Does it give you an advantage...

Sure, you can try to call but there's no guarantee. It doesn't hurt to ask. If the Admission Committee hasn't decided on your application, then you won't be offered the interview.

 

Well, if you can get an earlier interview out of the deal at a non-rolling school, then there's definitely an advantage in terms of chances of being offered an admittance rather than a spot on the waitlist. And of course, the financial advantage to you. No disadvantages that I can think of, but in my experience, not a lot of schools jump at the chance to make your life easier this way. But it never hurts to ask. Good luck!!

 

my cali schools have been rather unaccomodating - but i guess mstp is harder to corrdinate. going to be expensive

 

That's Cali schools for you. As I recall they weren't that accomodating to anyone last year!

 

MSTP used to pay for our travel and lodging expenses when I interviewed. Did they stop doing that?

 

In my humble opinion, I would advise that you don't try anything like that. I mean, let's think about it this way: Medical schools are more open to people who really want to go to their school and show that interest by interviewing and visiting. You probably don't want to ask the school "Would you mind interviewing me on Monday because they're interviewing me on Wednesday" because they are yet again reminded of how they're not the only medical school. Speaking from experience, medical schools don't like that. You might as well make up an excuse or something to move an interview. Good luck.

 

The people who schedule the interviews are not the ones who make any decisions about your app. So if you call and ask for an early interview, you're not going to piss anyone off. You just might get lucky and have some secretary pull your app out of a pile and get a scheduled a little earlier than normal. I wouldn't worry about anyone reading anything into a call.

 

Some do, some don't. Actually as I get more interviews I'm finding that most schools don't. That's one of the big reasons I didn't apply to the UCs or Stanford--they expressly will not pay for your expenses. Most of the schools I applied to are in driving distance or I thought would pay. The notable exception is Baylor. I figured they would pay since they are competing with WashU, but I am footing the bill for the flight to Houston.

As for lodging, they usually do provide lodging with current students.

 

Don't some MSTP schools often interview a huge part of the pool at once, and make it a weekend?

-RA