nontraditional students

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Donco, I believe the general philosophy is that if you are granted an interview, then the school considers you to be qualified to attend. However, since most schools interview between 4 and 10 students for every spot, a good interview in no way means an acceptance. That being said, getting an interview and having a good one is generally better than not.
 
most schools interview 3 times the number of people that are accepted. u do the math.
 
argh? What happened with this thread?
 
Sadly, I have learned that a pretty good interview is no guarantee of an acceptance. Your logic is otherwise impeccable. I'd say a good interview boosts your odds by some unquantifiable amount depending on the number of people they interview and/or admit per place in the class.
Good luck with your interview!! 🙂 When and where is it?
 
but what the hey, I'm a nontrad.
 
•••quote:•••Originally posted by locitamd:
•argh? What happened with this thread?•••••I don't know but I'll try to reel it in. I am a nontraditional student. I am 31 and will be entering med school this summer.
 
i am 26 (almost).
nyu class of 1997.
got accepted to suny @ syracuse.
 
I'm 27 soon to be 28...I think I am non-trad...but I don't know I guess I don't consider myself since alot of people I was interviewing with were 24-26...
 
I am also nontrad. I am 25 and married, finishing my junior year of undergrad.
 
Will be 32 in November. Recently accepted at Mayo Medical School.

Do you know about <a href="http://www.studentdoctor.net/opm/index.asp" target="_blank">OldPreMeds</a> on SDN?
 
I wish to make you aware of the existence of the National Society for Non-Traditional Pre-Medical & Medical Students &lt;informally known as OldPreMeds&gt;. We are a new, but rapidly growing, non-profit organization who focuses our efforts on gathering and exchanging information that will benefit non-traditional students getting into & succeeding in medical school. We have members who are attendings, residents, med students & pre-meds at all stages who are willing to share their advice, experience and wisdom merely for the asking. We make no differentiation b/t those who are interested in either the allopathic or osteopathic educational paradigms -- we feel the we are all part of the same profession -- the healing arts. OPM does exclude anyone from joining based upon their age -- we welcome mature pre-meds & med students who wish to come & interact with our community.

OldPreMeds has recently launched a new web site. It is still a work in progress, but is coming along very nicely. SDN has graciously consented to be our web host & you can find links to our home page in various spots on SDN. Currently, our web developer is building our resources & links sections to be added to the web site very soon. In these areas you will find various study guides and articles offering guidance for both med students & pre-meds.

The web address is: <a href="http://www.studentdoctor.net/opm" target="_blank">www.studentdoctor.net/opm</a>

Our 2nd National Convention & Workshop will be held in Dallas, TX this year. The weekend of 30 May through 2 June OldPreMeds will gather to hear presentations and a workshop by several notable speakers that will focus on strategies for the non-traditional applicant. Among our presenters are Dr. John Pelley (TX Tech med school BioChem professor, past Dean of Admissions, author of "Success Types" & pre-med guru) and Jane Anderson (Dir of Admissions for TCOM).

Information on how to join OldPreMeds & attend the 2002 Convention & Workshop in Dallas are both accessible from the web site home page. Membership in OPM is free.

Please drop by & consider joining us. We'd be glad to have you!
 
I am 30. Biology undergrad, Epidemiology grad and worked in Public Health for 5 years now.
 
I am 30, just started back at college this January. (I left Ugrad halfway through the seventh semester while working on a chem degree. AARGH!!!) I am taking all the med pre-reqs again simply because they are too old, and I don't remember hardly a d@mn thing. <img border="0" alt="[Pity]" title="" src="graemlins/pity.gif" /> This time around I am majoring in bio. Much more interesting to me.

What are the best type of EC's for us older ppl to do?
 
I was a snowboard and ski instructor for the adaptive sports foundation...love it😉
 
Nontrad? I think I meet that criteria. I'm 35, with someone, and have one child (born very recently). I've been accepted to 3 schools so far. I wish those nontrads the best of luck for it can be done!
 
I'm 30yrs old, graduated with a BS in Bio, all the way back in 94! I'm currently getting a master's degree in pharmacology, expect to finish by next dec or in the following spring. Decided I want to be a doctor about 2yrs ago. Unfortunately for me, I am trying to make up for the sins of my youth (undergrad gpa was 2.8, yikes!). Thats what happens when you go to college with no real goals and a serious penchant for good times. But, the times have changed and so have I. I will be graduating from the master's program with no less than a 3.8 gpa and some solid research experience.

