OHSU=Frustration Station!

Started by karma4me
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I think someone needs to volunteer to call Admissions and see how many acceptances they've sent out so far. Those of us on hold are banking on keeping the pre-May numbers low....

I'll call myself, but I sprained my fingers typing this post; also I think I've overused my quota of polite phone calls to their office.
 
I'd volunteer, but I still haven't interviewed yet. I'm afraid I might be a little rusty since I haven't interviewed anywhere snice January. I'm still hoping for that pre-hold acceptance. When I'm there in a week or two I'll ask how many accpetances they've given out so far. I'll let you know then.
 
I called the admissions office today since I hadn't heard anything since my interview on 2/28. Apparently I'd been up in front of the committee, but Jennifer checked with the Admissions Director and no decision had been made on my application yet. How weird is that? I thought it was a simple give-you-a-number-and-cut-you-off sort of deal.

I'm being optimistic and hoping it's a borderline accept/waitlist decision as opposed to a borderline waitlist/reject decision. 😉

Anyway, they said they'll mail a letter on Friday or Monday...so just as an example to anyone else waiting, it could take up to six weeks....
 
Originally posted by xaelia
I called the admissions office today since I hadn't heard anything since my interview on 2/28. Apparently I'd been up in front of the committee, but Jennifer checked with the Admissions Director and no decision had been made on my application yet. How weird is that? I thought it was a simple give-you-a-number-and-cut-you-off sort of deal.
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I've heard Cindy Morris (director for admissions) is pretty weird. On the other hand, ohsu keeps going up in the us news rankings (almost into the top 30's now!!), and reclaimed its #2 spot for primary care..
 
Yeah, when I called last Thursday (after a 2/25 interview) Jennifer had already gone home. Another woman in the admissions office said that my file had been reviewed by the committee the previous week, and that a decision letter should be sent out "yesterday, today, tomorrow, or possibly Monday." OK....... could you be any more vague?

Xaelia, that's definitely wierd about your non-decision. I have no idea what that means, especially since OHSU is a by-the-numbers kind of school. It must mean that they're adjusting the "threshold" for acceptance and trying to figure out where you fall within that adjustment?

Keep the faith, people!
 
I was accepted at OHSU a month ago and I was told by a source close to the admin that they are doing a rolling system of admissions where they have basically gone through and accepted the highest 10% from their scoring system and everyone else was put in the "holding pool". Every 2 weeks or so they meet up and pull more people out of the pool by lowering the score a point or two. This is sort of what they described in the interview but I think they are just moving slower than anticipated. Good luck though and I hope this helps a tiny bit just to know what's going on. 🙂 🙂
 
Crap! I just found out yesterday that I'm in the hold pool. 🙁 I know that they're only accepting a small percentage of those at the top of their interview pool, but I was definitely still hoping.... oh well. Now I just have to wait until may 15 to see if I even make it onto their alternate list.....

Hey ORswan, congrats on the acceptance. You're actually one of the few people that I've heard of who have been accepted. Is OHSU your first choice? Would you mind sharing a few of your particulars (gpa, mcat, extracurriculars, etc...)?
 
So how many Accepts do they give out at those meetings every couple of weeks? And do they make a final decision on hold applicants on May 15? That's pretty late, but I get the impression that OHSU is REALLY taking their time.
 
i know may 15th is the deadline for people holding multiple acceptances to withdraw from all but their top choice... is there anyone out there already holding one or more acceptances that are going to require a deposit by or before may 15th?

for example... i applied simultaneously to a few graduate programs in case med school didn't happen. since i'm desperately waiting to hear from OHSU (obviously my first choice), I had to send in a non-refundable $500 deposit to hold my spot in one of those programs. it was due april 15th... i thought for sure i'd have some kind of feedback from OHSU with which to guage whether that $500 was a good investment.

naturally it's water under the bridge when/if I get in to OHSU, but right now it stings a little.
 
That happened to me as well. I withdrew from all but one of the schools that I was accepted too, and then had to pay a $500 tuition deposit. I am also still on the OHSU waitlist and I interviewed on November 15. Living in Oregon, I have many friends who also applied to OHSU and they are all having a similar experience to my own. OHSU is known among many people in the state (physicians, applicants, and students alike) as having an odd admissions process compared to other schools. In fact, I have had such a pleasant experience with the other school that I am holding a spot at, even if OHSU accepts me, I still may not attend...even though it was my first choice going into this whole process.
 
