It's the last day of June, and I'm still waiting on transcripts. Am I doing it wrong?

[stayathomemom]

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• My college mailed them May 8th, they were never marked received. In hindsight, I waited too long to resend them, because I was told to trust the process and wait.
• I sent instructions to my school to email them when AAMC opened up that option, and they emailed them on June 15. They were never marked as received, although it's only been 10 business days.
• When the AAMC sent a mass email regarding transcript trouble and gave a procedure for emailing them regarding this, I followed their directions and I immediately got an email back saying they are overwhelmed. I haven't heard back from them yet, although it's only been 4 days.
• I've tried calling but can never get through.

Is anyone else still hanging out, waiting for their transcripts? Or is it just me? I feel like my ship is in danger of sinking before it's even left the harbor.
The stupid thing is that there are no updates to my course work. I wish the AAMC would allow my institution to verify that so we could all move on using last year's course work verificaiton.

 

[penguinsfan71]

From the AMCAS Twitter:

Today, #AMCAS is marking electronic transcripts delivered on June 16 as “Received" and paper transcripts delivered on June 16 as "Received."

I would try to call, if they received it on the 15th it should have been marked received by now.

 

[stayathomemom]

From the AMCAS Twitter:


I would try to call, if they received it on the 15th it should have been marked received by now.

Thanks, I don't follow them on twitter so I'll keep that in mind.
Yeah, I have tried to call. You have to go through a long series of "Press # for X" only to be told via recording that they're too busy, too bad, goodbye, *click*

 

[penguinsfan71]

Following up with your school might not be a bad idea. Just because they said that they sent it on the 15th doesn't mean that they actually did.

 

[Goro]

OP, patience is a virtue. There IS a pandemic going on, after all.

 

[stayathomemom]

OP, patience is a virtue. There IS a pandemic going on, after all.

With all due respect, that's easy to say when your future isn't on the line. I'm just trying to do the best I can to be my own advocate. I've been waiting since May 8th. I know things are slow this year, but in another week it'll be two months! That's way outside the bounds of even the AAMC's updated COVID guidelines for transcript processing.

 

[Goro]

With all due respect, that's easy to say when your future isn't on the line. I'm just trying to do the best I can to be my own advocate. I've been waiting since May 8th. I know things are slow this year, but in another week it'll be two months! That's way outside the bounds of even the AAMC's updated COVID guidelines for transcript processing.

I fully understand that this is an anxiety-provoking process, and that you are feeling vulnerable. Everyone is.

But do try to have some sympathy for the employees of AAMC and the admission office staff members who have to process all their apps at home now, especially given that apps are up since the economy is in the toilet.

I followed their directions and I immediately got an email back saying they are overwhelmed.

We are living in a once in a century catastrophe, equivalent to the Great Depression or WWII. If your grandparent's (or great-grandparents') generation could deal with those, so can you.
Wise @gonnif, any thoughts to add?

 

[stayathomemom]

I fully understand that this is an anxiety-provoking process, and that you are feeling vulnerable. Everyone is.

But do try to have some sympathy for the employees of AAMC and the admission office staff members who have to process all their apps at home now, especially given that apps are up since the economy is in the toilet.

I followed their directions and I immediately got an email back saying they are overwhelmed.

We are living in a once in a century catastrophe, equivalent to the Great Depression or WWII. If your grandparent's (or great-grandparents') generation could deal with those, so can you.
Wise @gonnif, any thoughts to add?

At the beginning of this pandemic, people thought I was a pessimistic crazy old bastard when I said I wasnt sure we would actually have an application cycle this year. Between applicants have difficulties getting transcript sent from their UG schools to AMCAS first getting them, processing them, verifying applications, to MCAT testing. And we havent even started to distribute them to the med schools yet all while COVID cases are on the rise with predictions by Fauci of 100,000 new cases a day by year's end. Frankly, I am still not sure.

The only positive note I will say is that timing for applicants can be safely delayed by a month. That is, being complete by Oct 1st (instead of Labor Day) is ontime/early and by end of Oct for solid candidates at most programs is ok. Instead of Thanksgiving as being the "cutoff" for a reasonable chance for interview, Christmas will be the target. Even then, I am confident that at least 20%-25% of invites wont happen until after New Years and interviews will go on thru March, perhaps longer. I would also imagine the typical April 30 cut off will be pushed back by 2-4 weeks.

But in this world-wide pandemic that is affecting millions medically, economically, socially, and many other factors, there is little anyone can do to help applicants caught up in forces much bigger than any they will see in their lifetime

Thank you for your explanations. It's helping me to feel better and less like I've been left in the dust by everyone else by things outside of my control. Also, it's helpful to keep event in perspective with regards to history. Sometimes it's hard to step back and recognize the significance of our time when we're just focused on getting through it. Gonnif, I am hoping and praying that all admissions committees share your sentiment regarding Oct 1st.

 

[KnightDoc]

At the beginning of this pandemic, people thought I was a pessimistic crazy old bastard when I said I wasnt sure we would actually have an application cycle this year. Between applicants have difficulties getting transcript sent from their UG schools to AMCAS first getting them, processing them, verifying applications, to MCAT testing. And we havent even started to distribute them to the med schools yet all while COVID cases are on the rise with predictions by Fauci of 100,000 new cases a day by year's end. Frankly, I am still not sure.

