Applying while abroad

[ConfusedFulbrightScholar]

Hi....odd situation.

I'm sitting at a 3.65/3.42 GPA, hoping to get something equivalent to 32+ on MCAT (Percentiles of practice 2015 exams have been pointing this direction), and am a Fulbright scholar living in Indonesia for the next year.

I made the difficult decision to forgo employment as a Middle School Science Teacher stateside in order to go for the Fulbright. I'm scared, and excited, to be away from everything I know for a year.

I'm taking my MCAT in June, hope to be verified by July, will be pre-writing all my Secondaries, and am leaving the States in September.

Question

1) Has anyone had experiences with the application season while abroad? Do it? Don't do it?

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[NickNaylor]

At my institution, I always run into at least a couple of people that are working/studying abroad while applying. Given the relative frequency I've run into this situation, it's clearly feasible to do. However, understand that, logistically, arranging interviews will be a challenge. Most people had a marathon of interviews scheduled for when they returned, often doing 3-4 interviews a week in a 2-3 week span. As long as you're ok with that (or, alternatively, if you have the cash to make multiple trips back to the States), then you should be fine. All you really need is access to a computer assuming everything else with your app is good to go prior to you leaving.

You should also understand that you will likely need to interview later in the cycle in order to schedule everything. This will put you at a disadvantage at schools that have rolling admissions. Unfortunately, I don't think there's anyway to avoid that unless, again, you're flush with cash and can make multiple trips back.

 

[ConfusedFulbrightScholar]

At my institution, I always run into at least a couple of people that are working/studying abroad while applying. Given the relative frequency I've run into this situation, it's clearly feasible to do. However, understand that, logistically, arranging interviews will be a challenge. Most people had a marathon of interviews scheduled for when they returned, often doing 3-4 interviews a week in a 2-3 week span. As long as you're ok with that (or, alternatively, if you have the cash to make multiple trips back to the States), then you should be fine. All you really need is access to a computer assuming everything else with your app is good to go prior to you leaving.

You should also understand that you will likely need to interview later in the cycle in order to schedule everything. This will put you at a disadvantage at schools that have rolling admissions. Unfortunately, I don't think there's anyway to avoid that unless, again, you're flush with cash and can make multiple trips back.

Thank you for your response. Do you think that most schools have rolling admissions?

 

[ConfusedFulbrightScholar]

It can be a challenge to abroad when completing medical school application. I am presuming that virtually all schools have secondaries via electronic form so that shouldnt be an issue.

1) pre-writing secondaries may not be as efficient as you think as many schools both have wildly varying questions as well as change questions year to year. So you need to stay on top of them and turn them around quickly

2) Getting back and forth for interviews will be a challenge, especially with the cost and lack of capacity in airlines (ie not as many empty seats as before). Some schools have limited and set dates for interviews. So you may not be able to group them together thus requiring a few international trips.

Again, these are challenges to prepare for and not necessarily change your plans

Thank you for your response. Yeah, I'll trying my best to study past years as an indicator as to how secondary questions might vary.

 

[NickNaylor]

Thank you for your response. Do you think that most schools have rolling admissions?

I would say that rolling admissions is more common than not. However, the top tier schools seem to use non-rolling admissions more commonly.

 

[ConfusedFulbrightScholar]

Right, thanks for that info! My stats aren't congruous with top tier admissions, so it is definitely something I will have to take into account.

What I was thinking of doing is...possibly after receiving an II, emailing all the other schools and letting them know my situation. If they were ever going to interview me, hopefully they'll do so sometime around that period.

But, I understand that expecting such..."hospitality" when it's really a seller's market might be a bit naive of me!

I would say that rolling admissions is more common than not. However, the top tier schools seem to use non-rolling admissions more commonly.

 

[NickNaylor]

Right, thanks for that info! My stats aren't congruous with top tier admissions, so it is definitely something I will have to take into account.

What I was thinking of doing is...possibly after receiving an II, emailing all the other schools and letting them know my situation. If they were ever going to interview me, hopefully they'll do so sometime around that period.

But, I understand that expecting such..."hospitality" when it's really a seller's market might be a bit naive of me!

In your case you have extenuating circumstances, so I imagine schools will be more accommodating to you than others that are sending dubious "in the area" e-mails. However, just expect to do most of your interviews later on in the cycle (e.g., November or December) to give schools time to actually evaluate your application. Also make sure to get your app in ASAP.