May I apply for any OOS public schools?

[windcolour]

I am an old applicant with GPA 3.76, MCAT 8 11 10M, one year shadowing, 1.5 years volunteer at inpatient clinic, 20 publications in the field of biomedicine.
Is my stats eligible to apply for any out-of-state public schools?
I do not have any ties to those schools.
It seems the out-of-state public schools set a much higher bar for oos applicants.

Thanks a lot for your inputs.

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[Dendrite]

Wow, 20 publications... impressive.

It depends on the public school entirely. Some, like the Virginia Commonwealth University, accept a high proportion of OOS students compared to other schools that get state funding - this seems like a good candidate for you. The University of Miami is increasingly accepting OOS students, despite being a private school subsidized by the state of FL.

Look at the latest MSAR to get a better analysis on OOS public schools and the proportion of IS and OOS'ers they accept. For the vast majority though, you may need to bump up the MCAT to around a 34-35 to be considered competitive in this case. Your life and research experience may offset that somewhat, but an increased MCAT would do wonders.

 

[windcolour]

Wow, 20 publications... impressive.

It depends on the public school entirely. Some, like the Virginia Commonwealth University, accept a high proportion of OOS students compared to other schools that get state funding - this seems like a good candidate for you. The University of Miami is increasingly accepting OOS students, despite being a private school subsidized by the state of FL.

Look at the latest MSAR to get a better analysis on OOS public schools and the proportion of IS and OOS'ers they accept. For the vast majority though, you may need to bump up the MCAT to around a 34-35 to be considered competitive in this case. Your life and research experience may offset that somewhat, but an increased MCAT would do wonders.

Thanks for your reply.
I would like to bump the MCAT, but it seems it is late for this cycle.

 

[DrMidlife]

I am an old applicant with GPA 3.76, MCAT 8 11 10M, one year shadowing, 1.5 years volunteer at inpatient clinic, 20 publications in the field of biomedicine.
Is my stats eligible to apply for any out-of-state public schools?
I do not have any ties to those schools.
It seems the out-of-state public schools set a much higher bar for oos applicants.

Thanks a lot for your inputs.

Don't be like me and apply to a bazillion MD schools, but there are definitely public schools that take a lot of OOS. Vermont, Michigan, Penn State, etc. Find an MSAR to see the numbers.

You have a nice GPA, which should help, but I'm not sure about your MCAT score.

 

[[pj]]

MSAR is definitely the way to go. Some schools don't take any OOS, no matter how great you are.

 

[Luxian]

It very much depends on the state. UMass only takes people from Massachusetts that have lived there for five years or more. California schools are notoriously hard to get into (not that that stopped me from applying) but there are many others that take OOSers. You just have to check each one.

Keep in mind that many public schools are no cheaper than private schools if you're not a resident. Check residency requirements first.

 

[windcolour]

Thanks for replys.
My MCAT really hurts me and I do not have any time to retake it for this cycle.
In addition, I forgot to mention that one of my paper was published on CELL (I am a first author). Will it help a little?
What am I going to do? Still worth trying???????

 

[notdeadyet]

What am I going to do? Still worth trying???????

I don't usually share too many details of my personal situation, but our circumstances seem somewhat similar, so what the hell.

I applied last year with very similar stats. About the same GPA and I had a 30 on the MCAT (but with an 8 in Bio, you know, the MCAT section about, well, medical stuff....). I had zero research, no science background and I doubt I could name publications, let alone publish in them. I was also an old applicant (34yo at time of app).

I applied to 37 schools and received 5 interviews, which yeilded 3 acceptances and 2 waitlists.

What's interesting is that all five interviews were from state schools. I wouldn't necessarily read anything into this fact, except for this: when most people talk about safety schools, they throw out names of private schools with lower than average median MCAT/GPAs. The problem is that these schools tend to have a huge number of applications, so it's easy for an average applicant to just get lost in the shuffle. I interviewed at UCSF, but didn't get an interview from Drexel and several other schools that folks with ho-hum stats are encouraged to apply to.

