Official 2015-2016: LizzyM <70 thread
Started by kilez12
Get help with your application
Use all the free resources available to you from SDN: articles, guides, expert advising, forums discussions, and school research.
I wonder if the MD physicians 20 years from now who are from significantly easier admission states will remember the leeway they had when they are looking down on the DO physicians who came from California.
Yeah if I were to rank the luckiest states these all would be the top tier
Texas
Alabama
Kentucky
South Carolina
West Virginia
Arkansas
Mississippi
North Dakota
South Dakota
Also relevant that I pay close attention to is the % of IS applicants that get a II at these schools.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
There was actually some old physician on here ranting a couple weeks ago how "admission isn't any harder now because there all these new schools coming up" completely ignoring the fact that only 5 MD schools have come out the past 35 years. When someone actually told him that he just went to the default "we'll agree to disagree" and that's else.
Yea, I remember that thread and participated in it lol.
Yea no, its gotten way harder. People forget that its not just about stats. Everything has gotten insanely competetive about the whole application that is required. Way more people are applying as well.
Not only do you have to have the cookie cutter hundreds of hours of volunteering, shadowing , research, etc, you also need to stand out and have meaningful experiences that you can actually talk about in an interview.
On top of that my state MD school mcat average was a 28 10 years ago lmao. Now its a 31. I will say that the GPA of the 3.69 has remained the same for decades.
Edit: med school admissions really really care about your MCAT though.
Last edited:
Only 5 MD schools? Do you know which ones? Texas alone has 4 new MD schools....UT Austin Dell, UTRGV, Paul L Foster, and TCU/UNT have joined together and released plans for a new MD school opening in 2018.
I meant 5 schools that don't have significant IS biases and are available for the majority of people not a select 2-3%. Should have clarified that. Anyway here are the list of schools, you can see for yourself how few over that time are available for all applicants.
2001 :FSU
2008: Cleveland Clinic
2009: FIU
2009: FCU
2011: FAU
2011: Hofstra
2012: Cooper Rowan
2013: TCMC
2013: Quinnipac
2013 :Texas Tech
2014: Western Michigan
2014: Va Tech
2015: Oakland
2017: Central Michigan
2017; UC riverside
I wouldn't really consider Cleveland Clinic since they have such astronomical admission criteria. I actually got to chat with their dean who casually told me most successful applicants have a 3.9/37 along with several first author pubs and serious amounts of service. He found a very nice way to say "you are massively unqualified for our school"
Isnt it some kind of extension of Case Western. I admittedly know next to nothing about it
No, you graduate from the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine.
It's just so small that it's not listed on USNews and doesn't have enough infrastructure to be completely independent of CWRU.
CCLCM>>>CWRU
It's not like people in this thread are exactly hurting for MD love (see this entire thread). Gandy, you'll definitely get some MD shots, w/ a 67(?) LizzyM--no need to stress out.
Only on SDN do you see applicants w/ almost a 70 LizzyM worrying that they're in deep ****.
Haha, yea. its a 67.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
Idk man, California's a bitch
Just for an excuse to hang out with y'all:
LizzyM: 68-69 (balanced)
Complete at 25 schools (waiting for 10 more, thank you FAP)
3 IIs: UCD, Oakland, Quinnipiac, Upstate
Rejections: Georgetown, and UCLA and UCR won't give me secondaries so far.
New York resident
Thinking of applying DO but not sure it's necessary. I have a letter and everything's in--plus I have a fondness for OMM--but those secondaries are pricey. Any opinions?
Edited to add updates from three hours later. How are we doing this?
LizzyM: 68-69 (balanced)
Complete at 25 schools (waiting for 10 more, thank you FAP)
3 IIs: UCD, Oakland, Quinnipiac, Upstate
Rejections: Georgetown, and UCLA and UCR won't give me secondaries so far.
New York resident
Thinking of applying DO but not sure it's necessary. I have a letter and everything's in--plus I have a fondness for OMM--but those secondaries are pricey. Any opinions?
Edited to add updates from three hours later. How are we doing this?
Last edited:
I applied to 2 DO schools...but my desire to stay in CA was the reason why I applied. I applied to ~30 schools in total. We have about the same LizzyM, so I'd say just apply to the DO schools that you'd seriously consider over an MD. The 2 DOs that I picked, I really could see myself choosing these schools over an MD in a less desirable location. So..there's that. I didn't bother applying to the DOs that I would never choose over any MD school.
Isn't Gandy from a midwest state?
CA applicants w/ a 70 can be quite competitive at OOS private schools, no?
Lol don't you have a 37 man
Yea, I'm from the Midwest.
Yea Zed has a 47.
I was speaking generally. The problem with LizzyM scores is that they really only have predictive power when balanced.
