Applying this cycle far and wide! How's everything looking.

[Jack-Kennedy35]

Hello all!

My MCAT is currently scheduled for September 28th with a score turnaround time of October 13th. I was planning on applying to around 35 MD schools and have already started pre-writing my secondaries (EDIT: I will stop Immediately). I am hoping to have all of them in by the 13th. I definitely don't plan on delaying it past the 13th and I am positive that I will be complete by then.

Cumulative GPA: 3.84
Science GPA: 3.78
UCLA Undergraduate Student (CALIFORNIA APPLICANT)

My primary has already been verified to a throwaway school and I have all my LORs in.

Please tell me if this okay? @Goro @gyngyn @gonnif @Catalystik

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[deleted804295]

What are your practice scores looking like?

 

[Jack-Kennedy35]

What are your practice scores looking like?

Currently a 513. Hopefully I can bump it up to a 517 in the next 6 weeks. I haven't started AAMC practice material, so need to start soon.

I honestly think I'll apply even more to say around 60 MD schools. But at least 40 should be done by October 13th.

 

[deleted804295]

Currently a 513. Hopefully I can bump it up to a 517 in the next 6 weeks. I haven't started AAMC practice material, so need to start soon.

You're in a gray area since your score is subject to improvement and not in the red zone (<510).

Have you already applied to one throwaway school?

 

[xDNA]

Bruh...applying to 60 schools?

 

[Jack-Kennedy35]

You're in a gray area since your score is subject to improvement and not in the red zone (<510).

Have you already applied to one throwaway school?

yes, my app is verified to one school! I'm hesitant to add on additional schools (even the schools willing to offer interviews without an MCAT) unless you think it's in my best interest to do so right now, to at least these schools).

I was gonna add the rest around September 12th or something like that based on my practice test score two weeks before my exam date.

 

[Jack-Kennedy35]

Bruh...applying to 60 schools?

Bro I am cutting it close with my timeline so I have to go big right. I don't want another cycle so all I can hope for is that my wide net can catch atleast one school.

 

[Goro]

Hello all!

My MCAT is currently scheduled for September 28th with a score turnaround time of October 13th. I was planning on applying to around 35-40 MD schools and have already started pre-writing my secondaries. I am hoping to have all of them in by the 13th. I definitely don't plan on delaying it past the 13th and I am positive that I will be complete by then.

Cumulative GPA: 3.84
Science GPA: 3.78
UCLA Undergraduate Student (CALIFORNIA APPLICANT)

My primary has already been verified to a throwaway school and I have all my LORs in.

Please tell me if this okay? @Goro @gyngyn @gonnif @Catalystik

I feel that you are wasting your time prewriting secondaries when you have no what schools you should be targeting.

Mid Oct is, I fear, going to be getting late.

 

[patnic511]

Can you take your MCAT any sooner? Ideally you should be only focusing on the MCAT first since it's all riding on that one test performance. Trying to prepare for the MCAT while writing 60 secondaries sounds like a recipe for disaster, AKA potentially not doing either well.

 

[Jack-Kennedy35]

I feel that you are wasting your time prewriting secondaries when you have no what schools you should be targeting.

Mid Oct is, I fear, going to be getting late.

Do you think mid-October is not doable even this cycle? Aren't most schools willing to accept the September 28th MCAT and are pushing back the dates?

I will only take it when I am ready, but I will double my effort to prepare for the September 12th exam date if you think that's better. The score release would be September 29th for that one.

But I just want to know ur thoughts on if October 13th is still acceptable or do you think It truly is late at that point.

 

[Goro]

Do you think mid-October is not doable even this cycle? Aren't most schools willing to accept the September 28th MCAT and are pushing back the dates?

I will only take it when I am ready, but I will double my effort to prepare for the September 12th exam date if you think that's better. The score release would be September 29th for that one.

But I just want to know ur thoughts on if October 13th is still acceptable or do you think It truly is late at that point.

