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Just curious if I'm the only crazy person who is thinking of applying to almost every school. How many schools are you planning on applying to and why?
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11 Months later
Alright guys, it has been almost 11 months and I would like to see the results of how things went. Did you apply to too many schools or not enough? Hopefully this can help out applicants for next cycle.
I don't feel like creating an account on MDapps so I'll post a quick summary of my cycle here. Feel free to add as much or as little to your post as you want.
Alright guys, it has been almost 11 months and I would like to see the results of how things went. Did you apply to too many schools or not enough? Hopefully this can help out applicants for next cycle.
I don't feel like creating an account on MDapps so I'll post a quick summary of my cycle here. Feel free to add as much or as little to your post as you want.
Alright guys, it has been almost 11 months and I would like to see the results of how things went. Did you apply to too many schools or not enough? Hopefully this can help out applicants for next cycle.
I don't feel like creating an account on MDapps so I'll post a quick summary of my cycle here. Feel free to add as much or as little to your post as you want.
Background:
Took my MCAT in July and ended up getting a better score than I thought I would. I had originally planned to apply at ~15 low/mid tier schools but ended up throwing my application to 29+ schools.
The stats:
3.4-3.7 GPA /26-29 MCAT
Schools applied: 29+ DO schools
Reason: Got my MCAT results back and didn't have time to research all the schools. I decided I would just dump my application everywhere and decide as the secondaries came in. According to napkin calculations I spent $1,200 on my primary. I didn't apply to TouroNY because of secondary price and another school I can't remember off the top of my head. I would have saved $525 if I only applied to 15 schools originally but I probably would have dropped DMU and WesternU for WCU and Touro Nevada.
That $525 bought me some time and a safety net if had gotten no IIs by November. I could just send more secondaries later on.
What I might have done differently... It costs $50+35x to send out your primary as a second batch. That is $20 more than what I originally paid but if I had gotten an acceptance I wouldn't have needed to pay this $545.
Secondaries: There is NO WAY I could have finished 29+ secondaries so I narrowed them down to ~15 places I really wanted to check out. The breakdown was roughly 6 Top tier, 6 mid tier and 3 low tier.
Reason: I tried to make sure that I sent out 1:1:1 secondary to each tier. I probably got a bit greedy by not applying to enough low tiers. Lets assume the average was $60/secondary * 15 schools = $900.
Results: ~15 secondaries, 3 post-secondary rejections, 8 IIs, attended 6 interviews, 1 post-interview rejection, 2 waitlists, 2 acceptances.
Post Game Analysis:
Positive:
I'm really glad I applied broadly because my only post-interview rejection was from a place that I thought was my 90% match.
Thanks to applying broadly I ended up interviewing at schools that I thought I would have no chance at (DMU, WesternU, and KCUMB) and got accepted into a fantastic school. I ended up hating 1 school so much that I hoped it would turn out to be a rejection. That experience really taught me how important these interviews are. You get to evaluate the school and they evaluate you as a candidate.
I only got IIs from 1/2 the places I sent secondaries to because my list might have been too top heavy and/or regional. I shouldn't have applied to OSU or OU-HCOM. AZCOM's tuition is too high so I didn't even bother following up when they said a LOI would help. CUSOM and MUCOM would have been better choices. If my interviewing skills were better I truly believe 2 of those waitlist decisions would have been acceptances.
The 2 interviews I didn't go to were new/low tier schools. That might have raised my acceptance number a bit.
Negative:
There are 2-3 schools that were regional and I shouldn't have applied to them in the first place. Got rejection from OSU and haven't heard from OU-HCOM yet.
LMU-DCOM never got back to me. I'm shocked about this because it's a pretty cool school and I thought my stats were good enough for them.
I really should have applied to more lower tiers. My interviewing skills aren't the best and if I hadn't landed that 1 acceptance I would have been rushing to fill out more secondaries.
My only regret was not applying to PCOM, MUCOM and MSUCOM. Those 3 are great schools and who knows how things might have turned out. Even a rejection would have been worth the $$$.
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There is a point of diminishing returns. I would say 13-17 schools is the best bang for your buck if you're planning to apply broadly.
The rest either have regional bias or something weird going on.
Regional bias:
OU-HCOM - Public and require 5 years service post graduation. You sign a contract for this that takes affect once you matriculate. [3] [4]
OSU--86% in-state (about 15 OOS students/year) [6]
MSU - Public and $80k OOS tuition. 86% are IS [5]
PNWU -
TCOM - Public and required to take 90% IS [2]
VCOM -
WVSOM -
Rowan - Public - 88% from NJ [1]
Others:
CCOM - Pretty tough to get into unless you have competitive stats.
[1] http://www.rowan.edu/som/about/index.html
[2] http://web.unthsc.edu/info/200679/admissions_and_outreach/1535/frequently_asked_questions
[3] http://www.oucom.ohiou.edu/aid/fin_aid_ohio_residency.htm
[4] http://www.oucom.ohiou.edu/admissions/contract.htm
[5] http://www.com.msu.edu/About/FactSheet3.htm
[6] http://www.healthsciences.okstate.edu/com/admissions/
If someone can help me find sources for OOS figures on other schools that would be great.
