Have we pre-meds made the application process seem overly complex?

[907906]

Hey everyone!

So I've talked to a few of my close friends who are either in med school or starting their residency about the whole pre-med process. One thing they all say is that it really comes down to few things and the pop-culture has made it look so much more complex than what it really is. Basically what they're all saying is that you need to have good GPA, good MCAT, and volunteering and preferably research. I definitely agree with them and I feel like people make it so super complicated. The way I see it, adcoms want to see us applicants volunteer and give back to the community - any kind of volunteering is good. It's the neurotic pre-meds (myself included lol) who ask very specific questions like "food bank or homeless shelter", "hospital or small clinic", and thus make it seem like there would be some substantial difference in the aforementioned volunteering places. What my friends are telling me is that it does not matter. They're saying that pre-meds completely lose the sight of what the whole thing is about: volunteer wherever you wanna volunteer and that is ok.

I recently attended an event at a med school where we had the dean of admission give a talk. The dean gave a very touching & motivating speech about them needing us to be the future doctors. The dean said that without good stats, they can't reach to us. We need the stats to get us to the door. This kind of reassured me about my friends' opinions.

Also SDN definitely makes this whole neurotic rambling over ECs worse. I love reading the WAMC section but sometimes it's pretty depressing to see the superstars with 5 years of volunteering or 6 publications. I don't know if this is true, but of the 23k accepted students (40ish% of all applicants), majority of them can't have super duper applications - or can they? I mean there's only so many active people on SDN so the representation of the applicant pool here is definitely not very accurate, right? I'm sure there are accepted students who are exactly like my friends described - they had 3.7, 513, volunteering and research.

What do you guys think? Are we all just making this look so much more complicated than what it really is by bombarding the gracious SDN adcoms with billion super detailed questions? I'd love to hear adcoms' take on this! @LizzyM @Goro @gyngyn and others!

P.S. I know that its getting more and more difficult to get in and schools need more variables to evaluate the applicants. I'm not asking to compare two students, but to assess an applicant's app and tell us how they are analyzed. Is Jane's food bank really better than John's homeless shelter?

P.P.S. I know some folks at my school who have no business in applying (stats below 3.0 GPA etc), so it's hard for me to believe that all of the 55k+ applicants are golden stars... That all of them would have good volunteering and research and thus the "superstar elements" like military, 5+ pubs, founder of a million dollar non-profit etc, would be necessary to differentiate people.

Thanks for reading! I'm really interested to see what you all think!

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[HomeSkool]

This is one of the best posts I've ever read on here. You get it.

 

[Oso]

Ya.


Makes me so glad I didn't join SDN until after I was already accepted to med school.

 

[gyngyn]

Makes me so glad I didn't join SDN until after I was already accepted to med school.

We didn't even have the internet when I applied. or color photos...

 

[Oso]

Haha @HomeSkool your avatar ... if you love your children do not bring them to me

 

[smukke]

If you have average or above stats, you'll probably get in somewhere (assuming you aren't a complete boob on interviews). Problem is most people aren't happy with getting in somewhere, they have a specific school or range of schools they want (stats-wise, location, etc).

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

This is one of the best posts I've ever read on here. You get it.

Bro, your avatars are awesome.

 

[LizzyM]

. Basically what they're all saying is that you need to have good GPA, good MCAT, and volunteering and preferably research.

And clinical experience! Gotta have clinical exposure of some kind.

What I would say is that it is easier said than done particularly for students on rural campuses and those in huge feeder schools where there is so much competition to get into volunteer opportunities, research labs and shadowing opportunities.

 

[Catalystik]

Are we all just making this look so much more complicated than what it really is . . .? I'd love to hear adcoms' take on this!

We didn't even have the internet when I applied. or color photos...

I applied on a four-page AMCAS paper application with 3.75 inches allocated to listing ECs, honors, and jobs.

 

[smukke]

I applied on a four-page AMCAS paper application with 3.75 inches allocated to listing ECs, honors, and jobs.

Did you have to handwrite that for every school you applied to?

 

[wysdoc]

We didn't even have the internet when I applied. or color photos...

My app was typed on a correcting selectric typewriter.

 

[Catalystik]

Did you have to handwrite that for every school you applied to?

