If you are a resident of AZ, your list has about 5 schools where you have a fair to good chance of an interview.
Let me be more specific because I thought I had a good school list for my stats and ECs. I am in Utah FYI and served an LDS proselyting mission in California for two years so I do have ties to the state. I also lived in Texas through high school and the beginning of college.
Boston University, which is OOS friendly, I was complete on 9/4/19
Penn State, which is also OOS friendly, I was complete on 9/7/19
The University of Wisconsin, which is semi-OOS friendly and have family there, I was complete on 9/11/19
University of Arizona - Tucson, which is OOS friendly from what I read, I was complete on 9/10/19
University of Arizona - Pheonix, I was complete on 9/13/19
The University of Rochester, which is OOS friendly, I was complete on 8/31/19
Medical College of Wisconsin, not sure about OOS friendly, could not find anything about it, I was complete on 8/30/19
UC - Davis - I was complete on 9/6/19
UCLA - I was complete on 9/2/19
UC - San Diego, which I really really hope works out, I was complete on 9/19/19
Creighton, which is located in Omaha and has one of the best Trisomy centers in the nation (my daughter has Trisomy-13 and I am huge advocate for the kiddos), I was complete on 9/18/19
Baylor, I lived in Texas until I was 20 (I could not afford to apply the to Texas schools because I only got AAMC FAP. If I am a reapplicant then I definitely plan to apply to the Texas schools), I was complete on around 9/27/19
The University of North Carolina is a real long shot because their minimum MCAT for OOS is 514, but I was still encouraged to apply, I was complete around 10/3/19
The University of Utah has a special place in my heart because they saved my daughter's life. I was complete around 9/3/19
Vanderbilt University is also a long shot, but why not? I was complete on 10/3/19
I just found out about the University of Vermont - Larner and am completing the secondary today.
I also included the George Washington School of Medicine, University of Toledo, Stanford, University of Colorado, John Hopkins, and Eastern Virginia University in the AMCAS, but did not complete secondaries upon doing further research. Colorado is SO expensive for OOS, I don't really have a chance at John Hopkins or Stanford.
To be more specific about EC's
I have over 300 hours of teaching at the undergraduate level
I have over 7000 hours working with adults with disabilities/ clinical exposure
I think my PS is fairly compelling (so do my professors who read it) due to my lived experience with my medically complex daughter and obstacles that I have faced.
I interned at a concussion clinic in which I wrote patient reports and developed a system to quantitatively code patient demographics and outcomes. Also had research presented at the international neuroscience conference
I have also facilitated a grief support group for adolescents who lost a parent or sibling
Research-wise, I have a few published abstracts at an international conference. I also had three or four oral and conference presentations at national and professional psychology conferences and criminology conferences.
There were also some other volunteer experiences.
Could those ECs make up for the average or below average MCAT score?
Thank you for your time in reading and responding
1) For solid applicants at most schools, Sept 20 is not late
2) Application and candidate evaluations timeline varies widely by school may not done in a linear, chronological order. EDP, High achievers, URM, family of alumni, feeder schools, associated UG programs, linked postbaccs, and other factor may push an app forward in the process.
3) You can hear for II anytime from now until March 2020
4) Also be clear that all schools are deciding on admissions and all applicants start as "un-admitted" or rejected. There is no requirement that any school notify you of anything other than II or acceptance. Many applicants will never receive a formal rejection.
5) Any individual school receives 5000+ applications at best 1000 interview slots. This means that 80%+ of applicants will get no II from a school
********AMCAS 2020 Timeline Summary (post count #036)************
-AMCAS May 1, 2019, Primary application opens up. Can send formal requests for transcripts from your schools and letter requests to your letter writers.
-AMCAS May 30, 2019, Completed primary applications with all ECs, PS, and course information can be submitted.
-You enter the verification queue (“time to verify”) only when both completed primary application and all transcripts have been received.
-AMCAS does not, repeat, does not verify LOR or MCAT score. Your primary application will be verified regardless of LOR or MCAT score status
-AMCAS June 28, 2019, begins transmission verified applications (though some schools have secondaries sent to contact info upon submission to AMCAS)
-Verification peak is about August 1st and takes 20 days
-Most Primary Apps are transmitted early July thru early September
-Secondaries timelines can vary widely as to when to they are sent out from almost immediately upon submissions to 3 months, though most are in the range 1-3 weeks after transmission.
-Letters via AMCAS are processed/transmitted separately from primary
-Letters can be added after primary has been submitted and transmitted and are mostly not needed until secondary reviews at the earliest.
-While applications are transmitted at end of June, most schools do not start any processing until at least mid-July at the earliest; even then, most dont get up to full speed until mid-August.
-There are usually 3 main phases in processing application
----1) Initial Screening/Evaluation: A hybrid of automatic GPA/MCAT screen plus human for "quick review" of application. Used to for general priority and, in some cases, which team/subcommittee gets application. At some schools, preset criteria or informal policy can lead to II at this stage.
----2) Full Evaluation: This is where evaluator/reader/team/subcommittee will fully evaluate all sections of primary, secondary, and LOR and generally summarize in broad categories or point system. This essentially becomes your priority for adcom review and II. This function may be split up among several evaluators and may go to a team or subcommittee for II decision. Application are not typically evaluated until complete with Primary, Secondary, MCAT, and LOR
----3) Full adcom: this is where your fully evaluated application is reviewed and decided for interview invite After interview Adcom will vote on admission (acceptance or alternate WL)
-Application and candidate evaluations timeline varies widely by school may not done in a linear, chronological order. EDP, High achievers, URM, family of alumni, feeder schools, associated UG programs, linked postbaccs, and other factor may push an app forward in the process.
-Most adcoms dont start meeting for review of evaluated applicants until at least mid-August, more likely September, though some reviews may be done earlier for groups mentioned above. Evaluation may start almost immediately at some schools.
-Schools receive 5,000-10,000 application but can only evaluate several hundred applications a week. Therefore, it can take anywhere from 4-16 weeks (1-4 months) or more to be evaluated, reviewed and invited for interview after your application is complete.
-Schools must reduce several thousand applications to several hundred interviews.
At least 80% of applicants at any individual school must be rejected pre-interview.
-There are about 900,000 individual applications across 150+ medical schools with about 150,000 interview slots maximum. That means on average of 16 submitted applications only 3 will get an II.
-Applicants should check each applicant portal daily until application is marked complete, under review, or similar. After that, you should check applicant portal 2 to 3 times as week as schools may invite you for interview solely by portal; some schools do not send email for interview invite.
-Submitting Primary Application June is Early, July Medium, August Late
-Having Primary verified and transmitted to school by middle of August is normal speed
-Having Secondary and all LORs complete to school by Labor Day is early/ontime. By late or end of September is about middle/normal speed, by end of October is about late.
--After that point you will generally start getting impacted by the number of applications submitted, the finite number of interview slots, and seats given by rolling admissions. These aren’t absolute dates nor is it a fixed timeline. It should be used as a guideline
-Medical schools focus on evaluation and pre-II review up until approximately Thanksgiving. At that time they need to start transitioning to post-interview acceptance decision. However, with the increasing number of applications per school, some fraction of interview invites will continue into the new year.
-Medical schools cannot inform regular MD candidates of admission (acceptance or alternate) prior to Oct 15th. However, medical school can inform applicants of any other decision, such as rejection or hold, at any time from initial primary submission until past end of cycle. Do note that the only formal vote an admission committee need to make is for admission (acceptance or alternate/WL) and that is the only decision they must inform you about. A large fraction of applicants will never get a formal rejection; they will simply never get II or acceptance.
