions to my application. Do any of you have advice or thoughts on how to go about this?
 
To all my loyal meme lovers, I was making the following meme to fit the theme of my recent watch of The Avengers...

12E9862E-1431-4A79-BF63-1977B86BF3EF.jpeg


...when I got the call. I’m going to be a doctor!

I want to thank everyone for their love and support - this was my one waitlist and my top choice school so it means so much to me that I was able to secure a seat. If it is okay with everyone else, I will be sticking around here to see out the cycle and contribute support where I can!
 
benzodiazepinacolada said:
To all my loyal meme lovers, I was making the following meme to fit the theme of my recent watch of The Avengers...

View attachment 335914

...when I got the call. I’m going to be a doctor!

I want to thank everyone for their love and support - this was my one waitlist and my top choice school so it means so much to me that I was able to secure a seat. If it is okay with everyone else, I will be sticking around here to see out the cycle and contribute support where I can!
Click to expand...
keep the memes coming I am so proud !!!!!!! good job friend 🥳
 
Julatteluver said:
So do we know which schools started giving out As today :-o
Click to expand...
You have to go to individual school threads for that, and, the only ones that really matter are the schools where you are on the WL, so the relevant schools are different for everyone. There is a spreadsheet somewhere, but it doesn't look like most people are going to the trouble to update it.
 
A huge wave of acceptances to waitlisted students happened earlier this week at the school I am waitlisted at, and unfortunately, I was not part of it. Nonetheless, is the expected waitlist movement past today going to be lower than what it would have been had a wave like this not happened?
 
Quil98 said:
A huge wave of acceptances to waitlisted students happened earlier this week at the school I am waitlisted at, and unfortunately, I was not part of it. Nonetheless, is the expected waitlist movement past today going to be lower than what it would have been had a wave like this not happened?
Click to expand...
I think early waitlist movement means that the schools faced way lower yield way earlier than expected. I mean, schools wouldn’t utilize their waitlist unless they absolutely need to, since it’d be useless to pull out applicants from the WL when there are no empty spots. This should be a good thing in general unless their initial waitlist movement shows good yield, which will lessen the later movement
 
Julatteluver said:
I think early waitlist movement means that the schools faced way lower yield way earlier than expected. I mean, schools wouldn’t utilize their waitlist unless they absolutely need to, since it’d be useless to pull out applicants from the WL when there are no empty spots. This should be a good thing in general unless their initial waitlist movement shows good yield, which will lessen the later movement
Click to expand...
The latter part of your statement is what worries me. It seems that most of the people who got off the waitlist are those who didn't have any acceptances or even waitlists elsewhere. Hoping for the best.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Rhymic
2024-2025 Waitlist Support and Manifestation Thread
2 3 4
Replies
164
Views
21K
rtrmed
R
D
2023-2024 Waitlist Support Thread
12 13 14 15 16
Replies
771
Views
137K
Adil Khan
Adil Khan
Happy Bulbis Cordis
2022-2023 Waitlist Support Thread
25 26 27 28 29
Replies
1K
Views
230K
Angler
Angler
BioPsychotic
2021-2022 Waitlist Support Thread
22 23 24 25 26
Replies
1K
Views
179K
sacguy
S
A
Waitlist bittersweet?
Replies
12
Views
2K
Mr.Smile12
Mr.Smile12
Top