It was the primary application. And it was typewritten on a typewriter (the kind with an inked ribbon). Corrections were made with an eraser that had a whisk on the other end to remove the shavings.

 

[wysdoc]

It was the primary application. And it was typewritten on a typewriter (the kind with an inked ribbon). Corrections were made with an eraser that had a whisk on the other end to remove the shavings.

LOL I used that kind too (my mom’s cast-iron Underwood). Using the electric at school was a luxury

 

[Unlimited Apps]

This post is really refreshing to read, especially as someone that is applying this cycle and in the middle of the hell that is all the secondaries I am drowning in.

 

[smukke]

You guys make me feel young. Did my college apps on a Brother typewriter with a correcting strip. Still have it, original box, only used a couple of times

 

[trobinsonmd]

I would also agree... I think pre-meds focus way too much on the specifics and read too much into certain things... in reality, not much has changed over the last 20 years imo -- get good grades, do not do anything stupid that goes on your record, volunteer, and get some clinical experience to demonstrate that you know what you're getting into.

 

[MomJeansandDadJorts]

And clinical experience! Gotta have clinical exposure of some kind.

What I would say is that it is easier said than done particularly for students on rural campuses and those in huge feeder schools where there is so much competition to get into volunteer opportunities, research labs and shadowing opportunities.

Yeah at my UG they said only about 1/3 of students who apply to volunteer at the hospital actually get positions. And they dont allow shadowing at the hospital (unless you take a course which is specifically shadowing for like 50 hours 1 semester). Research? Emailed 40 labs to have only 1 say they had a spot that *might* be open. Our school was trying to weed us out even for ECs The glory of going to a school where my gen chem lecture had 2x as many students as my hs graduating class haha

 

[theKingLT]

Yeah at my UG they said only about 1/3 of students who apply to volunteer at the hospital actually get positions. And they dont allow shadowing at the hospital (unless you take a course which is specifically shadowing for like 50 hours 1 semester). Research? Emailed 40 labs to have only 1 say they had a spot that *might* be open. Our school was trying to weed us out even for ECs The glory of going to a school where my gen chem lecture had 2x as many students as my hs graduating class haha

Availability of EC's is always the first thing I tell high school pre-meds to look for when college hunting. It makes a world of difference

 

[Goro]

Hey everyone!

So I've talked to a few of my close friends who are either in med school or starting their residency about the whole pre-med process. One thing they all say is that it really comes down to few things and the pop-culture has made it look so much more complex than what it really is. Basically what they're all saying is that you need to have good GPA, good MCAT, and volunteering and preferably research. I definitely agree with them and I feel like people make it so super complicated. The way I see it, adcoms want to see us applicants volunteer and give back to the community - any kind of volunteering is good. It's the neurotic pre-meds (myself included lol) who ask very specific questions like "food bank or homeless shelter", "hospital or small clinic", and thus make it seem like there would be some substantial difference in the aforementioned volunteering places. What my friends are telling me is that it does not matter. They're saying that pre-meds completely lose the sight of what the whole thing is about: volunteer wherever you wanna volunteer and that is ok.

I recently attended an event at a med school where we had the dean of admission give a talk. The dean gave a very touching & motivating speech about them needing us to be the future doctors. The dean said that without good stats, they can't reach to us. We need the stats to get us to the door. This kind of reassured me about my friends' opinions.

Also SDN definitely makes this whole neurotic rambling over ECs worse. I love reading the WAMC section but sometimes it's pretty depressing to see the superstars with 5 years of volunteering or 6 publications. I don't know if this is true, but of the 23k accepted students (40ish% of all applicants), majority of them can't have super duper applications - or can they? I mean there's only so many active people on SDN so the representation of the applicant pool here is definitely not very accurate, right? I'm sure there are accepted students who are exactly like my friends described - they had 3.7, 513, volunteering and research.

What do you guys think? Are we all just making this look so much more complicated than what it really is by bombarding the gracious SDN adcoms with billion super detailed questions? I'd love to hear adcoms' take on this! @LizzyM @Goro @gyngyn and others!

