Apply to them all if you can scrounge up the bills. The cycle will surprise you - you'll end up with interviews at places you never expected, but get passed over at others where you felt confident.
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This is so true - apply to as many schools as you can afford. I was extremely fortunate to receive 10 interviews ( I only attended 6 and was accepted at 5) this cycle, and although that may seem like a lot, I applied to 20 schools! You really never can predict which schools will interview/accept you or pass you up.
Before the cycle started I'll admit I felt a little bit entitled to interviews everywhere because I had a 4.0+ GPA and a 22DAT, but was extremely humbled when I almost immediately was rejected from Midwestern-AZ and ASDOH. As the cycle went on, I was also rejected without an interview from BostonU, UOP, Maryland, Louisville, Harvard, Columbia, Oregon, and Case despite my stats being higher than many of their averages. I was also rejected at WesternU post-interview even though I live only about 20 min from the campus and think I did a fine job of showing my interest in the school and voicing how important it was to me that I stay near home if it all possible (I really don't think my interview skills were an issue since they were good enough for UCLA, UCSF, Michigan, UPenn, and USC). Again, I think the moral of the story is that even though there are many things that you CAN control regarding your application, there are also many other things that you CANT control. No matter how good of an applicant you think you are, you may rub some schools the wrong way, while still being a perfect fit at others.
The application cycle will definitely test your patience and play with your emotions. You may have think you've done everything you can to gain an acceptance by the time AADSAS opens up, but choosing which (and how many) schools to apply to is the last step in putting yourself in the best position to receive as many interviews as possible. Make sure you get the ADEA book and figure out exactly which schools take a large % of students from YOUR state (just because they accept a high percentage OOS, because of certain agreements that some schools have with neighboring states, it doesn't necessarily mean that they will accept a large number of students from where YOU live). It may seem foolish, but try to stomach the extra costs of applying to a few extra schools up front because maximizing your chances of interviews (and thus acceptances) up front can potentially save you thousands of dollars and many years of time in the long run. Best of luck!