I don't know SM, my read is that early Oct is still OK, but I still think you're gambling and writing secondaries to schools where your MCAT score may end up the being not competitive.

Let's call out the big guns

@Angus Avagadro
@gonnif
@Moko
@Maimonides
@gyngyn
@LizzyM
@Mr.Smile12
@lord999

 

[Jack-Kennedy35]

I don't know SM, my read is that early Oct is still OK, but I still think you're gambling and writing secondaries to schools where your MCAT score may end up the being not competitive.

Let's call out the big guns

@Angus Avagadro
@gonnif
@Moko
@Maimonides
@gyngyn
@LizzyM
@Mr.Smile12
@lord999

I will stop pre-writing secondaries. I just think I will be most comfortable taking the exam on September 29th with a score release on October 13th. I am positive I can be complete by this date but I just want to take the opinion of wise adcoms such as yourself.

I am also going to apply DO, having already submitted many secondaries. So I don't think either date all be a problem for DO. But I also want to make sure about MD.

 

[KnightDoc]

Do you think mid-October is not doable even this cycle? Aren't most schools willing to accept the September 28th MCAT and are pushing back the dates?

I will only take it when I am ready, but I will double my effort to prepare for the September 12th exam date if you think that's better. The score release would be September 29th for that one.

But I just want to know ur thoughts on if October 13th is still acceptable or do you think It truly is late at that point.

You are conflating accepting a later MCAT scores with pushing back the cycle. As you noted above, many schools are reviewing secondaries (and even offering IIs) without the score -- THAT is your accommodation, and why they are willing to accept a 9/28 score. Submitting a secondary around 10/13 looks like it will be as acceptable (or late) as it would have been in any other year.

 

[candbgirl]

And if they receive your score on 10/13 they’ll either immediately send a secondary or put you in the queue for prescreening. You can’t just send your secondaries on 10/13 and by that point you won’t be marked complete for weeks. Remember, under the best of times it’s a slow process.

 

[Hopefulpremed123]

And if they receive your score on 10/13 they’ll either immediately send a secondary or put you in the queue for prescreening. You can’t just send your secondaries on 10/13 and by that point you won’t be marked complete for weeks. Remember, under the best of times it’s a slow process.

I respectfully disagree because I think around 80% of all schools are sending secondaries without an MCAT score. So OP can submit secondaries to these schools up until October 13th when he would receive his MCAT score.

For this method he needs to add in his remaining schools I’d say maybe 2-3 weeks before his MCAT test date. That gives time to receive the secondary and he can begin chugging away at them until the MCAT release date.

 

[Goro]

I respectfully disagree because I think around 80% of all schools are sending secondaries without an MCAT score. So OP can submit secondaries to these schools up until October 13th when he would receive his MCAT score.

For this method he needs to add in his remaining schools I’d say maybe 2-3 weeks before his MCAT test date. That gives time to receive the secondary and he can begin chugging away at them until the MCAT release date.

Secondaries are a tax on the hopelessly optimistic or even the pathologically naive.

 

[Hopefulpremed123]

Secondaries are a tax on the hopelessly optimistic or even the pathologically naive.

Under normal cycles- for DO schools.... would taking a September 28th MCAT and receiving the score on October 13th be okay? Provided if secondaries have already been submitted. Would this be considered early or On-time for DO?

 

[KnightDoc]

Under normal cycles- for DO schools.... would taking a September 28th MCAT and receiving the score on October 13th be okay? Provided if secondaries have already been submitted. Would this be considered early or On-time for DO?

DO schools are always on a later cycle, and there is no such thing as a September 28th in a normal cycle (testing usually ends the second week of September), but applying in October is always okay for DO. It's not "early" by any means, but it's fine.

 

[Goro]

Under normal cycles- for DO schools.... would taking a September 28th MCAT and receiving the score on October 13th be okay? Provided if secondaries have already been submitted. Would this be considered early or On-time for DO?

That would fine. In a normal year, Tgiving is late for DO