Being a WA or OR resident sucks!
- Thread starter Doc Henry
- Start date
yeah that does suck. in tx its part of state law--but its still just as hard, trust me
... ...but you should call your congressman, or any of the state reps!
- Feb 7, 2007
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Correct. You have close to 0 chance of getting accepted if you're OOS. However, that does not mean that it's easy to get accepted as an in-stater either. Not only are a portion of the seats reserved for Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho residents, but also because UW is a top 10 school (not to mention the cheap tuition) and people who get accepted tend to stay. Basically, you have about 900 in-state applicants fighting for 120 spots (numbers might be off because I don't remember exactly)
Its true that they can be unfriendly to oos students. but i read somewhere that 25% of spots are reserved to the surrounding states which leaves 75% for us in-staters...not a lot considering its a top ten school and its the only WA med school.
that being said- the process is tough for everyone in all regions...
Well, we'll see what happens when I start applying to med schools. I still have a few years before that will happen. I would prefer to get into UW - it would be nice not to have to move all the way across the country.
Try living in ID. 18 seats at UW for us and 8 in UT. 125+ people apply each year for the 18 UW seats, and probably for the 8 in UT as well. Anywhere else we are simply OOS. Still feel bad?
The surrounding states tax dollars help pay for the costs of running the medical school in Washington, and that is why some of the seats are reserved for people of these states. If you have problems with the number of spots for Washington residents, write your legislatures as they are in control of how much money is put into the med school (thus the number of seats for in-state residents). If you think you have it bad, try having to apply to UW, a school that accepts as few out of staters as possibly, as an Idaho resident.
I would like to agree with many others that have mentioned UW as a strong preference to in staters. From my experience and experiences of close friends, they are also rather rude to out of staters regardless of the programs involved (undergraduate, science PhD programs, and medical school).
Um, are you kidding me? 900 to 120? Those are incredibly good odds as medical school applications go. You could be below the top 10th percentile iin every way and still be a shoe-in. And how great is it to have one of the best (if not the best) public medical school reserving spots for only you and people from 4 other states (which aren't very populated), while rejecting every other non-URM applicant. I'd take those odds any day. Yes, I am from Michigan so am lucky enough to have 3 med schools. But the only one that comes close to UW in resources is UMich, which likes to advertise the fact that no more than 50% of their class is in-state. I sure wish I were a Washington resident. Quit yer bitchin'.
at uw it's more like 1000 in-state apps for 100 spots. those 100 spots are also for md/phd and the oos students who's life mission is to serve the underserved. personally I think the system in the northwest sucks...we need more schools.
And your state school (per your listed location and my MSAR) has similar numbers plus 3 more options for the private route, with many of those seats going to in state students. Some of us have it better than others, yes?
If the OP is from either state, he has similar chances to me- But I didn't start a thread to complain about it.
That being said, he later admitted that it is tough everywhere. It wasn't meant to be a pissing contest, just to give him a point of reference to judge his opinion.
It's not good odds if most people who got accepted decide to stay. In Michigan, you have backups that are in-state. In Washington, you don't. The next closest school is in Portland and the next one closest is in California which is like a 14 hr drive away. At least in Michigan, if you don't get into your state school, you can still go to somewhere else in the Midwest where you can drive home once in a while.
Dude, calm down. If you don't agree, just say you don't agree. No need for the hating.
- Jun 6, 2005
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One BIG reason I moved to South Carolina. And I'm enticing my younger sister to move to SC as well (she's premed applying for 08).
But I do miss home. You can't get a decent cup of coffee in the south (well, actually I did get my first decent cup in 6 months in Mt Pleasant yesterday...but I had to drive an hour and a half to vacation-ville to find coffee culture....)
Also, the ocean is not frigid cold here!
But I do miss home. You can't get a decent cup of coffee in the south (well, actually I did get my first decent cup in 6 months in Mt Pleasant yesterday...but I had to drive an hour and a half to vacation-ville to find coffee culture....)
Also, the ocean is not frigid cold here!Yeah, I used to live in Seattle (was on an extended job contract) and when I decided to go back to finish pre med, I decided to come back to Fl and do it so I could do the FL residency thing b/c even though UW is a good school the number of seats available vs. the number of people fighting for them is not worth it unless you are rooted there and that is your only real choice. Personally, i'd rather fight with only Floridians for over 500 seats in the state vs fight with folks from the WWAMI region (Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, Idaho) for 120 seats.
- Oct 22, 2006
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Although the population of Florida is significantly larger than that of Washington and all of the WWAMI states combined. I don't know how many people apply each year for those 500 Florida seats that you've mentioned, but I wonder if our chances in Washington are really any worse.
I agree that the odds may be the same or similar between FL and WA residents, but simply having more options to stay in-state makes Florida a better choice. For example, at UW your interview counts for 50% of your score, and if your interview doesn't go well for whatever reason, you can pretty much count yourself out of the running for the school, whereas in FL you will probably have multiple other in-state chances to redeem yourself. Besides, having more than one in-state school means that most solid applicants will have a number of in-state choices.
