Program Directors' Comments

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I've been stomping along the interview trail for the past few weeks and becoming increasingly intrigued by the kind of language that people use to show or gauge interest in their programs. I've heard to not trust anything out of a program director's mouth, but it would be great to hear some personal anecdotes of the kinds of things people heard (or didn't hear) from the program directors or administration before they matched at their respective programs. Obviously this is person or situation specific, but I'm interested in hearing about the extent of the pre-rank chatter that goes on.

Thanks!

We dont contact anyone after the interviews. The about a week or so before rank lists were due I get an email and a phone call from the same PD.
 
I had an interview where the program director didn't show up.
The residency coordinator gave the initial talk. I interviewed with an intern, a third year resident, and a faculty member that had only been there for two months. I asked where the PD was and was told by the resident "He doesn't come to a lot of these."

This was a an established program, midway through interview season...this place did not get ranked.
 
wanted to bump this thread.. was about to post something similar..

It might bring me some peace of mind to hear from people who matched. Specifically, what post-interview communication, if any, did you have with your program? How common is it to not communicate with your program between your interview and match day?

From the program director's point of view, do applicant's post-interview thank you letters, emails, questions, etc make a difference in their rank?
 
wanted to bump this thread.. was about to post something similar..

It might bring me some peace of mind to hear from people who matched. Specifically, what post-interview communication, if any, did you have with your program? How common is it to not communicate with your program between your interview and match day?

From the program director's point of view, do applicant's post-interview thank you letters, emails, questions, etc make a difference in their rank?

The problem is that unless you get applicants of varying competitiveness from every program to post then it's not going to get you an accurate picture of how often post-interview communication happens.

My program said they didn't contact anyone pre-match, but I did get a call from the PD (who's not there anymore) just before the rank list was due. If a PD says they do call and you're not contacted, there's no way you're ranking them highly. The PD probably doesn't have time to call everyone they think may rank. So the smart play for them is to say they don't call, call their top 5-10-20 and not have queered the deal for those that didn't know that their fellow applicants had been called.
 
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