P.S. I know that its getting more and more difficult to get in and schools need more variables to evaluate the applicants. I'm not asking to compare two students, but to assess an applicant's app and tell us how they are analyzed. Is Jane's food bank really better than John's homeless shelter?

P.P.S. I know some folks at my school who have no business in applying (stats below 3.0 GPA etc), so it's hard for me to believe that all of the 55k+ applicants are golden stars... That all of them would have good volunteering and research and thus the "superstar elements" like military, 5+ pubs, founder of a million dollar non-profit etc, would be necessary to differentiate people.

Thanks for reading! I'm really interested to see what you all think!

Several thoughts.

If anybody has made the process more complicated than it is, it's Tiger Parents (who come in all colors) who push their kids to Medicine starting around kindergarten. They're the ones who started pusing hoards of talented students into the arms race of ECs.

SDN magnifies angst and neuroses. Look at how many posts ask "Is this a declining GPA trend?" when they went from a 3.9 to a 3.85 in one semester! There is a tendency for SDNers to think that one needs a perfect record (including finishing college in 4 years straight) to get into any med school.

It's a competitive environment, ad some 60% of applicants fail to get an accept. 20% only get a single accept. BUT, based upon chats with my own Admissions dean and Adcom members here, I'd say some 50% of all applicants have no business setting foot on a medical school campus, except maybe as a standardized patient. Interestingly, we Faculty see the same thing with Faculty candidates for positions. You'd be surprised how many geneticists and microbiologists will apply for an Anatomy faculty position!

If you wish to understand the admissions process on the receiving end, read this:
Goro's Guide to Interviews: The View from Behind the Curtain

the median acceptee for MD schools has a 3.7ish GPA and a 511 MCAT. One does not have to be perfect, and the bar gets lowered a bit for your state schools....especially if you live in a lucky state that favors its own. the median acceptee for DO schools is around 3.3-3.4 and has a 503ish MCAT. I forget the exact number for the latter.

So chill.

 

[theKingLT]

Several thoughts.

If anybody has made the process more complicated than it is, it's Tiger Parents (who come in all colors) who push their kids to Medicine starting around kindergarten.

My little brother received a flyer at his high school the other day for an mcat prep course. It was designed to prepare high schoolers to study for the mcat in college

 

[RNtoMD87]

One of my friends matriculated DO with a 499 MCAT, and 3.21 cum GPA, and all of the med students I've been talking to here have maybe a 510 mcat and 3.6 GPA.

Ive heard it depends on location. I happen to live in Louisiana, and LSU strongly prefers people from in state, perhaps that helps us.

 

[Jasmine2022]

Pre-medical students absolutely overcomplicate things. We are neurotic, insecure, and overthink many details. But we have so many options now which weren't available 20 years ago, and technological developments have changed the landscape immensely. One could argue that utilizing a resource like SDN serves as both problem and solution due to the wide variety of feedback, experiences, and opinions available, whether qualified or not.

I remember logging into TMDSAS for the first time and thinking it wasn't anywhere near as complicated as I had expected. Tedious? Definitely. But the fact that there's a TMDSAS, AMCAS, and AACOMAS application to consider is indicative of the potential for complications. While I think there's merit in the idea that an application comes down to stats, LORs, and ECs, both my experience as an applicant as well as experiences and expertise I've read here suggest that same idea to be an oversimplification. If it really came down to just those things, CASPer, essays, interviewing, and the ongoing updates some schools request wouldn't serve much purpose. Perhaps my opinion as a ultra non-traditional student skews my perspective, but I do believe pre-medical students bring diverse backgrounds and personalities to the table, and the backgrounds and personalities of admission committees do the same. Medical schools have varied missions and seek an array of personal characteristics from potential students, and all of this complicates the process.

Pre-medical students should definitely find ways to cut back on the overthinking (such as in the example provided about which volunteer activity to get involved with). We also need to break away from constantly comparing ourselves to our peers, better utilize resources already in place, have more confidence in our own achievements along this path, along with humility when necessary. Regardless, I still vote that medical school applications are complicated and imperfect, and will likely continue to be as knowledge and technology evolve. And I reckon that's enough late night rambling

 

[907906]

And clinical experience! Gotta have clinical exposure of some kind.