Yea, and a low GPA. I wasn't really talking about myself anyway.
All this time I assumed you were from California! You def dont need to worry
That's what TBR promised me... I want a refund!
lol. Honestly some of those passages in the biology TBR were of an extraordinary power level.
"How many replication forks are there in this DNA molecule in the protein when it is undergoing a serine phosphorylation change at serine 307, while a chymotrypsin protein is using histidine to activate Serine 309?"
"Based on the number of replication forks, what is the quantum power of the Sun?"
..........
Yeah it's a given that all states are not created equal. But CA definitely is not the only one to suffer; IIRC my state, Maryland, sports a lower IS matriculation rate than CA, and we only have 1 IS med school that averages a 3.8 GPA and almost 33 MCAT.
Literally no one (I had a friend last cycle with stats similar to my own--higher GPA, lower MCAT--get waitlisted after II) is a lock to get in there.
Literally no one (I had a friend last cycle with stats similar to my own--higher GPA, lower MCAT--get waitlisted after II) is a lock to get in there.
I bailed on the SMP btw, couldn't justify it. Your anti-SMP rhetoric got to me lol
Congrats on your interviews!!!! Can you talk more about your ECs?
Why were you considering an SMP w/ a 37?? Do you have like a 2.5 or something? 😛
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
You're welcome lol unless your talking sub 3.2 GPA territory it really isn't the way to go with a 37.
I think even with a 3.2, and a 37, it would be tough right?
You'd be surprised what kind of MCAT scores you'll see in some of the more well-known SMPs haha. I don't really want to reveal my GPA to protect what little is left of my anonymity. Suffice it to say that it's low enough that MD is by no means a guarantee.
I just interviewed at AZCOM and many many people told me the same thing there. I hear its hard as hell to get into the state MD schools there not because of stats.... but because they have so few spots for people. Their stats are pretty average... like a 31 and 3.8 for both Arizona MD schools.
Thanks! They're a bit unusual. I spent about >500 hours building and running a service organization. Built a brick and mortar business while in school--thousands of hours. >200 hours of underserved clinic volunteering. >600 hours research (no pubs.) Tutoring. Hospice. Some funky hobbies. My anonymity is going down the toilet here. Sigh.
I'm a nontrad and also kind of a quirky love-or-hate (I've been told) applicant, so idk what's going on..!
Man, maybe I should build a brick and mortar business. Just kidding I dont know the first thing about running a business. What kind of support group are we talking here?
A quirky one likely to annoy some people. I got a psychiatrist to advise us tho, so that might help?
Edit: like, imagine it was a support group for people who had been kidnapped and kept in basements by Republicans. For unknown Republican reasons that wouldn't make sense to your average Republican. And the name of the group was The Republican Kidnap Survivors Group. And it turned out there were over 100 people in one city who had had that experience. And you are an adcom who is Republican.
Last edited:
Wowzers, sounds intense.
Love or hate...! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Depends on who you ask.
My school would tell you that you're a lock for MD if you apply broadly; our 3.25+ cGPA acceptance rate (so w/o consideration of that kick-ass MCAT) is 80%+. Obviously this includes URM, LGBTQ, special ECs etc, but I think a 3.2/37 from known rigorous programs is competitive; not a lock, but competitive.
If you look at AAMC Table 25, you will see that well more than half of Caucasian applicants with 3.2-3.39/36-38 got in. This is irregardless of UG institution, so this seems to support what I'm hearing.
wut
Exactly.
(Uh that wasn't what the group was for. But similar reactions likely!)
I lulzed. @pageantry, you're awesome.
Unfortunately only about 1/2 of my school's applicants get in somewhere, and it's a fairly prestigious school. Many also consider it a "grade-deflating" school, if that matters.
I think we addressed this on another thread, you're at one of the top UCs?
Your numbers will invariably suffer because of the quantity of apps; I'd wager that if you read all of your schools applicants, you'd laugh and throw out at least 1/3 for being absurdly noncompetitive.
Not sure how you're doing this cycle but I'd be quite surprised if no MD schools take up a 37.
Advertisement - Members don't see this ad
I'd love to be an optimist! I'm sitting this cycle out.
Mutual fanclub! [emoji172]
lyke omg!
Mutually awkward fanclub!
That's part of the reason why I always hesitate with SMP recommendations there are a ALOT of really smart people in them. The type of people I usually say are reasonable candidates for SMPs are a) those with strong upward trends but who's GPA is still just too far below the radar to keep doing post-bacc work b) those with strong MCATs but who go to grade deflating schools. You fall in the latter but I think you'll do just fine without an SMP. Being on SDN and having any semblance of knowledge about the process and where to apply is such an advantage to you over so many apps.
Similar threads
