Official 2008 Secondary Discussion Thread part 2

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Thanks Sandlot!! 🙂 I'm still excited that I got it. 🙂
 
That is a nice retort to Pritzker. I'm pretty sure I'll have the chance to write one of those letters myself in a couple of weeks...
 
hey, since the "what are my chances" thread was closed, i was wondering w/ a 3.81 cumulative, 3.76 science, and 32Q, what are the odds for uic & rush, especially if my secondary essays are not so spectacular? I just want an honest outside opinion, thanks guys!
 
starter1259 said:
hey, since the "what are my chances" thread was closed, i was wondering w/ a 3.81 cumulative, 3.76 science, and 32Q, what are the odds for uic & rush, especially if my secondary essays are not so spectacular? I just want an honest outside opinion, thanks guys!
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why was that thread closed?
 
In Harvard's secondary they ask:

"How many hours per week did you devote to employment during the academic year?"

Does this only include paid employment? or could it also include other employment done not for pay but e.g. for credit?
 
Why won't UCSF send out their secondaries? That is the only one I haven't gotten and it's my top choice. Does anyone know when they usually send them out?
 
peechykeen513 said:
Why won't UCSF send out their secondaries? That is the only one I haven't gotten and it's my top choice. Does anyone know when they usually send them out?
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It's screened and they send it to you if they feel you're worthy.
 
So far, all I can recall is that UCSF has only sent out one batch of secondary requests. Have there been any more because I haven't heard of any lately?
 
I've looked around, but haven't noticed anything....anyone know about UMinn Twin Cities? I know that they are usually pretty late to the show, but has anyone gotten anything?
 
div0t17 said:
I've looked around, but haven't noticed anything....anyone know about UMinn Twin Cities? I know that they are usually pretty late to the show, but has anyone gotten anything?
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Haven't heard a thing. I'm debating whether to turn in their secondary even if I do get it now.
 
Just be happy you didn't get the outright rejection like the rest of us.

Looks like Pritzker was nice enough to put the reject notice right on the status page now.
 
So I'm working on the Pittsburgh moral/ethical dilemma question, and it says specifically not to address cheating in an academic situation.

I was a TA in orgo lab last semester and one of my students was on academic probation. She realized she needed an A- in my class in order to continue attending school in the fall, and had let me know that. I knew she was pretty borderline - the class is graded on a straight point scale, and to get an A- she needed 18 out of 20 points on the last assignment. I could've easily helped her out and just given her the 20 points and got her the A-, but I told her that I would grade normally, and if she ended up under 18 points, she'd probably be very close, and I'd talk to the professor about seeing whether he'd bump her up. It turned out she got 19/20 on the last assignment so everything worked out okay.

Do you guys think this would fall under cheating in an academic situation? I figured they probably meant like letting someone copy your work or knowing someone had the answers to a test and what to do about it... but this is sort of an academic situation... what do y'all think?
 
purreleven said:
So I'm working on the Pittsburgh moral/ethical dilemma question, and it says specifically not to address cheating in an academic situation.

I was a TA in orgo lab last semester and one of my students was on academic probation. She realized she needed an A- in my class in order to continue attending school in the fall, and had let me know that. I knew she was pretty borderline - the class is graded on a straight point scale, and to get an A- she needed 18 out of 20 points on the last assignment. I could've easily helped her out and just given her the 20 points and got her the A-, but I told her that I would grade normally, and if she ended up under 18 points, she'd probably be very close, and I'd talk to the professor about seeing whether he'd bump her up. It turned out she got 19/20 on the last assignment so everything worked out okay.

Do you guys think this would fall under cheating in an academic situation? I figured they probably meant like letting someone copy your work or knowing someone had the answers to a test and what to do about it... but this is sort of an academic situation... what do y'all think?
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hmm...i would say yes it applies to cheating in an academic situation. because the student was basically asking for you to cheat for her. For some reason, I felt like this question was more about ethics/morals related to medicine...like i thought it was sort of "what did you learn from your clinical experience" type thing. i could be completely wrong though.
 
Does anyone else have a problem with receiving more than 1 secondary invite from schools? I've received doubles from like 5 schools so far!😕
 
Since it ended up working out okay in the end, you didn't actually have a moral dilema. And your dilema doesn't have to be related to medicine. Most undergraduates haven't had enough clinical experience to actually have a medical moral dilema.