What I would say is that it is easier said than done particularly for students on rural campuses and those in huge feeder schools where there is so much competition to get into volunteer opportunities, research labs and shadowing opportunities.

Exactly!

When it comes to feeder schools, I'm so happy I don't attend one. Actually, my school only produces a handful of applicants every year. It is definitely an advantage on so many levels. First, the atmosphere is incredible! Everyone supports each other, shares MCAT tips, and helps with difficult courses. I'm sure it's the other way around when we start talking about schools like UCLA with the highest # of applicants every year... Second, getting research is much easier and most of the labs are very supportive and people won't rip each other's throats for a publishable project.

It definitely makes me wonder why so many people choose to attend schools that sound good but have horrible pre-med "living conditions".

Thanks for commenting!

 

[907906]

This post is really refreshing to read, especially as someone that is applying this cycle and in the middle of the hell that is all the secondaries I am drowning in.

Good luck! I'll get to experience that next year, yikes!

 

[907906]

Yeah at my UG they said only about 1/3 of students who apply to volunteer at the hospital actually get positions. And they dont allow shadowing at the hospital (unless you take a course which is specifically shadowing for like 50 hours 1 semester). Research? Emailed 40 labs to have only 1 say they had a spot that *might* be open. Our school was trying to weed us out even for ECs The glory of going to a school where my gen chem lecture had 2x as many students as my hs graduating class haha

Availability of EC's is always the first thing I tell high school pre-meds to look for when college hunting. It makes a world of difference

I just responded to LizzyM and told her how things truly are so much easier at a school that is not filled with pre-meds. I'm really curious as to what makes pre-med students choose prestigious schools over cheaper/less-known state schools. The name doesn't matter nearly as much as your chances for good ECs. The only person who I know attended a UC didn't wanna be a doctor until her 3rd year so she can't respond to my question, ugh!

 

[907906]

Several thoughts.

If anybody has made the process more complicated than it is, it's Tiger Parents (who come in all colors) who push their kids to Medicine starting around kindergarten. They're the ones who started pusing hoards of talented students into the arms race of ECs.

SDN magnifies angst and neuroses. Look at how many posts ask "Is this a declining GPA trend?" when they went from a 3.9 to a 3.85 in one semester! There is a tendency for SDNers to think that one needs a perfect record (including finishing college in 4 years straight) to get into any med school.

It's a competitive environment, ad some 60% of applicants fail to get an accept. 20% only get a single accept. BUT, based upon chats with my own Admissions dean and Adcom members here, I'd say some 50% of all applicants have no business setting foot on a medical school campus, except maybe as a standardized patient. Interestingly, we Faculty see the same thing with Faculty candidates for positions. You'd be surprised how many geneticists and microbiologists will apply for an Anatomy faculty position!

If you wish to understand the admissions process on the receiving end, read this:
Goro's Guide to Interviews: The View from Behind the Curtain

the median acceptee for MD schools has a 3.7ish GPA and a 511 MCAT. One does not have to be perfect, and the bar gets lowered a bit for your state schools....especially if you live in a lucky state that favors its own. the median acceptee for DO schools is around 3.3-3.4 and has a 503ish MCAT. I forget the exact number for the latter.

So chill.

Hey Goro,

Yes I'm sure parental pressure is a real thing!
Haha it's actually so relieving to hear that you find a lot of applicants be inadequate. Like I said in the original post, I have some acquaintances who have applied with rather bad applications... So I'm sure you see more of Janes with 3.7 and 510 than Jennys with 4.0 and 525.

Thanks for the link! I'll check it out!

 

[Lucca]

Congrats Op, you’ve unlocked the secret knowledge that allows SDN to be useful and not conniption inducing.

To paraphrase @efle, SDN is scary because many on SDN are not interested in getting into medical school, but getting into a top medical school.

If you don’t know that from the get go, you are going to have a bad time. It’s not like anyone has any control over who happens to sign up for the site.

 

[RNtoMD87]

I don't understand why one would want to spend so much more money to get into a top medical school.

 

[Catalystik]

LOL I used that kind too (my mom’s cast-iron Underwood). Using the electric at school was a luxury

Mine was a Royal and very heavy. Two weeks ago, I saw one just like it in a museum. My mom used it in college, too.

