A newbie question about acceptance....

[ocwaveoc]

Hello everyone.
What do you do when you've been accepted to a school yet you are either still waiting to see if you'd be interviewed at other schools, have an interview date with another school or have been interviewed at another school and are waiting to see if you'd be accepted or not? I mean, you can't hold the school who has already accepted you forever. There is a timelimit, right? What do you do if that time limit isn't sufficient for you to make a decision whether to accept the school who's already accepted you or to wait around for other possibilities?
thanks

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[Kuba]

you pay up

 

[ocwaveoc]

IC. But, you don't get that deposit back if you choose another school later, right?

 

[NickRiviera]

You usually don't get that deposit back. If you staggered your applications and get accepted to schools you like more each time, you can dump a lot, a lot, of money. What other choice do you have though? You can't just call the school and be like "I want to go to your school but don't want to pay the money because a better school might accept me and I'd want to go there, so could you just extend my deadline?"

 

[Nickelpennykid]

That is generally the case but if the school you are waiting for is sig. cheaper than the one you paid a deposit for, then losing the deposit (even if it is like 2 grand) is still going to be more cost effective in the long run.

 

[digital01]

correct, your deposit is theirs to keep, but it'd be stupid to not pay up b/c you may not get in to another school for one reason or another.

 

[Buckeye4life]

Put the money down to reserve your seat, and be grateful that a school accepted you. Do it at least a week before the deadline to make sure the mail goes through. I just look at it as this is the school you were meant to attend. It makes it much easier to decide if you only have one choice. If you're rich enough you can still hold out and see if other schools accept you or not and then just bite the bullet with your original deposit, if that's not your first choice.

 

[nascardoc]

I agree with what everyone here has said, in fact, I have had to pay up and lose $. It sucks, but it has to be done.

This is one area that the MD schools really get it right and I have never understood why the DO schools don't use the same set of rules (perhaps modified a bit). According to the AAMC (I believe), MD schools are not allowed to charge more than $100 to hold your seat and the deposit is refundable up until May 15.

IMO, I think the DO schools should adopt these rules too, but with the following modifications (in order to deter students using DO programs as back-up and then leaving each school scrambling try to find students)

1) Deposits are no more than $500
2) Refundable until March 15

This still gives the DO schools the "edge" in not letting students hold multiple offers for a long time, but also allows those who have scattered interview/acceptance dates to choose schools with more freedom, rather than feeling forced to a school b/c you dropped 2K.

What do you guys think of my plan? or

 

[t-funk]

Totally agree with that. I really feel the $2000 non-refundable deposit sucks but I also understand why they do it.

I have a question related to this, if a school calls you up for an interview, can you delay the interview to make sure that you interview at your first choice school first?

 

[TerpDO]

Totally agree with that. I really feel the $2000 non-refundable deposit sucks but I also understand why they do it.

I have a question related to this, if a school calls you up for an interview, can you delay the interview to make sure that you interview at your first choice school first?

of course you can do this but keep in mind that most schools only permit one schedule change for the interview per cycle and what happens if you change your schedule to a later date only to have some unfortunate event happen (like a death in the family at worst case scenario) at the same time and the school either won't have any opening for a later date or you end up interviewing way, way later when it is a lot more difficult to be accepted. And keep in mind that as each week passes, there are less seats left and there is a lot more competition for those remaining seats. Unless it is Sept or Oct, I would recommend taking any interviews as early as possible to maximize the chance of being accepted somewhere. hope this helps!

P.S. who is to say that your first choice will offer an interview at all? you don't want to be waiting forever do you?

 

[t-funk]

Thanks for the reply. I am faced with the issue that my top choice (from what I've gathered by reading these forums) interviews very late, like Nov and Dec. It also appears that the other schools I'm applying to are more likely to interview in Sept or Oct. I guess the best strategy is to just fork over the dough if I'm lucky enough to get accepted somewhere and then lose it if I am lucky enough to get accepted to my top choice. Would you agree? I'm trying to figure out a better strategy cause I'm cheap. I really, really, really want to go to my top choice for a million different reasons.