I go to Pitt undergrad and I know quite a few people that got in there and none of them wrote about medicine for their ethical dilema last year. My one friend that got in wrote about someone offering to pay her under the table for MCAT tutoring because she worked for Kaplan. If her supervisor found out she would have lost her job. That was her ethical dilema.

Hope that helps a bit.
 
jochi1543 said:
Does anyone else have a problem with receiving more than 1 secondary invite from schools? I've received doubles from like 5 schools so far!😕
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Sounds like something fishy is going on. Maybe AMCAS sent your information to them twice? Regardless, doesn't sound like it will hurt you. But you might want to follow up with each of the schools just in case there is a mix up later on (i.e., like if they give you two separate login and passwords and you only submit your secondary under one of them and it causes confusion).
 
For one of Cornell's secondary questions, they ask you to explain what you are doing if you will not be in college for the 2007-08 year. If I will be attending graduate school during that time, do I still need to answer the question?
 
SnoPearl said:
For one of Cornell's secondary questions, they ask you to explain what you are doing if you will not be in college for the 2007-08 year. If I will be attending graduate school during that time, do I still need to answer the question?
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You might not have to, but it probably wouldn't hurt to mention it. Especially if you want to mention other ECs that you're continuing with or just starting up as well.
 
hi, i was wondering if someone could help me out w/ any of the following questions. Im hitting my head against a brick wall.....
1. (hopkins) - briefly describe your most rewarding experience or some achievement of which you are proud -
is this supposed to be in the academic setting? or is it some sort of exposure to medicine as a premed that i found most rewarding?? any guidance here would be very helpful
2. (hopkins) briefly describe a situation where you had to overcome adversity
ok so basically, this was my ENTIRE PS, wherein i explained how this "adverse situation" was what propelled me to puruse a career in medicine. I think its a bad idea to re-use, correct?? Quite frankly, I DONT (thank G-d) have any other "adverse" experiences...I guess I can make something up? I dont know.
3. (stony brook) describe an obstacle youve overcome and how it has defined you
- see #2. my obstacle is basically my entire PS, and IT HAS DEFINED ME!! thats why I wanna go to med school? how do i put that differently?
4. (U-MD) briefly describe your most important exposure to clinical medicine?
WTF? Im not a dr yet??? What am i supposed to talk abt? volunteering in a nursing home? Shadowing a dr all summer?
5. (U-MD) Please describe your long term career goals.
I dont know abt e/o else - but I am honestly not sure what type of medicine i want to be practicing and im trying to keep an open mind. I mean, there are certain things Im just NOT interested in doing for numerous reasons (peeds, OB/gyn, psych), but im not EXACTLY sure. I have alot of research in one specific area (renal diseases and hypertension) but i dont NECESSARILY want to become a nephrologist although its something im sure ill consider. HELP!!
6. (MSSM) What makes you special, someone who will add to the mount sinai community?
are they looking for character traits? I have a great sense of humor. but does that make me special? Im pretty smart, but i dont think thats unique among med students...uh im really having a hard time with this one. Ive written two drafts and torn both of them up.
Any input at all would be greatly appreciated.
 
shevie said:
1. (hopkins) - briefly describe your most rewarding experience or some achievement of which you are proud -
is this supposed to be in the academic setting? or is it some sort of exposure to medicine as a premed that i found most rewarding?? any guidance here would be very helpful
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In my opinion, it could be any kind of accomplishment or experience. Maybe you won a major ice skating competition? Or perhaps you organized a field trip for disadvantaged kids? Or, on the academic side, maybe you got a first-author paper published?
4. (U-MD) briefly describe your most important exposure to clinical medicine?
WTF? Im not a dr yet??? What am i supposed to talk abt? volunteering in a nursing home? Shadowing a dr all summer?
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Well, you should have gotten some sort of clinical exposure - otherwise, how will med schools know that you know what you're getting into? So yes, maybe you learned something by shadowing a surgeon, or by working at a free clinic. Describe the experience and what you learned from it. For example, when I shadowed a surgeon, I realized that surgeons deal with problems through surgery as well as work closely with patients - they're not just surgical machines.
 
Is it generally acceptable to use scientific terms in the secondary? I would like to say "fMRI" in an essay without having to say "functional magnetic resonance imaging, which is an imaging technique that shows..."
 
silverlining1 said:
Is it generally acceptable to use scientific terms in the secondary? I would like to say "fMRI" in an essay without having to say "functional magnetic resonance imaging, which is an imaging technique that shows..."
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I used a couple of the more common ones in my PS. I think fMRI is ok, esp for med sch essay.
 
