Bad if Too Many Safety Schools?

[JustinG]

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I heard that all med schools see what schools you applied to. So if you're an avg applicant, applying to 20% reach schools and 80% safety schools (ideal for you), will the top schools on your list see this as a red flag and think "This student wasn't aiming very high, so I'll just let one of the lower tier schools will take this guy, since that's the more likely case"??

Any thoughts?

 

[partinerns]

I'm not entirely sure on this, but I don't think that schools can see which other schools you've applied to until May 15th.

 

[Hifey]

I heard that all med schools see what schools you applied to. So if you're an avg applicant, applying to 20% reach schools and 80% safety schools (ideal for you), will the top schools on your list see this as a red flag and think "This student wasn't aiming very high, so I'll just let one of the lower tier schools will take this guy, since that's the more likely case"??

Any thoughts?

Schools do NOT see where else you've applied. The only time they are aware of whether you have been accepted or not is when May 15 rolls around and they can see if you're holding other acceptances. May 15 is the date you are allowed to hold only ONE acceptance.

I'm about 80% sure on the May 15 thing and 100% sure about the schools NOT seeing where else you applied. At a few of my interviews the interviewers asked me if I would mind sharing where else I had interviewed...and even then thats up to you whether you want to reveal it or not.

 

[long]

Medical schools are not able to see what other schools you applied to, so it doesn't matter.

Also, if you've got the money and time to blow, I say you can't have enough "safety" schools. I applied last year and didn't get in anywhere, but expanded my list of schools this cycle and got 6 interviews (so far) with 5 of them at schools that I didn't apply to last time.

 

[NASA123]

I heard that all med schools see what schools you applied to. So if you're an avg applicant, applying to 20% reach schools and 80% safety schools (ideal for you), will the top schools on your list see this as a red flag and think "This student wasn't aiming very high, so I'll just let one of the lower tier schools will take this guy, since that's the more likely case"??

Any thoughts?

My only thought on this is that I was rejected by my most safety, safety school. Apparently if they see your qualifications (and if your dumb enough to tell them where you applied (that was me)), they will waitlist or reject you because they know that your not going to come there and they don't want their matriculated / accepted ratio to be too low. Which when it's your first letter back is extremely discouraging lol... Then I was told why lol.

 

[jla314]

i thought that med schools find out where you've been accepted sometime in march, and that this happens around the deadline that aamc gives all med schools to fill their class (in march). so all your med schools' decisions will have already been made regarding your file, and the only way your admissions decisions could impact your candidacy at other schools is if you were waitlisted somewhere (even then, i'm not convinced it would work like that...do you think med schools could check out every school their waitlisted applicants were accepted at, and then somehow use that information to rank the waitlisted applicants?).

check out this link regarding the release of your admissions decisions information to AAMC on march 15: http://www.aamc.org/students/applying/policies/admissionofficers.htm

 

[schrizto]

There really isn't such thing as a safety medical school anyway. If you are an "average" applicant like the OP's example it'd probably be tough to make your list 80% schools you perceive to have a sure shot of getting into.

 

[TaylorMDhopeful]

1. Schools can't see where you got in until the Ides of March (March 15th). 2. Thry can only see where you have been accepted and this is only if they have already accepted you. 3. There are no US medical schools that are safeties, luck plays a part in it to some extent.

 

[FlowRate]

So if you can only hold one acceptance on the 15th and they can only see your acceptances on the 15th, are there a lot of phone calls and scrambling around trying to play schools against each other on this day?

 

[flip26]

i thought that med schools find out where you've been accepted sometime in march, and that this happens around the deadline that aamc gives all med schools to fill their class (in march). so all your med schools' decisions will have already been made regarding your file, and the only way your admissions decisions could impact your candidacy at other schools is if you were waitlisted somewhere (even then, i'm not convinced it would work like that...do you think med schools could check out every school their waitlisted applicants were accepted at, and then somehow use that information to rank the waitlisted applicants?).

check out this link regarding the release of your admissions decisions information to AAMC on march 15: http://www.aamc.org/students/applying/policies/admissionofficers.htm

So I read that link, and I am still not convinced that other schools know where you got accepted on March 15. If you read that link carefully, it says that med schools must notify the AAMC within 7 days of an admissions action, and prior to March 15, within 4 weeks...

Regardless, this link doesn't indicate one way or the other if schools find out where you have been accepted, at least not by March 15. Now after May 15, I think it makes more sense for this information to be made available to med schools, for purposes of waitlists, etc.

 

[jla314]

So I read that link, and I am still not convinced that other schools know where you got accepted on March 15. If you read that link carefully, it says that med schools must notify the AAMC within 7 days of an admissions action, and prior to March 15, within 4 weeks...

Regardless, this link doesn't indicate one way or the other if schools find out where you have been accepted, at least not by March 15.

yep, which is why there is still debate on whether or not schools find out where you've been accepted.

i'm personally thinking based on what i read on that link and what i've seen around sdn that releasing admissions decisions to AAMC is akin to releasing admissions decisions to all your participating medical schools. but i provided the link because it's the closest thing made publicly available by AAMC that addresses the post-acceptance process as viewed by med schools rather than by applicants...vague though it is