 

[theKingLT]

I just responded to LizzyM and told her how things truly are so much easier at a school that is not filled with pre-meds. I'm really curious as to what makes pre-med students choose prestigious schools over cheaper/less-known state schools. The name doesn't matter nearly as much as your chances for good ECs. The only person who I know attended a UC didn't wanna be a doctor until her 3rd year so she can't respond to my question, ugh!

IMO It's the same 2 reasons that people tend to choose more prestigious medical schools. 1. Prestige is important to most pre-meds, whether they admit it or not. This profession attracts people who want to be the best. 2. They think it will give them an edge up at the next stage. Most people out of high school think that a more prestigious school will give them an admissions edge for med school. Most people out of undergrad think a more prestigious med school will give then an edge in the match. Both are true, however as the experts on here will say time and time again, this prestige advantage is actually very small compared to the personal factors of how an individual applicant does. Personal fit to a school is much more important in breeding personal success (on EC's, gpa, mcat, Step scores, clerkships, etc.) but many people simply don't seem to understand this because they're ego either blindly pulls them towards prestige or they get caught up in the idea that prestige=your best chances of being successful later on.

Anyways that's my .02. Rant over .

 

[theKingLT]

Mine was a Royal and very heavy. Two weeks ago, I saw one just like it in a museum. My mom used it in college, too.

I'm too young for a personal typewriter story , but I had the opportunity to do some shadowing in a public hospital in mexico this year and I kid you not they still use typewriters for the majority of their charting

 

[MomJeansandDadJorts]

I just responded to LizzyM and told her how things truly are so much easier at a school that is not filled with pre-meds. I'm really curious as to what makes pre-med students choose prestigious schools over cheaper/less-known state schools. The name doesn't matter nearly as much as your chances for good ECs. The only person who I know attended a UC didn't wanna be a doctor until her 3rd year so she can't respond to my question, ugh!

I went to a large stats school (non UC) with like 60,000+ students and I think at my graduation day there were about 12k. Its crazy cuz I volunteer and work in a lab and I see freshman already looking for labs and volunteering like 1 week after classes started. I had no idea about the pre med route when I started and started late and it was so hard to get volunteering/shadowing. Not to mention its hard to get a letter of rec when you're a class of 500+. My LOR writer said she has taught over 15k over time and that students come to her asking for letters and shes like "I honestly couldnt tell you anything more than they earned an A. I probably have never met them". I was very very close to going to a smal liberal arts school but wanted to be in a city and get out of my comfort zone. But Ive driven over an hour just to shadow and I advise people to dont even bother trying to volunteer at the big hospitals because you have to apply 6+ months in advance and there are free clinic that run off volunteer work and would gladly have their time.

 

[Goro]

Hey Goro,

Yes I'm sure parental pressure is a real thing!
Haha it's actually so relieving to hear that you find a lot of applicants be inadequate. Like I said in the original post, I have some acquaintances who have applied with rather bad applications... So I'm sure you see more of Janes with 3.7 and 510 than Jennys with 4.0 and 525.

Thanks for the link! I'll check it out!

The wise @gyngyn once told us that he had to review an app where the candidate had a single digit MCAT score (on the old exam). Not single digit in a category...but for the entire exam!!!

 

[fantasticman221]

Hey everyone!

So I've talked to a few of my close friends who are either in med school or starting their residency about the whole pre-med process. One thing they all say is that it really comes down to few things and the pop-culture has made it look so much more complex than what it really is. Basically what they're all saying is that you need to have good GPA, good MCAT, and volunteering and preferably research. I definitely agree with them and I feel like people make it so super complicated. The way I see it, adcoms want to see us applicants volunteer and give back to the community - any kind of volunteering is good. It's the neurotic pre-meds (myself included lol) who ask very specific questions like "food bank or homeless shelter", "hospital or small clinic", and thus make it seem like there would be some substantial difference in the aforementioned volunteering places. What my friends are telling me is that it does not matter. They're saying that pre-meds completely lose the sight of what the whole thing is about: volunteer wherever you wanna volunteer and that is ok.

I recently attended an event at a med school where we had the dean of admission give a talk. The dean gave a very touching & motivating speech about them needing us to be the future doctors. The dean said that without good stats, they can't reach to us. We need the stats to get us to the door. This kind of reassured me about my friends' opinions.