---
11 Months later
Alright guys, it has been almost 11 months and I would like to see the results of how things went. Did you apply to too many schools or not enough? Hopefully this can help out applicants for next cycle.
I don't feel like creating an account on MDapps so I'll post a quick summary of my cycle here. Feel free to add as much or as little to your post as you want.
Alright guys, it has been almost 11 months and I would like to see the results of how things went. Did you apply to too many schools or not enough? Hopefully this can help out applicants for next cycle.
I don't feel like creating an account on MDapps so I'll post a quick summary of my cycle here. Feel free to add as much or as little to your post as you want.
Alright guys, it has been almost 11 months and I would like to see the results of how things went. Did you apply to too many schools or not enough? Hopefully this can help out applicants for next cycle.
I don't feel like creating an account on MDapps so I'll post a quick summary of my cycle here. Feel free to add as much or as little to your post as you want.
Background:
Took my MCAT in July and ended up getting a better score than I thought I would. I had originally planned to apply at ~15 low/mid tier schools but ended up throwing my application to 29+ schools.
The stats:
3.4-3.7 GPA /26-29 MCAT
Schools applied: 29+ DO schools
Reason: Got my MCAT results back and didn't have time to research all the schools. I decided I would just dump my application everywhere and decide as the secondaries came in. According to napkin calculations I spent $1,200 on my primary. I didn't apply to TouroNY because of secondary price and another school I can't remember off the top of my head. I would have saved $525 if I only applied to 15 schools originally but I probably would have dropped DMU and WesternU for WCU and Touro Nevada.
That $525 bought me some time and a safety net if had gotten no IIs by November. I could just send more secondaries later on.
What I might have done differently... It costs $50+35x to send out your primary as a second batch. That is $20 more than what I originally paid but if I had gotten an acceptance I wouldn't have needed to pay this $545.
Secondaries: There is NO WAY I could have finished 29+ secondaries so I narrowed them down to ~15 places I really wanted to check out. The breakdown was roughly 6 Top tier, 6 mid tier and 3 low tier.
Reason: I tried to make sure that I sent out 1:1:1 secondary to each tier. I probably got a bit greedy by not applying to enough low tiers. Lets assume the average was $60/secondary * 15 schools = $900.
Results: ~15 secondaries, 3 post-secondary rejections, 8 IIs, attended 6 interviews, 1 post-interview rejection, 2 waitlists, 2 acceptances.
Post Game Analysis:
Positive:
I'm really glad I applied broadly because my only post-interview rejection was from a place that I thought was my 90% match.
Thanks to applying broadly I ended up interviewing at schools that I thought I would have no chance at (DMU, WesternU, and KCUMB) and got accepted into a fantastic school. I ended up hating 1 school so much that I hoped it would turn out to be a rejection. That experience really taught me how important these interviews are. You get to evaluate the school and they evaluate you as a candidate.
I only got IIs from 1/2 the places I sent secondaries to because my list might have been too top heavy and/or regional. I shouldn't have applied to OSU or OU-HCOM. AZCOM's tuition is too high so I didn't even bother following up when they said a LOI would help. CUSOM and MUCOM would have been better choices. If my interviewing skills were better I truly believe 2 of those waitlist decisions would have been acceptances.
The 2 interviews I didn't go to were new/low tier schools. That might have raised my acceptance number a bit.
Negative:
There are 2-3 schools that were regional and I shouldn't have applied to them in the first place. Got rejection from OSU and haven't heard from OU-HCOM yet.
LMU-DCOM never got back to me. I'm shocked about this because it's a pretty cool school and I thought my stats were good enough for them.
I really should have applied to more lower tiers. My interviewing skills aren't the best and if I hadn't landed that 1 acceptance I would have been rushing to fill out more secondaries.
My only regret was not applying to PCOM, MUCOM and MSUCOM. Those 3 are great schools and who knows how things might have turned out. Even a rejection would have been worth the $$$.
---
There is a point of diminishing returns. I would say 13-17 schools is the best bang for your buck if you're planning to apply broadly.
The rest either have regional bias or something weird going on.
Regional bias:
OU-HCOM - Public and require 5 years service post graduation. You sign a contract for this that takes affect once you matriculate. [3] [4]
OSU--86% in-state (about 15 OOS students/year) [6]
MSU - Public and $80k OOS tuition. 86% are IS [5]
PNWU -
TCOM - Public and required to take 90% IS [2]
VCOM -
WVSOM -
Rowan - Public - 88% from NJ [1]
Others:
CCOM - Pretty tough to get into unless you have competitive stats.
[1] http://www.rowan.edu/som/about/index.html
[2] http://web.unthsc.edu/info/200679/admissions_and_outreach/1535/frequently_asked_questions
[3] http://www.oucom.ohiou.edu/aid/fin_aid_ohio_residency.htm
[4] http://www.oucom.ohiou.edu/admissions/contract.htm
[5] http://www.com.msu.edu/About/FactSheet3.htm
[6] http://www.healthsciences.okstate.edu/com/admissions/
If someone can help me find sources for OOS figures on other schools that would be great.
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