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Latest SDN Article! Keeping Costs Low as a Pre-Med
Admissions are purposely separated from financial aid by AAMC guidelines. Schools are supposed to make admissions decisions without regard or consideration for the applicants ability to pay. Indeed, this is one of the reasons some schools do not consider or release financial aid info until an applicant has made final acceptance decision. As for letter of intent, if you come off as iffy for any reason, such as needing a scholarship, that may negatively impact an adcom
At most places I think it's one committee that votes on admission, and a different committee that goes through the admits to decide who is a highest priority recruitment/merit-$ target. So sending admissions a letter will likely not have any impact.
Besides, if you're a high priority recruitment target, you're def not going to need a LoI to get an interview or admit there.
Besides, if you're a high priority recruitment target, you're def not going to need a LoI to get an interview or admit there.
Even with high priority recruitment targets, schools can not offer or make promises of a scholarship prior to admissions. What they tend to do is emphasize the existence of the scholarship and have you apply for it at the same time. If you are being recruited like this, it will be quite obvious they are going to throw money at you.
BTW, there are numerous outside scholarships for medical school, UCI has a list
Outside Scholarships for Medical Students: Medical Students
That just seems so wrong. I understand that that's the way these things are done, but really.
If I am lucky enough to get multiple interviews/acceptances, I am absolutely going to make my final decision about where to go based on financial aid. I hate that we all have to pretend like we're not talking about taking out six figure sums when some of us might end up in primary care and struggle for decades to pay our loans back. Nothing about our futures is guaranteed. I'd choose to matriculate at the absolute bottom school on my list in the worst possible area of the country for me if they offered me a full ride before I'd take my #1 top choice school if they offered me no help.
...Would I tell any school that in a letter? Absolutely not, but still. We're all just supposed to be dreamers with our heads in the clouds, with no understanding that $200k of student loans is a lot of money and is a significant hardship to pay back? Seems counterintuitive... I'd think med schools would want matriculants with some common sense and not a burning desire to take out huge amounts of debt just because they can.
This is a question I have been meaning to ask. I'm assuming each school gives a few merit based scholarships, but how many are financial need based? I've been blessed during undergrad with a scholarship to every school. They were "merit based," but deep down, I know financial need played a large part in receiving them. I wasn't sure if medical school uses similar guidelines.
And now the bad news. There is no requirement that medical schools provide any financial aid information prior to the April 30th Single Acceptance Deadline. Indeed, many medical schools will not begin financial aid analysis until after you have taken final acceptance. So you may have to make a decision without any financial aid information
That is even more terrible than I realized. The whole system needs some serious rebooting.
The system is working the way that it is intended. The mission of a medical school is to educate and train physicians by filling every seat they have each term. They produce this product by taking the raw material, premedical applicants, and manufacture them into MDs ready for the next level of processing in residencies. Oh, what about the fairness and consideration for these applicants? That is a minor part of this process and only matters as much as the law dictates. The government provides sufficient subsidies and the schools have some money but frankly they are there for those students who have already committed to a school and really not designed to entice a student to attend a specific school. With thousands of applications needing to be reduced by a minimum of 80% pre interview at each school for just hundreds of interview slots which get reduced to a few hundred acceptances and WL, less than 10% of an applicant pool at any individual school will be in the running to be accepted. Hence why applicants apply to an average of 14-15 schools. Even so, just under 50% of all matriculants, get a single acceptance. Even if you get two or more acceptances, either a school will not provide financial aid prior to acceptance deadline or will not offer significant merit or need based assistance. The belief that you will have multiple acceptances and can somehow leverage them for better Financial Aid is mostly a myth except for the top 3%-6% at most of the superstars. Most acceptees will not have financial aid info at final acceptance time, will come off a WL without FA, or get a single acceptance.
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