Does Rejecting a School hurt your chances when you apply again?

[langiyo]

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A lot of schools allow you to become a resident of you live instate for a year. I was thinking that if I get into a school I would reject it and try to live in that school's state for a year to gain residency before applying again as a resident. But if I reject the school for financial reasons would it hurt my chances of getting in the second round?

 

[pp9]

I don't see why you just wouldn't move a year prior to applying as opposed to wasting money on an application you intend on rejecting. I'm not totally sure of the politics involved with your idea, but you cannot change residencies for the sole reason of education. You have to change over all of your info and have a job for that year prior to matriculation. Some schools do that a little differently. There are also a handful of schools that allow you to become an IS student during your 2nd year of vet school.

Also, being accepted OOS does not guarantee that you'd be accepted IS the next year.

 

[dyachei]

A lot of schools allow you to become a resident of you live instate for a year. I was thinking that if I get into a school I would reject it and try to live in that school's state for a year to gain residency before applying again as a resident. But if I reject the school for financial reasons would it hurt my chances of getting in the second round?

Sometimes, yes. Various users in the past have been asked about why they rejected a school when reapplying

 

[Innerspeaker]

It definitely can, especially if you reapply directly the year after.

The most you could do in your situation that wouldn't jeopardize your acceptance would be to attempt to request a deferral for one year and move during that time. However, there are schools that will only give you the tuition you were offered upon acceptance and don't allow residency changes during gap years. It's worth looking into your school's policies and seeing what your options are because I know there are some that are a lot more flexible with this.

 

[bbeventer]

Also, just because you got accepted one year does not guarantee an offer the next because the application pool is fluid.

 

[Minnerbelle]

And nowadays, the coin is flipping. Acceptance as an OOS student maybe easier due to high tuition than as an IS student.

 

[pp9]

And nowadays, the coin is flipping. Acceptance as an OOS student maybe easier due to high tuition than as an IS student.

Yeah, I agree with this if I'm understanding what you're saying correctly. In some schools, it seems like the OOS pool stats are becoming noticeably lower than the IS students. I'm not sure if that's because the 'cream of the crop' IS students, who are also applying OOS, are accepting their IS offers and leaving the other OOS applicants (who didn't get IS offers if they have an IS school) with lower stats to get a seat or what. I'm looking at myself as an example. Also probably due to the increasing OOS seats, but no change in IS seats.

 

[Minnerbelle]

I think it's that even if the OOS applicant pool looks 2-4x the size of the IS applicant pool for a particular school, there are fewer schools competing to take those IS applicants, whereas many OOS applicants apply to and are choosing between multiple schools. A majority of those who apply IS will take that spot if they get it. Nowadays, even the large OOS applicant pool is getting stretched thin because those people have choices. Even if accepted, the chances they'll go to a particular school is much lower because they either get accepted at their IS school or have other possibly more desirable OOS schools to choose from. So I wouldn't be surprised if the effective acceptance rate (the number of people accepted including waitlists/total applicants) was lower for IS than OOS. Most schools won't disclose that number and express their acceptance rate as (number of seats/number of applicants) which makes them look much more selective.

 

[DVMDream]

I think it's that even if the OOS applicant pool looks 2-4x the size of the IS applicant pool for a particular school, there are fewer schools competing to take those IS applicants, whereas many OOS applicants apply to and are choosing between multiple schools. A majority of those who apply IS will take that spot if they get it. Nowadays, even the large OOS applicant pool is getting stretched thin because those people have choices. Even if accepted, the chances they'll go to a particular school is much lower because they either get accepted at their IS school or have other possibly more desirable OOS schools to choose from. So I wouldn't be surprised if the effective acceptance rate (the number of people accepted including waitlists/total applicants) was lower for IS than OOS. Most schools won't disclose that number and express their acceptance rate as (number of seats/number of applicants) which makes them look much more selective.

I was flat out told in file reviews by more than one school that if I had been in the IS applicant pool, I would have been accepted, but since I was OOS there were too many people and the application pool was too competitive. Granted this was 4 years ago. I think applications are heading in the direction that you are saying, but I am not convinced that IS is more competitive than OOS at this point.

 

[Minnerbelle]

I was flat out told in file reviews by more than one school that if I had been in the IS applicant pool, I would have been accepted, but since I was OOS there were too many people and the application pool was too competitive. Granted this was 4 years ago. I think applications are heading in the direction that you are saying, but I am not convinced that IS is more competitive than OOS at this point.