Originally posted by karma4me


Hey ORswan, congrats on the acceptance. You're actually one of the few people that I've heard of who have been accepted. Is OHSU your first choice? Would you mind sharing a few of your particulars (gpa, mcat, extracurriculars, etc...)?
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Hey karma4me,
OHSU is actually my first choice. Here are some of my particulars:
gpa: 3.97
mcat: 31
extras: lots of shadowing time in clinics. Different types of clinics also. I was able to get lots of hands-on experience in the medical field but I've also had a job since I was 14. I did some unique volunteering opportunities also that many of the interviewer's were interested in because they weren't what everyone else was doing. Thanks for the congrats! Hang in there, I personally don't know anyone else that has been accepted there, most are in the "holding pool" as far as I know. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them! I feel like my strongpoints were my letters of reference, my personal statement (interviewer's loved it for some reason) and my actual interviews. Nothing was unique about the classes I took and obviously my scores weren't fantastic.
 
It?s hard to believe someone with a 3.9 is really dumb enough to say there stats are unimpressive. Next time ditch the charade. 😉
 
they're crappy, I tell you. crappy crappy crappy. I have heard of exactly two people who have gotten in so far this year. TWO! and I live in oregon. One of them was from wisconsin, I think.

They have just been so lame in this process. I'm leaving my application in until they finalize the waitlist just to see if they would have actually accepted my ass. Good lord.

Yucky, xaelia. One more waitlist. Sorry about that. Everyone I know who has outstanding numbers and great experiences continues to be put on hold. I nominate oregon as the most frustrating acceptance procedure school.

blah.😡
 
Ugh is right....Jennifer told me that my application would finally get to the committee TODAY to be reviewed...so I am currently having some trouble typing while keeping my fingers crossed at all times 😉 Seriously though - seeing as I also live in Oregon and have heard of only ONE acceptance (to an out of state person at that!) I am fairly sure I too will be on the waitlist. Does anybody have any solid idea of how much the waitlist will move? I have heard as high as 80, as low as 30....I'm just wondering so that I know my chances once May 15th rolls around. All I can say is that I really hope this school is worth the wait.
 
I have a feeling that waitlist info from previous years will be less like this year. Only because they've started to take more and more students from out of state with higher GPAs. Personally, I feel like that would result in more movement on the waitlist as more competitive candidates from out of state take other offers from better schools. Just a guess.

Other reasons OHSU kind of sucks: they're a state school which is slowly becoming unfriendly to state residents, and their tuition is really high for a non-private institution. They're admission process bites and their interview day was pretty lame. And all of these great candidates are being put on indefinite hold while they try to make plans to go out of state in case oregon doesn't come through. Ack, I say. Ack.

J244 good luck. I hope you are among the few, the proud.
 
I don't think OHSU is especially bad when compared with other public schools' admissions processes. At least it's no worse than U of California schools, believe me. Other than admissions, and from what I've heard financial aid, OHSU seems like a fabulous school and possibly my number one choice if I get in (I too am on hold). However, the cost would make me hesitate, depending on financial aid comparisons.
 
I think that we should plan a date/time/moment for a collective scream. You know, something like at 11:11pm on Friday night, all of those qualified applicants who were put on hold by OHSU can race outside, scream their guts out, and vent. Maybe not.

Anyways, regarding waitlist movement, I think that Manic is dead right. OHSU sets their initial standards really high, and accepts so many out of staters, that I am thinking there will be a lot of movement this year. Check out these 2001 applied/interviewed/accepted/enrolled numbers:

Oregon Health Science University Admissions

Total: 2,502 331 180 101 In state: 276 140 82 68
Out of state: 2,226 191 98 33 Women: 1,180 178 115 60
Minorities: 485 61 33 18 International: 0 0 0 0
Acceptance rate: 7.2%

They gave out 98 acceptances to out of staters, and only 82 to instaters!!!! And, only 33 out of staters matriculated, compared to the 68 OR residents!!! When are they going to learn!!!

I guess that the best way to sum up waitlist movement is that it totally depends on how many people they "overaccept." Last year, they overaccepted by 30 people (130 initial acceptances.) Consequently, they only went down the waitlist to about 50. However, in previous years when they only accepted 100 people initially, they have gone down the waitlist as far as 80 (pretty rare). 😕

I'm crossing my fingers for all of you (and for me too!)
 
I share all of your pains, just found out that I am in the "hold" catagory as well. Good Luck everyone!
 
For those of you who just ended up on the hold list, when did they say you might find out something?
 
Mid may at the latest, they say. From looking at threads from previous years it sounds like in may they send out a bunch of rejections, acceptances and then they rank the waitlist.

rad.
 
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