The only positive note I will say is that timing for applicants can be safely delayed by a month. That is, being complete by Oct 1st (instead of Labor Day) is ontime/early and by end of Oct for solid candidates at most programs is ok. Instead of Thanksgiving as being the "cutoff" for a reasonable chance for interview, Christmas will be the target. Even then, I am confident that at least 20%-25% of invites wont happen until after New Years and interviews will go on thru March, perhaps longer. I would also imagine the typical April 30 cut off will be pushed back by 2-4 weeks.

But in this world-wide pandemic that is affecting millions medically, economically, socially, and many other factors, there is little anyone can do to help applicants caught up in forces much bigger than any they will see in their lifetime

And yet, absolutely no one other than you is "frankly .. still not sure" that there will be an admissions cycle this year, even if some folks are unreasonably delayed in getting verified.

MCATs have been and are still being administered, people are working from home, tons of people have been verified, with more being done every day, and interviews are going to be conducted virtually. We are in the cycle now; first transmission is less than two weeks away.

When will you be convinced that the season is not cancelled? October 15th? Next March 15th? 🙂 Yes, you are "a pessimistic crazy old bastard" whose broken clock was right when it read that things wouldn't go as smoothly as AMCAS hoped back in April and May. All your other predictions, including today's that the cycle might still be canceled if Fauci's millions of new cases come true, are not based in reality, but are rooted in the fact that you do not realize that the clock generating them is broken.

By year's end we will be around halfway through the cycle that you are not sure is going to happen. And, while he thinks we might have 100,000 new cases a day by then, he has also said he thinks there is a good chance there will be a vaccine by then. So, are we all doomed, or is there light at the end of the tunnel??? Either way, virtual interviews will proceed, and there will be a cycle!!!

Transcripts will ultimately be verified. MCATs will either proceed, be waived, or, at this point in the season, some people unable to take them if testing stops again might be SOL, but it's unbelievable, after all of your years in the business, that you honestly think there is any chance that there will not be an entering class in 2021 at each and every school in the country, given how many tens of thousands of applications are currently in the pipeline, just waiting to be verified by the diligent staffers who are sitting at home having nothing else to do other than verify away.

 

[KnightDoc]

There simply wont be enough complete applications before for schools to go very far into the process

By when? 7/10? I'm sure you're correct. 8/10? Not so much. 9/10? C'mon!!!

Unless we all end up in the hospital or worse, at some point things will get done. Not as soon as anyone would like, but they will get done. I'm certainly no insider, but my observation from the last cycle is that lots of schools have a flurry of activity in the fall, and then not as much as they wait to release decisions in February-March.

A delay for them will mean more work later in the fall and winter, and less work between July (when you have always pointed out very little happens anyway) and September if there are relatively fewer completed applications to review. For schools that traditionally release decisions earlier in the cycle, sure, things will be later for them this year.

While lots of applicants on SDN complain that the cycle for the stragglers lasts for an unreasonably long 14 months, this year there will be good reason for it to take so long, but it's really not as if there is not enough time between now and April, May, June 2021 to seat a class, no matter how bad things get between now and then.

 

[InvaderZ1m]

And yet, absolutely no one other than you is "frankly .. still not sure" that there will be an admissions cycle this year, even if some folks are unreasonably delayed in getting verified.

MCATs have been and are still being administered, people are working from home, tons of people have been verified, with more being done every day, and interviews are going to be conducted virtually. We are in the cycle now; first transmission is less than two weeks away.

When will you be convinced that the season is not cancelled? October 15th? Next March 15th? 🙂 Yes, you are "a pessimistic crazy old bastard" whose broken clock was right when it read that things wouldn't go as smoothly as AMCAS hoped back in April and May. All your other predictions, including today's that the cycle might still be canceled if Fauci's millions of new cases come true, are not based in reality, but are rooted in the fact that you do not realize that the clock generating them is broken.

By year's end we will be around halfway through the cycle that you are not sure is going to happen. And, while he thinks we might have 100,000 new cases a day by then, he has also said he thinks there is a good chance there will be a vaccine by then. So, are we all doomed, or is there light at the end of the tunnel??? Either way, virtual interviews will proceed, and there will be a cycle!!!

Transcripts will ultimately be verified. MCATs will either proceed, be waived, or, at this point in the season, some people unable to take them if testing stops again might be SOL, but it's unbelievable, after all of your years in the business, that you honestly think there is any chance that there will not be an entering class in 2021 at each and every school in the country, given how many tens of thousands of applications are currently in the pipeline, just waiting to be verified by the diligent staffers who are sitting at home having nothing else to do other than verify away.

I'm sure continuing such constant passive-aggressiveness towards far more experienced individuals who are doing all they can to help navigate us through this difficult process will work wonders during interviews. I'm just as innately proactive as OP and quite honestly it is really helpful to hear from those who have been through this process many times before that there are just certain things that are out of our hands right now given how crazy the times are.

Like someone previously suggested, I was having transcript issues earlier this month despite getting an email from my university saying it had been sent and (while admittedly there wasn't 2 months worth of waiting behind it) it ended up being a mistake that I had made on my end that was fixed after an email to my university's registrar's office. So, although I know you've already spoken to your university about it in requesting them to email your transcripts, I doubt another follow-up could hurt.

 

[stayathomemom]

Today, 7/10, two months and two days after my institution mailed my transcripts, and nearly a month after they emailed another copy my transcripts, AAMC finally marked them as received, and I am finally able to enter the verification queue. Just in time for peak verification times. I just want it to be known.