I didn't intend to make a general statement across the board. There are way too many variables for that to ever be true across the board. Some take so few OOS students or offer such cheap OOS tuition that competition will always be fierce. Others have ridiculously high IS tuition, that even their IS students choose to go elsewhere because of costs. Nor will any of us really know for sure that it's true for a particular school because they won't release that info. But I think it's likely to become or be true for the schools that have a high differential between IS and OOS tuition that also take in a high number of OOS students. If we're talking anecdotally, then CSU would be a school where this likely does happen given that many IS students on the waitlist are pulled off and given OOS spots.

If you're talking about what PP is talking about, which is the chance of a particular person getting admitted to their IS school vs. getting admitted to ANY accredited (in some way) school including the island schools and LMU and Midwestern, I bet the chances are better for the latter for many (probably most) people already.

 

[pp9]

I was flat out told in file reviews by more than one school that if I had been in the IS applicant pool, I would have been accepted, but since I was OOS there were too many people and the application pool was too competitive. Granted this was 4 years ago. I think applications are heading in the direction that you are saying, but I am not convinced that IS is more competitive than OOS at this point.

I'm sure it's very school dependent. My IS school, IMO, has an extremely competitive IS pool and less so for OOS. Definitely only one person's experience, but sometimes when you see people getting accepted into every school but their IS, it's safe to assume they were out-competed somehow. There are ~10 people in my class who didn't get into our IS (Michigan) and are at Illinois + had other acceptances. Maybe we couldn't compete with the best Michiganders, but we could compete with the OOS applicants to Illinois, even though the Illinois OOS pool greatly outnumbered the IS pool at MSU. However, I feel that IS competition at Illinois isn't quite as fierce as it is as MSU. There's a huge difference in how applicants are evaluated.

It would swing both ways though. If you're not competitive in general, you probably won't get an OOS acceptance no matter what (me my first try). I'm not saying that being OOS makes it a cake walk, but I think it can have an affect on chances (whether it makes them better or worse).

 

[JJ1019]

Nor will any of us really know for sure that it's true for a particular school because they won't release that info.

Agreed. It would be interesting to see to see a stat on accepted OOS #s vs matriculated.

It seems the OOS applicant pools are so large because it can be filled with people who don't qualify for their IS, they are covering their bases, they are applying b/c its a better fit and their IS is ridiculously high also, maybe a SO lives in that state, or whatever the reason. Many students apply to multiple schools, so while there may be 1000s students trying to get into 20 spots, not all actually want to go there. Not all are even qualified. What's the number of applicants (across the country) versus spots? To me that gives you a better feel for how competitive overall the field itself might be. It's not perfect, but perhaps its a data point that should be considered.

If 10 students each apply to 10 schools looking to occupy 1 of 10 spots (1/school), that seems like you've now got 100 applications for 10 spots. The individual school now publishes their OOS acceptance rate is 10% (1/10). But really in this poor example, all kids get in. No, of course it's not like this for real, I made up numbers to make it easy to show that overall acceptance rates can be a smoke and mirror act depending on how you spin the data.

 

[twelvetigers]

Rejecting a for sure offer in order to move and try agasin is very ballsy.

But saving money on tuition IS vs. OOS is pretty important if you are somewhere that it makes a big difference.

The answer is probably planning for that in advance - like if you want to have an IS, move first and then apply accordingly.

 

[JJ1019]

With regards to the OP, I wouldn't turn down an acceptance in an attempt to establish lower tuition. I would just wait to apply after establishing residency like suggested.

 

[Staffie]

I agree. You're better off moving to the state you want to be IS at before you apply. Check the residency requirements and make sure you're a good fit for it (GPA, GRE, experience, research etc).

Don't apply to a school as OOS if you wouldn't be willing to pay the OOS tuition.

 

[pp9]

Agreed. It would be interesting to see to see a stat on accepted OOS #s vs matriculated.

It seems the OOS applicant pools are so large because it can be filled with people who don't qualify for their IS, they are covering their bases, they are applying b/c its a better fit and their IS is ridiculously high also, maybe a SO lives in that state, or whatever the reason. Many students apply to multiple schools, so while there may be 1000s students trying to get into 20 spots, not all actually want to go there. Not all are even qualified. What's the number of applicants (across the country) versus spots? To me that gives you a better feel for how competitive overall the field itself might be. It's not perfect, but perhaps its a data point that should be considered.

If 10 students each apply to 10 schools looking to occupy 1 of 10 spots (1/school), that seems like you've now got 100 applications for 10 spots. The individual school now publishes their OOS acceptance rate is 10% (1/10). But really in this poor example, all kids get in. No, of course it's not like this for real, I made up numbers to make it easy to show that overall acceptance rates can be a smoke and mirror act depending on how you spin the data.

Plus, I don't think any school takes into account any auto-rejects due to missing requirements or the fact that the applicant didn't meed the published minimum GPA requirement. So it inflates their numbers a bit. Technically, that's not contributing to competition