Also SDN definitely makes this whole neurotic rambling over ECs worse. I love reading the WAMC section but sometimes it's pretty depressing to see the superstars with 5 years of volunteering or 6 publications. I don't know if this is true, but of the 23k accepted students (40ish% of all applicants), majority of them can't have super duper applications - or can they? I mean there's only so many active people on SDN so the representation of the applicant pool here is definitely not very accurate, right? I'm sure there are accepted students who are exactly like my friends described - they had 3.7, 513, volunteering and research.

What do you guys think? Are we all just making this look so much more complicated than what it really is by bombarding the gracious SDN adcoms with billion super detailed questions? I'd love to hear adcoms' take on this! @LizzyM @Goro @gyngyn and others!

P.S. I know that its getting more and more difficult to get in and schools need more variables to evaluate the applicants. I'm not asking to compare two students, but to assess an applicant's app and tell us how they are analyzed. Is Jane's food bank really better than John's homeless shelter?

P.P.S. I know some folks at my school who have no business in applying (stats below 3.0 GPA etc), so it's hard for me to believe that all of the 55k+ applicants are golden stars... That all of them would have good volunteering and research and thus the "superstar elements" like military, 5+ pubs, founder of a million dollar non-profit etc, would be necessary to differentiate people.

Thanks for reading! I'm really interested to see what you all think!

Keep in mind, you saw the end result, not 7+ months of applying, waiting etc. Of course, after their accepted, they'll try to play it cool and act like it was no big deal.

 

[deleted916225]

Does anyone else feel like there's an increasing proportion of pre-meds each year as well?

 

[gyngyn]

Does anyone else feel like there's an increasing proportion of pre-meds each year as well?

It may seem that way but it's not true.

 

[deleted890552]

I think some people overthink it, but there's also probably a lot of people with the numbers that don't put the work in. I'd be interested to know what your odds actually are if you have sub-optimal stats (3.0-3.2, 502-505), average volunteering/research, average letters/essays, and applied to 20 schools where you had the statistically highest possible chance to get accepted.

 

[907906]

IMO It's the same 2 reasons that people tend to choose more prestigious medical schools. 1. Prestige is important to most pre-meds, whether they admit it or not. This profession attracts people who want to be the best. 2. They think it will give them an edge up at the next stage. Most people out of high school think that a more prestigious school will give them an admissions edge for med school. Most people out of undergrad think a more prestigious med school will give then an edge in the match. Both are true, however as the experts on here will say time and time again, this prestige advantage is actually very small compared to the personal factors of how an individual applicant does. Personal fit to a school is much more important in breeding personal success (on EC's, gpa, mcat, Step scores, clerkships, etc.) but many people simply don't seem to understand this because they're ego either blindly pulls them towards prestige or they get caught up in the idea that prestige=your best chances of being successful later on.

Anyways that's my .02. Rant over .

Yeah I agree. I would even argue that one has better chances at getting in from a state school where the availability of ECs is much better. Also, the same dean of admissions who I mentioned in my original post specifically said they want applicants from my school, which is a public state school with acceptance rate of about 60%... Plus one of the SDN adcoms told me they'd love to see good applicants from my school and not only from the typical pre-med breeders. I'd definitely advice high schoolers to choose their undergrad based on 1) their abilities to succeed there and 2) the availability of ECs.

When it comes to choosing a med school I kind of understand that one might consider the prestige factor. I feel like once you're a MD student, making connections is important or at least beneficial to your career. A friend of mine had a quite distressing situation (I won't elaborate on it for their and mine privacy) but what saved them big time was the right connections. I don't mean that prestigious schools means more success. Just that there can be some benefits that are worth the debate over what school to attend.

 

[907906]

I went to a large stats school (non UC) with like 60,000+ students and I think at my graduation day there were about 12k. Its crazy cuz I volunteer and work in a lab and I see freshman already looking for labs and volunteering like 1 week after classes started. I had no idea about the pre med route when I started and started late and it was so hard to get volunteering/shadowing. Not to mention its hard to get a letter of rec when you're a class of 500+. My LOR writer said she has taught over 15k over time and that students come to her asking for letters and shes like "I honestly couldnt tell you anything more than they earned an A. I probably have never met them". I was very very close to going to a smal liberal arts school but wanted to be in a city and get out of my comfort zone. But Ive driven over an hour just to shadow and I advise people to dont even bother trying to volunteer at the big hospitals because you have to apply 6+ months in advance and there are free clinic that run off volunteer work and would gladly have their time.

