Class List Help: Applying from Canadian undergrad (3.87/516)

[McGillChemistry]

Hi all,

Any help refining my class list would be helpful and much appreciated! I am a bit unsure of my chances as a Canadian undergrad.

A bit about me:

Citizenship: Dual Canadian/American

Languages: English/French/Spanish

Undergraduate program: Honours Chemistry - Bio-organic, minor Neuroscience at McGill University (Montreal, CA)

GPA: 3.87 (3.69 end freshman year)
MCAT: 516 (130 chem/128 CARS/130 bio/128 psych)

Extracurriculars:
President Pre-Medical Society
Volunteering at Hospital (200 hours)
Clinical Research at Shriners Hospital for a semester
2 month Neuroscience internship at MIT
Materials Chemistry lab for past 8 months (20 hrs a week/40 hrs in summer): publication in submission

Residence: No in-state residence anywhere (did high school in NJ) but live in Canada currently

Factors important to me: city environment/NY&Cali Area primarily/low price

My class list:
Pitt
UCLA
Columbia
Cornell
UCSD
UC-Irvine
Rutgers
Mt. Sinai
U Texas Southwestern
Albert Einstein
U Colorado
Houston McGovern
Stony Brook (SUNY)
Hofstra
U Texas San Antonio
UVM
U Texas El Paso

My list is too long... And I'd appreciate any advice narrowing it down. I will also be applying to schools in Canada (but only 4)

Thanks!!

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[Saturday’s Child]

Any nonclinical volunteering to the underserved? Are you URM? Not sure about the Texas schools in your list, as Texas schools generally have strong in state preference... but Baylor is OOS friendly.

I’d recommend using the WedgeDawg applicant rating system (WARS) to help create your list. When you calculate your score, it’ll give you a percentage breakdown of what types of schools your list should consist of (i.e. 35% top tier-Harvard, Columbia, etc.; 25% mid tier...)

 

[McGillChemistry]

Nonclinical volunteering in high school, but not too much in university (20 hrs tops). Not URM! But thank you for letting me know about Baylor and the WARS system.

Any opinion on the rest?

 

[Saturday’s Child]

Nonclinical volunteering in high school, but not too much in university (20 hrs tops). Not URM! But thank you for letting me know about Baylor and the WARS system.

Any opinion on the rest?

The lack of nonclinical volunteering could hurt you at some of your top tier choices. I think there’s some old adage about it being ok to be missing a major category (in your case, non clinical) as long as the others (research, clinical, leadership, etc.) are quality. Something to consider. Your stats are competitive for mid/upper-mid tier schools, but you could benefit from a gap year to bolster your extracurriculars with ideally 200+ (150 is avg) hrs of nonclinical, some more research, and anything else you can think of that you could excel in and/or that would set you apart.

Colorado is very OOS friendly, but has high tuition and apparently doesn’t offer much financial aid. UCLA is pretty OOS friendly, but cost of living in LA is insane... may be the case at the other Cali schools as well.

 

[MyOdyssey]

Far too many of the schools on your list are state funded medical schools that will favor applicants who are residents of that state.

These include state funded schools from TX, CA, NJ and NY. You are at a disadvantage here because you're a nonresident.

Baylor is a privately funded TX medical but it too favors TX residents, though not quite as heavily as state funded schools like UT Southwestern, UT-San Antonio and UT-Houston (McGovern).

Once you exclude state funded medical schools, your list is actually very short - too short in fact.

You should be targeting privately funded schools in the T15-T70 range.

Consider adding Emory, Boston U, Tufts, Quinnipiac, Northwestern, Case Western, and other schools of that ilk.