Figuring Out Where to Apply

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[The Milkman]

are you applying this cycle?

 

[el_duderino]

3.97/38, CA resident, tons of volunteering, Doctors without Borders, medical scribe, lots of shadowing, 1+ publications, URM?

Apply anywhere you like. Sky's the limit, I think. Start your list with pretty much all the CA schools. Be prepared for a ton of interviews.

 

[xroc]

since you are interested in academic medicine:

step 1: apply to as many top 20 schools as you can afford
step 2: brace yourself for schools drooling over you
step 3: ???
step 4: profit

 

[Goro]

Sky's the limit for you. Start a list with your state school, Harvard and Wash U at the top, and work downwards. MSAR Online is your friend

I'm at the end of my junior year at a UC, and I'm realizing that the time for me to apply to medical school is just around the corner. The problem is: I have no clue where to start. I'm mostly interested in academic medicine as well as Public Health and I'm sure that will influence where I end up applying. Other than that, I've completed all my pre-medical requisites short of one lab and am a year away from completing my major, International Development, and my French minor. I've done two years of research and have published one paper, though I am trying to get another published (the second is related to my major, not medicine). I've done over 75 hours of shadowing, 370+ hours of hospital volunteering, and 50+ hours of hospital volunteering when I went on a study abroad. I spent a summer interning at Doctors without Borders and spent last summer and most likely this summer doing research and working as a Medical Scribe. I was a RA this year, though I probably wont have time for it next year. I've done MUN for three years, worked on my school's newspaper for two years, and am hoping to get accepted into a United Nations internship or an NIH internship during my gap year. I'm also currently working on a fundraiser for battered women. My GPA is a 3.97 and my MCAT score is 38. Can you guys help me come up with a realistic list of where I have a decent shot at getting accepted? If it helps, I'm an under recruited minority.

 

[NickNaylor]

NickNaylor's Whimsical Guide for Choosing Schools to Apply To:

Step 1: Buy the MSAR (AAMC, you may send me 10% of gross proceeds as a finder's fee)

Step 2: Add any schools which have MCAT and GPA averages roughly equivalent to or below your numbers to your list

Step 3: Add any schools which are "dream schools" - I define "dream schools" as anything in the top 10-20 on USNWR or schools at which your numbers are roughly at the 10th percentile

Step 3.5: Get a sense for how many schools you can feasibly apply to taking into consideration the amount of time required to complete secondaries as well as your budget; as a general rule, you'll probably want to apply to at least 10-12, but if this number is 25-30 or more then you should really think about why you're applying to so many places and consult with some kind if advisor before applying. In general, the stronger the applicant you are the fewer schools you'll need to apply to, but because of how finicky this process is and how difficult it is to predict success, I wouldn't go for any less than 10 without specific guidance from someone knowledgable about your particular situation and medical admissions.

Step 4: Eliminate schools from the list generated in steps 2 and 3 until you get to the number/range you came up with in step 3.5 IN THIS ORDER:
-Schools at which you would rather apply a second time than attend
-Schools at which you will be considered an OOS applicant and which traditionally accept very few OOS applicants
-Schools at which you are considered a "long-shot;" I would arbitrarily define this as near or below that school's 10th percentile numbers
-Schools with less-than-ideal locations, whatever that means for you

Step 5: Congratulations, you now have a reasonable working list that can be tweaked as needed.

As a general rule, you want to have a mix of schools at which you will be strongly competitive (near or above the 90th percentile for numbers and/or your state schools, if applicable), schools at which you will be competitive (near the median with respect to numbers), and schools which are a reach (basically anything in the top 10-20, regardless of stats, and near or below the 10th percentile for numbers). This shouldn't be strictly followed and is designed to give those of you who have no idea how to come up with a list somewhere to start. If you're reasonably competitive, I would aim for a list of 15-20 schools to apply to, assuming you have the ability to apply to that many.

I'm sure people will have bones to pick with this methodology, but again, it's somewhere to start if you really have no clue where to begin.

Good luck.

 

[el_duderino]

Somewhere in Step 4 you should put "schools whose mission statements do not coincide with my own goals" but that's a pretty good, common sense guide.

 

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