Plenty of 26 year olds or 30+ year olds get financial support from their parents. Unfortunately there isn't a great way to separate you from them.
Right. So AMCAS with their swanky office building needs to reevaluate the FAP program so it's based off of independent income, like you know, how financial aid works. I
No they do consider it. According to: http://www.afuturemd.com/2015/04/the-high-costs-of-applying-to-medical-school/ If your parents don't fall under the poverty guideline you can be denied FAP.
That's so dumb
Why not? AMCAS is sitting pretty making millions of dollars on our applications. They can afford to dish out more financial aid. Come on, undergraduate is expensive, MCAT classes/study materials are expensive, this is just a joke. We need to get a petition going. It's not fair to those who can't afford to apply. Just because your parents are or aren't wealthy shouldn't determine whether or not you can apply for the chance of even being consider to go to med school. Am I the only who who thinks this is wrong? Like taking out loans isn't an option for many people, especially if they were doing so for undergraduate in the first place. There should be equal opportunity.
Not to mention that the price of med school going up. JHU tuition increases by 2k every year. I don't even want to think about how expensive the whole process is gonna be when I apply
Exactly! AMCAS has a monopoly over the entire med school application industry. Nobody is bother going to bother challenging them because there's nothing we can do. Again, this is ridiculous.
Exactly. And it really sucks. It's not like people can boycott medical school admissions because someone will gladly take that seat, and honestly I would too. The whole thing is more ruthless than it is expensive.
I can understand medical schools requiring a **** ton of money, and I can maybe understand residencies, but this is ridiculous. Like we gotta draw the line somewhere and say enough is enough.
Anyone can say they are independent all while getting cash or having apps paid for by parents. There is very little way to truly prove financial independence.
Well you can argue that about undergraduate financial aid as well, but they still utilize that method. Reality of the matter is that financial aid doesn't even use the 300% below poverty guideline either way. I'm on food stamps, I'm below poverty line, my parents aren't. They've got 2 kids to feed. It's a flawed system; either you're rich enough to afford it, you go into more debt, or you're really really poor. The rest of us are left out, while AMCAS is making millions of dollars in profits.
No. I don't even remember if I mentioned it.
What the hell?? Where is the logic in any of that. If your middle aged and still depending on your parents Income how will you be ready for medical school, and yet they look for mature and well rounded applicants.
I misunderstood what FAP was. I didn't know we were talking about secondaries' fees. I thought it was for student loans (FAFSA). Suck it up, buttercup. Apply to less places.
YES.
Dude, relative to those who are eligible for FAP, you are the wealthy. Sorry, but as someone who was homeless in college and had to drain my years of savings to afford travel fees and interview attire, it's pretty hard to generate sympathy for those of you who grew up without ever worrying about being able to pay rent/afford groceries sit here and complain about being cut off from your parents (finally).
At least you had years of savings to drain. I am an adult with a job and a mountain of undergrad loans. And I still worry about being able to pay rent/afford groceries. I had to go into $5000 of credit card debt in order to apply because my dad, who makes $70,000 per year, only claimed one of his children on his tax return. He doesn't help me financially, but he does have to take care of his wife and 4 adult children who still live with him.
I don't understand the vitriol. I do have a mountain of undergraduate loan payments and I work three jobs alongside a full academic schedule to pay for everything. I'm not asking for sympathy, I'm pointing out what I think is a glaring flaw in the system. I don't care if you're a millionaire or dirt poor...I don't think secondaries should cost this much. It makes no sense to me. To the poster who says "suck it up and apply to less places," that's terrible advice. Why should somebody automatically make themselves less competitive by virtue of having less money?
Because I worked for it by carrying a full-time job while being a full-time student and working 60-70 hrs per week after graduating. It doesn't cost $5,000 to apply to medical school. If you're blowing through this much money, you are bad with money.
The issue is the cost of secondaries, not that you don't qualify for fee assistance.
If you are truly estranged from your financially stable parents and you were completely independent of them throughout college, you can submit an affidavit to FAP to have only your income considered. The issue here is that plenty of students want to reap the benefits of having stable parents all through college and then when it comes time to pay their own fees to apply to a professional school, they are suddenly an "adult" and deserve to be treated as such.
I've been married with at least one child for over a decade. I haven't had financial support from my parents for over 13 years. I've been working full time for over a decade. When you include the primary, secondary, and interviews, it does cost $5000 (depending on how many schools you apply to). I had to apply to a lot of schools because my GPA wasn't very high. And I'm just fine with money, thank you very much. I just never made very much of it. Not everyone applying for FAP is single and 22 years old.
If cost is a limiting factor, you need to contact schools and ask for secondary waivers. If they won't give them, then do your research and apply to schools who don't have astronomical secondary fees. Get your interview attire used. Crash with student hosts when you interview. Be smart about travel fees and drive whenever possible. Schedule low priority schools after October and cancel interviews if you get in before then. There is no reason anyone should be spending 5k on interviews. If you are applying to that many programs, you haven't done your research on the schools you are applying to.
I don't have the luxury of applying to schools with low secondary fees, and most schools are at around $100. Very few schools have low secondary fees. There is only one school within driving distance. It only takes a couple of interviews to go over $5000 when you apply at over 20 schools. Even if you are frugal. I have done my research on the schools I was applying to.
Can you post a link where AAMC says you can submit an affidavit to have only your income considered. If such a thing is possible, then AAMC sure does a good job of hiding that information.
Contact FAP. I had to submit an affidavit so I can assure that this exists.
It's too late for me, but hopefully there others who can use that information.
For primaries it's $160 for the first schools and $37 for each additional school. Secondaries are mostly around $100. I had one that was $35, but the rest averaged out to about $100 per school.
I think that most schools will waive the secondary fee if you qualified for FAP.