That being said, to get into UW I should have moved to one of the WAMI states, not WA.
That's a good point. The problem with having only one school, especially a school with a pretty subjective admissions process (50% of your score being based on your interview is pretty darn subjective), is that you have to hope that who you are fits with what the school is looking for. With multiple schools, you have greater odds of fitting in with the mission/atmosphere, etc. at at least one school.
- Oct 22, 2006
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Very good point, RisingSun and Dr Bagel. I concur.
There is also a hell of a lot of expensive flying all around the country in the middle of the night or an extra day in advance to interview since we are so far from all OOS schools except OHSU. When interviewing on the east coast, in the south and in California, I have found that 2/3 to 3/4 of my co-interviewees had driven in that morning or the night before. So far this process has set me back $6,000 and a lot of missed work days.
What's more, I, for one, have also experienced a GREAT deal of explicit skepticism at every single one of my OOS interviews regarding my willingness to move so far away, especially since I've got such a wonderful school in my backyard. Even big-name schools are suspicious that I'm using them as a back-up plan. They're right, of course--anyone who applies to more than one school is doing that, which means essentially everyone--but they seem to think that it's a cake walk to get into UW, when of course it isn't. I wish that schools didn't have to worry so much about the ratio of acceptances to matriculants and could just make offers to the people they like best instead of guarding their numbers so assiduously. At one school I was told by my interviewer that I had been one of the best interviewees he had ever had, but that they have such bad luck with west-coast applicants turning them down that I would be put on the waitlist anyway so that they could wait to see how I fared elsewhere. Sure enough, I'm on the waitlist.
C'est la vie. I'm still hopeful.
- Jul 20, 2006
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i love OHIO
Chulito, very articulate, as always. I, too, have spent a ton of money going to interviews because I have to fly everywhere. I has also meant that I haven't been able to afford to also take my wife/family with me so that they could see where I might be for the next four years. I did actually meet two people at my Indiana interview that had flown in from the northwest, but everyone else that I have met at interviews has been local, or at least could drive in (including internationally from Ontario to Indy). There is almost no school east of Kentucky that you can't drive to in one day if you live on the east coast. In WA state, we don't have that advantage. I have already turned down a number of interviews because I just can't afford to fly out there. If I could drive, I definitely would have gone to them.
FWIW.
How about being a Maine resident? If you're really going to complain about having one school, try having zero. Though UNE is a fantastic DO school. If you're applying allo, you're out of luck. No schools. No state tuition anywhere else. Just 20 spots at 3 other New England schools reserved for Mainers.
Plus it's cold!
Plus it's cold!
- Oct 22, 2006
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True, true. I didn't mean to imply that we in Washington have it worse than everyone else. As HumbleMD has pointed out, we not only have a state school with certain IS privileges (including a 15%-20% chance of acceptance), but it is one of the best schools in the country. No small benefit for us. The one benefit that a resident of Maine has is that none of the myriad great schools close by is going to doubt that you would be willing to move away from home to attend.
Yeah, nobody is doubting I'm moving away from home. The people at USC looked at me and thought "you must be from the east coast, it's cold there isn't it, oh you say 'wicked' you must be from Maine, it's really cold there. I bet you want to come here and play in the sunshine all day? But can you handle the stop lights? red means stop. green means go."
And then I just adjust my flannel tie and smile my toothless grin.....
And then I just adjust my flannel tie and smile my toothless grin.....
That just sucks.
It's hard to get around that one because of course you'd go to UW if admitted. Who wouldn't? Ditto on the costs, too. That's about what I spent last year. Anyway, good luck! 
Why do you think that UW is "so incredible"? Have you ever been there? I hope it's not because of US News and World Report. FYI, it's no more glamorous than any other med school I've been to.
I would much prefer to be a resident of Ohio and have my choice of what like 6 in-state schools than have the one "incredible" school who holds a monopoly of medical education in Washington.
Yes this explains the issue at hand. (credit the following to glp) Where I live, professionals like doctors don't want to move here (click my avatar if you wanna know where I am). As a result, they are forced to make resident status priority numero uno. Half of the residents get in, with the waitlist bar sliding down to the lower half of the 20's by MCAT.
The west coast? Naw. They can up their admissions standards without worry because people will want to take their MD's from other states and practice there. They don't have to grow their own docs. Furthermore, there are a lot more resident applicants per slot so the result is greater competition in-state.
Solution A--federalize higher education
Solution B--states with declining population growth can make their states more desirable, i.e. stop voting for politicians who they think God supports; intelligent professionals don't like **** like that and don't want to live here (not to mention lax regulation of practice scope and malpractice)
It sucks here.
Oregon actually ranked as a higher malpractice crisis states, though, and docs in NC supposedly make less money (brother did residency in NC and opted to come back here partially because of the moolah). I still would much rather be in either place. It sucks here.
Ditto. I would have moved away if I thought that I would have gotten in elsewhere.