Gosh! That sucks. I couldn't imagine attending a school like that. My school doesn't have a hospital affiliated with it but even if it would, that'd be the last place I'd look for shadowing or volunteering...
It doesn't say in your profile if you're a med student already but if you are, congrats! If you're not, good luck!

 

[JugglesMed]

Would you say the 40% acceptance rate is skewed due to people just applying for absolutely no reason? Like parents made them apply, they didn't know how the process worked and applied in December, they think being a doctor sounds cool, applying to schools they have no chance at (Top 20 or OOS Public schools),etc
I see schools like Drexel and George Washington get 12k+ applicants and just wonder how they can narrow it down to 200 matriculants.

 

[Oso]

@Tommy Needs A Mango - fantastic username and photo

 

[Goro]

Would you say the 40% acceptance rate is skewed due to people just applying for absolutely no reason? Like parents made them apply, they didn't know how the process worked and applied in December, they think being a doctor sounds cool, applying to schools they have no chance at (Top 20 or OOS Public schools),etc
I see schools like Drexel and George Washington get 12k+ applicants and just wonder how they can narrow it down to 200 matriculants.

Yup. Bad advising, parental pressure and plain ignorance of the process along with tons of wistful thinking.

 

[Lucca]

Would you say the 40% acceptance rate is skewed due to people just applying for absolutely no reason? Like parents made them apply, they didn't know how the process worked and applied in December, they think being a doctor sounds cool, applying to schools they have no chance at (Top 20 or OOS Public schools),etc
I see schools like Drexel and George Washington get 12k+ applicants and just wonder how they can narrow it down to 200 matriculants.

The overall acceptance rate is just a poor way to understand your chances. If you want a quick estimate, go to the AAMC MCAT/GPA grid and see what the % accepted is for your stats.

 

[JugglesMed]

The overall acceptance rate is just a poor way to understand your chances. If you want a quick estimate, go to the AAMC MCAT/GPA grid and see what the % accepted is for your stats.

Wow this was actually really helpful! Almost near 70% for me then, a lot better than I expected

 

[907906]

@Tommy Needs A Mango - fantastic username and photo

Lol thanks! Finally someone who got it

 

[Lucca]

Wow this was actually really helpful! Almost near 70% for me then, a lot better than I expected

Yah if you have strong stats, all boxes ticked, at the very least *non negative* letters, and a reasonable school list then your odds are typically pretty good.

The issue is that a lot of people neglect significant portions of their app, Rush the McAT, or make a poorly researched, shallow list but apply anyway. Putting in the time is half the battle.

 

[907906]

Would you say the 40% acceptance rate is skewed due to people just applying for absolutely no reason? Like parents made them apply, they didn't know how the process worked and applied in December, they think being a doctor sounds cool, applying to schools they have no chance at (Top 20 or OOS Public schools),etc
I see schools like Drexel and George Washington get 12k+ applicants and just wonder how they can narrow it down to 200 matriculants.

That's exactly what I think! There are relatively many applicants who either have too low stats, are missing a vital part like volunteering, write horrible essays etc and because these people apply but won't get in, the acceptance rate decreases. Im confident that if you'd remove those applications, we'd have an overall acceptance rate that is much more reflective.

 

[Robin-jay]

The application process isn't too complex UNTIL you mess up somewhere.

A low GPA one year, a really bad grade, a low MCAT score, etc.

Then it goes from 0 to 100 real quick in the complex department.

 

[wysdoc]

The application process isn't too complex UNTIL you mess up somewhere.

A low GPA one year, a really bad grade, a low MCAT score, etc.

Then it goes from 0 to 100 real quick in the complex department.

That's not the application process though-

 

[Robin-jay]

That's not the application process though-

Writing essays and explaining in the interview of the aforementioned mistakes could become complex issues.