question about interviews

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kojima

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I will get my MCAT score in couple days. I wonder if I apply medical schools in this week, will I get interviews immediately? Or medical schools will start interviewing until octobor?

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I will get my MCAT score in couple days. I wonder if I apply medical schools in this week, will I get interviews immediately? Or medical schools will start interviewing until octobor?

If you don't have your primary submitted already then it will take over a month before it gets verified. Once it is you can submit your secondaries. If it's already verified then you can start submitting secondaries whenever. They won't be considered complete until your MCAT score is in though. Schools have been getting back secondaries since the beginning of July so I'd say you are in for a wait either way.
 
I would wager that most medical schools have several hundred, if not several thousand, applications complete and ready to read today. Some have already issued some interview invitations and a few have already started interviewing.

After your AMCAS is verified and sent, along with MCAT scores, to the schools, they will send you instructions on submitting secondaries. Each secondary will take some time (a few hours or perhaps more than a few hours) to complete. After your application is complete (AMCAS application, seconary, and LORs) it goes in the queue for review. Schools start reading in August (perhaps some begin in July). At my school, we will read until mid-December. I think that the order in which applications are read is a combination of numbers (gpa and MCAT) and date received (a late application with a 3.8/38 may be bumped ahead of a 3.4/30). It is likely that if you submit now that your application will be reviewed in October/November and your interview invites will be for early 2012.
 
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I would wager that most medical schools have several hundred, if not several thousand, applications complete and ready to read today. Some have already issued some interview invitations and a few have already started interviewing.

After your AMCAS is verified and sent, along with MCAT scores, to the schools, they will send you instructions on submitting secondaries. Each secondary will take some time (a few hours or perhaps more than a few hours) to complete. After your application is complete (AMCAS application, seconary, and LORs) it goes in the queue for review. Schools start reading in August (perhaps some begin in July). At my school, we will read until mid-December. I think that the order in which applications are read is a combination of numbers (gpa and MCAT) and date received (a late application with a 3.8/38 may be bumped ahead of a 3.4/30). It is likely that if you submit now that your application will be reviewed in October/November and your interview invites will be for early 2012.


Are the early interviews (given out now) mainly to superstars or people with whom the school is interested in?
 
I would wager that most medical schools have several hundred, if not several thousand, applications complete and ready to read today. Some have already issued some interview invitations and a few have already started interviewing.

After your AMCAS is verified and sent, along with MCAT scores, to the schools, they will send you instructions on submitting secondaries. Each secondary will take some time (a few hours or perhaps more than a few hours) to complete. After your application is complete (AMCAS application, seconary, and LORs) it goes in the queue for review. Schools start reading in August (perhaps some begin in July). At my school, we will read until mid-December. I think that the order in which applications are read is a combination of numbers (gpa and MCAT) and date received (a late application with a 3.8/38 may be bumped ahead of a 3.4/30). It is likely that if you submit now that your application will be reviewed in October/November and your interview invites will be for early 2012.

It upsets me that I have everything lined up, ready, and submitted, but my premed office doesn't guarantee letter submission until September 19th. such a disservice.
 
It upsets me that I have everything lined up, ready, and submitted, but my premed office doesn't guarantee letter submission until September 19th. such a disservice.

My school, which had all my letters from last year, just had to write a new committee letter with some updates and new information, took longer to send my letters in than the AMCAS to verify my application. We always hire the worst non-faculty pre-med advisers at my school.
 
I will get my MCAT score in couple days. I wonder if I apply medical schools in this week, will I get interviews immediately? Or medical schools will start interviewing until octobor?

If you haven't submitted your primary yet, you're probably looking at about 8 weeks at the very earliest for interview invites. It will be about 4 or 5 weeks at minimum for your primary to be verified. Then factor in 2 or 3 weeks to submit secondaries and be marked as complete. It usually takes several weeks for med schools to review your application, especially later in the application season when apps have been piling up for months. So although many schools have been sending out interview invites already, you are looking at mid-to-late October for the earliest chance at an invite.

It upsets me that I have everything lined up, ready, and submitted, but my premed office doesn't guarantee letter submission until September 19th. such a disservice.

I'm in a similar situation. :( I know my committee is really busy right now, but it's been almost five weeks since I requested my letter and it was supposed to be 2-3 weeks.
 
Are the early interviews (given out now) mainly to superstars or people with whom the school is interested in?


Superstar--no. I'm applying <3.0 and have 2 interviews scheduled, one MD & one DO. And no I'm not URM.

Interested in--yes. That is the purpose of an interview, why interview if there is no interest.
 
It upsets me that I have everything lined up, ready, and submitted, but my premed office doesn't guarantee letter submission until September 19th. such a disservice.
I am just glad I didn't have to deal with all that.
 
I'm in a similar situation. :( I know my committee is really busy right now, but it's been almost five weeks since I requested my letter and it was supposed to be 2-3 weeks.

the worst part is the "process" begins in JANUARY in terms of them requesting you to write blurbs about yourself or answer Qs about your goals/personality/etc so that they have material for your committee letter. they interview you between march and MAY. and somehow... the letter takes another 4 months to write.
 
Are the early interviews (given out now) mainly to superstars or people with whom the school is interested in?

Superstar--no. I'm applying <3.0 and have 2 interviews scheduled, one MD & one DO. And no I'm not URM.

Interested in--yes. That is the purpose of an interview, why interview if there is no interest.

I'd like to add something here... LizzyM that foxy adcom member can chime in if I'm off the mark.

Getting an interview is HUGE, except in the case where the interview is a courtesy thing to the applicant/family of applicant.

Interview means the school is interested, yes. But an interview, THIS early in the game. Usually means the person has stellar stats, and worthy of an October acceptance. Why? Because medical schools publish stats... the MSAR is a wonderful resource. But it is also misleading.

The stats are compiled based on who they ACCEPTED, not who matriculated. So while a schools average MCAT may be 33, the matriculant MCAT average might be more like 31ish.

It is advantageous for schools to accept people with high stats first, then move down. That's why some schools like Kansas for example used to use a band system (ex. 24-29 MCAT range)

Is this necessarily fair? Probably not. It's certainly not holistic. Certain midwest schools that I am "extremely" familiar with.

"So Dr.Adcom at Midwest School... my GPA is lowish, but my MCAT is certainly a strong factor to my application. Is there anything else I need to do to be competitive?"

"Your GPA is not competitive, sometimes the later in the cycle, the better for people with lower GPAs."

(Not too late obviously, should be a sweet spot)

In summary, tl;dr = medical schools want the best and the brightest (not necessarily the highest numbers), but they like to pad their bottom line and then let those people go off to top 10s.

Prime example. Univ. of Michigan offers superb scholarships to applicants with excellent stats, and AUTO-interview invites based on school, GPA, MCAT score. Rankings depend on school selectivity too!
 
Superstar--no. I'm applying <3.0 and have 2 interviews scheduled, one MD & one DO. And no I'm not URM.

Interested in--yes. That is the purpose of an interview, why interview if there is no interest.

wow nice! good luck
 
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