I will be taking the mcat this August, and basically, everything will be riding on it. I'm figuring that if I don't break 28, there is no point in even applying. If i can break 28, maybe, just maybe, the adcoms will see that i've got my **** together and at least want to meet with me for an interview. We will see...

Anybody else in a similar situation?

----------------------------------------
You may be done with the past, but, the past may not be done with you.
 
Hi everyone,
I consider myself to be a non-trad. student (I am 26, married, etc..if you want more details..just pm me). I applied to med school this year with a 27Q mcat (my gpa's were very good, especially my science). I was accepted to one school and I have two more interviews coming up and I am still waiting to hear from some other schools. It can be done 🙂 .
 
Art_V--(wasn't that George Costanza's favorite pseudonym? I miss that show)

In the same situation as you. I won't be taking the mcat til August 2003, but have begun studying already. I'll be applying to schools that are non-trad friendly and that review each app(rather than do a numbers screening first!)

Good Luck

**love your sig..so very apt. my past HAUNTS me!!
 
I guess I'm non-trad....I graduated in 1999 and am 25 years old....Took the mcat last April and will be re-taking it this April (2002). Hopefully this time around I will have more success with the poopy test.

The years in-between me finishing undergrad and now included me working as a fruit delivery truck driver for a summer and putting together produce orders for the rafting companies in Flagstaff that run the Colorado River....living in Tahoe and enjoying my valet/bell hop job at a resort right on the lake....learned sign language....became a better snowboarder...volunteer at one of the coolest hospitals, Shriners Childrens Hospital Of Northern California...and now I've worked in a processing lab at a blood bank/center for a year and a half.

I will be applying this June. ANd for the rest of you who are also applying...good luck and keep up the dialogue....!

😀
 
I am a nontraditional applicant. I am 26 years old. Did all the typical premed stuff in college such as 2.5 years of research in a molec/bio lab, and 1 year of reasearch in a clinical lab. Volunteered several hours at the hospital, got my EMT license.
After undergrad went to graduat school in Public Health and got my degree in epidemiology.
Worked a year in health policy, then another year in healthcare consulting on the provider side, and this year consulting on the insurance/employer side.
Hopefully this is the year I get in. Keeping my fingers crossed for myself and all of you other non traditional apps.
 
I graduated in 1998 with a bachelors in playing cards, partying and drinking from Columbia. I did teach for america after I graduated until 2000 and went back to school to do a postbac and now am currently working on a m.s. in bio. 4 acceptances (downstate, nyu, columbia & pitt) waiting to hear only from 2 more schools. Cornell, please accept me!! Anyway, I even surprised myself with how well I did in this application process and that med schools were willing to look at all of my recent achievements instead of my less than stellar u.grad performance.
 
Chill,

Have you already rsearched the schools which appreciate the talents of us non-traditional types? If so, Iwould be interested in finding out which schools you think are non-trad. friendly.

Good luck
 
Hey everyone. I'm a nontrad also. Decided I wanted to go into medicine few years ago while working with HIV patients. On Jan. 31 I found out I had made it to Texas Tech (go Dr. Pelley!!). Nontrads: you can definitely do it. Yeeeee-haw!
 
I'm a 31-year-old former history major-turned-musician-turned-post-bacc student about to enter medical school. I've been accepted to a few places, but I'm holding out for NYU, where I was wait-listed.

Am I alone in my perception that medical schools really like "old" people? That's the impression I got at most of my interviews.

Good luck to you old folks!
 
Hello all,

I'm a 32 year old applicant. Was pre-med at UCLA where I graduated in '92. After being a pilot in the navy for the last 10 years, it's nice getting back into the academic realm. I though the toughest part would be the MCAT, for which I studied for 15 months, but was sucessful beyond my expectations. The inexplicable length of the application process reminds me a lot of working for the government, and can be quite discouraging, but anyone thinking of applying, go for it. I don't think age has much of a disadvantage when applying less research oriented schools, but I think not having the time to spend volunteering in a lab may have hurt when applying to schools emphasizing research in their programs. If anyone has any specific questions, please PM me and I'd be happy to pass on any experience I've gained in the last couple of years.