Do research on your public schools. Lots of them tend to be low volume and take higher than usual number of out of state students. Here is my mdapps page. I'm from California, so you can pretty much kiss off the UCs, but for the rest of them, all of the public schools accepted OOS students.

Many folks will tell you not to overapply, but my theory is this: if you're a borderline applicant (and for some reason are applying this round anyway), you should err on the side of inclusion. Folks said I was nuts for applying to 37 schools, but if I chopped this list down to 20, I would have most likely dropped two schools I was accepted to. And I was accepted by the third only a few weeks before classes. Caveat emptor.

Best of luck with your application. Hope this helps.

 

[nontrdgsbuiucmd]

I am an old applicant with GPA 3.76, MCAT 8 11 10M, one year shadowing, 1.5 years volunteer at inpatient clinic, 20 publications in the field of biomedicine.
Is my stats eligible to apply for any out-of-state public schools?
I do not have any ties to those schools.
It seems the out-of-state public schools set a much higher bar for oos applicants.

Thanks a lot for your inputs.

I'd go for at least some state schools, spoke with Michigan recently; they stated that there are 3 "tiers" for instate, 3 separate tiers for out of state at the initial screen, they did say they go through every application thoroughly and do not have hard cutoffs; this is nice to hear for those of us with a blemish on one part of the app & unique strengths on other parts; probably most of us nontrads. Vermont also was very open to OOS candidates; that's a big chunk of their matriculant body.

I don't think it's possible to generalize that state schools don't accept out of state candidates, they range from Indiana (3.8 gpa, high 30's MCAT) for out of staters to Ohio State (they're looking for similar stats, instate or out of state), to Iowa (out of state mcat interview minimums are 10 per section). This info is firsthand from admissions offices.

I'd go with windcolour generally and apply broadly; better to spend $1000 extra in secondary fees rather than delay entry for a year, if you have time to speak with some schools first regarding their policies for OOS I'd suggest that, there were a handful of state schools I spoke with that essentially said their goal was to attract instate candidates and were pretty much not interested in out of staters other than those currently residing in the state (for college or whatever) and those with strong state ties.

 

[windcolour]

Thanks a lot for you two's thoughtful replys.
I am from Tennessee. I will definitely apply for its only two IS schools, UT-memphis and ETSU. I am also trying to look into some OOS schools which are possible for me to reach. I will have a try at michigan and vermont.

Thanks again. Good luck to everyone.

 

[QofQuimica]

Welcome to SDN, windcolour. A couple of things:

1) Please do not cross post your threads in more than one forum. Just pick the best forum for your question and post it once. I've moved all the posts from the other thread here.

2) To answer your question, it depends. I don't know how set you are on staying in the South. Unfortunately, most public Southern schools do not take a lot of OOS applicants. My state schools (I'm from FL) are a good ex. of this. You might try applying to some of the private schools in the South, though, like Tulane and Miami. Also, I'm not sure what the policies are for schools from states that are neighboring TN. But that would be a good place to start, since some state schools give preference to people from neighboring states. You should see what the OOS rules are for state schools in Kentucky, VA, etc. For example, I was able to apply to UAB since I came from FL, although I also had ties to the state of AL (previous resident). You are from a neighboring state for AL too, but you should probably not apply to UAB unless you can raise your MCAT to the mid 30s range.

Best of luck to you.

 

[Scottish Chap]

I am an old applicant with GPA 3.76, MCAT 8 11 10M, one year shadowing, 1.5 years volunteer at inpatient clinic, 20 publications in the field of biomedicine.
Is my stats eligible to apply for any out-of-state public schools?
I do not have any ties to those schools.
It seems the out-of-state public schools set a much higher bar for oos applicants.

Thanks a lot for your inputs.

My single biggest mistake as a non-traditional applicant in 2004 was applying to state schools that take very few out-of-state applicants.