Loyola is the last place I've applied to, but I haven't heard anything from them. Any idea how long it takes to hear back? ( I submitted that round of Primaries around the end of July)
Thanks
 
Do you guys think it would be alright if I personally dropped my UCSD secondary off at the admissions office? I'm pretty close by and I think it'd be kind of silly to send it off in the mail and hope that it gets there the next day. Plus it'll save me the 41 cents 😀. I just don't want to be annoying any of the admissions staff or anything like that.
 
Bluesmurf314 said:
Loyola is the last place I've applied to, but I haven't heard anything from them. Any idea how long it takes to hear back? ( I submitted that round of Primaries around the end of July)
Thanks
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They screen pre-secondary. My AMCAS was verified on 7/6 and I received Loyola's secondary on 7/13, but things are probably lagging a little by this point. If you feel your stats shouldn't be a problem, then give them a call today (Thursday is their designated application inquiry day). They have a very friendly admissions staff.
 
Surf Rx said:
Do you guys think it would be alright if I personally dropped my UCSD secondary off at the admissions office? I'm pretty close by and I think it'd be kind of silly to send it off in the mail and hope that it gets there the next day. Plus it'll save me the 41 cents 😀. I just don't want to be annoying any of the admissions staff or anything like that.
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I did. I thought it'd be nice to do it in person. "Hi. I'm AMPed. I was wondering if I could just drop off my secondary. Thanks a lot."
 
zipmedic said:
They screen pre-secondary. My AMCAS was verified on 7/6 and I received Loyola's secondary on 7/13, but things are probably lagging a little by this point. If you feel your stats shouldn't be a problem, then give them a call today (Thursday is their designated application inquiry day). They have a very friendly admissions staff.
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FWIW, I just called Loyola and they said that they were waiting on the hard copy of my information from AMCAS. I was verified on the 8th of this month, and the fellow who answered the phone at Loyola said that it was taking about two weeks for them to get their hard copy information from AMCAS. Anyone else hear anything like this?
 
couple quick questions regarding the Tulane secondary:

1. It says Letters will be sent through: check VirtualEvals or Interfolio.

I have no idea what those are, but we have one of those composite services where we send all letters, and then they mail it all out for us. Can someone tell me which one i should be checking? Thanks.

2. It says, please List hobbies.

Am I to just list these hobbies with no description? not even a sentence about each one? thanks. I only ask because it is bold and underlined.
 
thedude007007 said:
couple quick questions regarding the Tulane secondary:

1. It says Letters will be sent through: check VirtualEvals or Interfolio.

I have no idea what those are, but we have one of those composite services where we send all letters, and then they mail it all out for us. Can someone tell me which one i should be checking? Thanks.

2. It says, please List hobbies.

Am I to just list these hobbies with no description? not even a sentence about each one? thanks. I only ask because it is bold and underlined.
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1. not sure on this

2. Do the directions say to write a description? No. Just list them. I think they'll understand if you just say rowing, running, stamp collecting, or whatever it is.
 
Jolie South said:
1. not sure on this

2. Do the directions say to write a description? No. Just list them. I think they'll understand if you just say rowing, running, stamp collecting, or whatever it is.
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wow...you actually got 2 of my 3 hobbies right.
 
To those who are complete at Harvard--did you get an email stating this?
 
just got it this afternoon
 
chudog15 said:
just got it this afternoon
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What were your stats? Someone in another thread said it's a 3.6 BCPM/34 MCAT cut-off for OOS, wanted to see if this were the case for you.



I got Vermont's today, is it a tough screener or no?.....and a THIRD invite from Georgetown and second from Creighton...:laugh: I don't know why I keep getting multiples! I thought maybe it was because I hadn't submitted the secondaries yet, but the previous one I got from Creighton was just this Monday!
 
jochi1543 said:
What were your stats? Someone in another thread said it's a 3.6 BCPM/34 MCAT cut-off for OOS, wanted to see if this were the case for you.



I got Vermont's today, is it a tough screener or no?.....and a THIRD invite from Georgetown and second from Creighton...:laugh: I don't know why I keep getting multiples! I thought maybe it was because I hadn't submitted the secondaries yet, but the previous one I got from Creighton was just this Monday!
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UVM doesn't screen (as far as I know).
 
mvenus929 said:
I just got UNC when I checked my mail too. I have a 4.0 and a 36. I'm not sure if I'm going to fill out the application or not, though.
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No prob, just forward it to me.👍



:meanie:
 
has anybody heard from emory since the email they sent in july?
 
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