Cheers, strider
 
Art_V

Off the top of my head I know Albany and MCPHU. I've really only looked at east coast schools. I know there's a few more that are more forgiving of past errors in judgment. Oh--and GWU, I believe.

Osteopathic schools seem to really like us older ppl, be sure to look into those too. PM me if you wish and I will let you know what others I have marked as possibilities. (just give me a few days please.)
 
PM'd you strider. 🙂
 
Hey folks, as I posted earlier, I too am a nontrad student. I'd just like to supplement chill's list of older friendly schools, with Pittsburgh, UVM, and Buffalo.

Additionally, I will offer this: no matter how many nor how often you hear that you can't do it, don't buy into it. I convinced myself that I could and somehow or another, I've worked to overcome my non-sci/non-gpa friendly past, and am heading to med school in the fall.

Best of luck to you all...
 
Sorry to be a pain in the @$$, but I felt that this merits repeating. All of you would be welcomed as members of OldPreMeds, although we are also accepting of mature traditional aged members as well. Please read the entry below and feel free to e-mail me, or reply here, if you have additional questions.

•••quote:•••I wish to make you aware of the existence of the National Society for Non-Traditional Pre-Medical & Medical Students &lt;informally known as OldPreMeds&gt;. We are a new, but rapidly growing, non-profit organization who focuses our efforts on gathering and exchanging information that will benefit non-traditional students getting into & succeeding in medical school. We have members who are attendings, residents, med students & pre-meds at all stages who are willing to share their advice, experience and wisdom merely for the asking. We make no differentiation b/t those who are interested in either the allopathic or osteopathic educational paradigms -- we feel the we are all part of the same profession -- the healing arts. OPM does exclude anyone from joining based upon their age -- we welcome mature pre-meds & med students who wish to come & interact with our community.

OldPreMeds has recently launched a new web site. It is still a work in progress, but is coming along very nicely. SDN has graciously consented to be our web host & you can find links to our home page in various spots on SDN. Currently, our web developer is building our resources & links sections to be added to the web site very soon. In these areas you will find various study guides and articles offering guidance for both med students & pre-meds.

The web address is: <a href="http://www.studentdoctor.net/opm" target="_blank">www.studentdoctor.net/opm</a>

Our 2nd National Convention & Workshop will be held in Dallas, TX this year. The weekend of 30 May through 2 June OldPreMeds will gather to hear presentations and a workshop by several notable speakers that will focus on strategies for the non-traditional applicant. Among our presenters are Dr. John Pelley (TX Tech med school BioChem professor, past Dean of Admissions, author of "Success Types" & pre-med guru) and Jane Anderson (Dir of Admissions for TCOM).

Information on how to join OldPreMeds & attend the 2002 Convention & Workshop in Dallas are both accessible from the web site home page. Membership in OPM is free.

Please drop by & consider joining us. We'd be glad to have you!••••
 
Hi 🙂 I'm a traditional applicant, but I just wanted to share that there were ar least 4 nontrads at my GWU interview last week, so as chill stated, that school is prolly nontrad friendly. I think there were 14 or 16 interviewees there total that day.
 
Ironically, at 3 out of 5 schools where I interviewed, I was the youngest applicant at 22! (I graduated in May 2001 and am taking a year off because I'm trying to enter medical school near my boyfriend of 3 years.) Anyway, the 3 schools were:

1. Einstein (There were 6 people there my day. Most were over 25 and had either done a post-bac and were working or were finishing up their post-bac.)
2. MCP (The average age of the matriculated student at this school is 25.5. You do the math! I was the youngest and the Dean actually pointed that out.)
3. GW (I wasn't the youngest here, but my student interviewer was mid 40s. She had two teenage children and only applied to GW and Georgetown because her husband was a lobbyist. She told me her class was predominantly older and married.)

Good luck!
 
Hi all! I am a 29 year old mother of two, Air National Guard medic, and aspiring to be a doc. I currently I am a junior and will be taking the mcat next year. I just found this site last month and I just want to say how uplifting it has been to hear all your stories. I am more hopeful than ever that I to can make it.
 
Dr. Kermit,

•••quote:•••I wasn't the youngest here, but my student interviewer was mid 40s. She had two teenage children and only applied to GW and Georgetown because her husband was a lobbyist. She told me her class was predominantly older and married.••••I do believe I know who your med student interviewer was...she's a friend of mine and a member of OldPreMeds. She is quite the dynamo!
 
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