Read MSAR for it will show you the application and acceptance ratio very clearly and the demographic profile for each. You'll find all sorts of interesting facts, like MUSC takes very few OOS applicants and those that do usually need a very close family connection to SC to make a convincing argument for admission, schools like SUNY Upstate consider OOS and instate applicants to be the same for the purposes of admission, and East Carolina University won't admit OOS applicants etc.

You have decent numbers (critical) so you should be fine. I've said it before and I'll say it again: an average applicant in the numbers arena with significant research experience is more likely to end up in a research-focused medical school and those tend to be considered more prestigious than a generic state school - whatever that's worth. Again, you should be fine but apply to schools that appreciate your strengths.

 

[windcolour]

Welcome to SDN, windcolour. A couple of things:

1) Please do not cross post your threads in more than one forum. Just pick the best forum for your question and post it once. I've moved all the posts from the other thread here.

Sorry, I am new to this forum. Thanks for letting me know this policy.

2) To answer your question, it depends. I don't know how set you are on staying in the South. Unfortunately, most public Southern schools do not take a lot of OOS applicants. My state schools (I'm from FL) are a good ex. of this. You might try applying to some of the private schools in the South, though, like Tulane and Miami. Also, I'm not sure what the policies are for schools from states that are neighboring TN. But that would be a good place to start, since some state schools give preference to people from neighboring states. You should see what the OOS rules are for state schools in Kentucky, VA, etc. For example, I was able to apply to UAB since I came from FL, although I also had ties to the state of AL (previous resident). You are from a neighboring state for AL too, but you should probably not apply to UAB unless you can raise your MCAT to the mid 30s range.

You are right that most southern state shool are quite conservative on admitting OOS student. That is why I raise this question. My stats is not so good and I hope it is possible to find some more schools to apply broadly. UAB is difficult for me to reach. I may want to have a try at AL.

Thanks again.

 

[windcolour]

My single biggest mistake as a non-traditional applicant in 2004 was applying to state schools that take very few out-of-state applicants.

Read MSAR for it will show you the application and acceptance ratio very clearly and the demographic profile for each. You'll find all sorts of interesting facts, like MUSC takes very few OOS applicants and those that do usually need a very close family connection to SC to make a convincing argument for admission, schools like SUNY Upstate consider OOS and instate applicants to be the same for the purposes of admission, and East Carolina University won't admit OOS applicants etc.

You have decent numbers (critical) so you should be fine. I've said it before and I'll say it again: an average applicant in the numbers arena with significant research experience is more likely to end up in a research-focused medical school and those tend to be considered more prestigious than a generic state school - whatever that's worth. Again, you should be fine but apply to schools that appreciate your strengths.

Thanks for your reply. You are right that I should try to find some schools which will appreciate my research experience, although my stats is too low for most of them.

 

[gman33]

I don't have much to add to the above posts.

Get a copy of MSAR or just check out school's websites.
If they take a very low % of OOS applicants, you are better off applying somewhere else.

I think it was notdeadyet who gave you some good advice about "safety" schools. Just because a school takes people with lower stats doesn't mean it's a good place to apply. My school is pretty average in stats, but they got around 12,000 applications this year. If you are going to apply to schools that get that many apps, make sure you apply to a bunch (like 30-40). Better to apply to too many than too few. You can always cancel interviews if you already have an acceptance in hand.

BTW - Have you thought about retaking the MCAT?
If you could bump that score a few points, you'd be in great shape with the rest of your application. That 8 is going to hurt at some schools.

 

[nontrdgsbuiucmd]

Thanks for your reply. You are right that I should try to find some schools which will appreciate my research experience, although my stats is too low for most of them.

If I'm reading this correctly, you have a 3.76 GPA and 29 MCAT? I've spoken with 3 top tier (not sure of their rank, all are well known, 2 are very strong in research) schools, those numbers would have been sufficient for a candidate to be interviewed at all 3 depending on extracurriculars & other areas such as community/medical volunteering, which you have. I'd go with your stengths and apply to the top research programs, I thought I saw that 10th percentile for Hopkins was around 3.7, so even that school which I consider among the top few in research may be within reach given your strong publications background.