Question about time of Med School Application

[AtomicPancakez]

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My Pre-professional advisor at my school says that your chances of being accepted to medical school severely diminishes the later in the application cycle you apply. Has anyone else heard this to be true? She basically told me to apply June 1st but I'd rather apply later in the cycle in order to beef up my volunteer experiences.

 

[phantomcello]

The earlier, the better.

 

[lalax]

This is true for schools with rolling, semi-rolling admissions (which are significant in number), so yeah the earlier the better.

 

[emdee89]

The earlier, the better. I applied last cycle (or the current one, 2014 admission) and it was about a 6 week wait for me and I submitted around June 20th. I believe that people who submitted just a tad later, in early to mid July, had to wait approximately two months to get verified, so keep verification times in mind. The majority of people probably submit between mid June and late July/early August, so there will be a huge bottleneck after a couple weeks of apps being open.

 

[sunnysmiles2]

I applied late in the cycle last year and did not get a single interview. Th is cycle I turned in my AMCAS app the first day and got interviews at schools I had previously applied. I did not re-take the MCAT, had the same grades, and just had a year of working in a lab under my belt - not a big difference from my first app. I would go as far as to say timing is everything - at least in my case!

 

[Pose]

You don't need to wait to apply to beef up your ECs, because when you fill out AMCAS you list the total amount of hours you expect to do in the next year. So list whatever you're doing (or will do), and estimate how many hours total you'll have done by the time you matriculate.

 

[common man]

My Pre-professional advisor at my school says that your chances of being accepted to medical school severely diminishes the later in the application cycle you apply. Has anyone else heard this to be true? She basically told me to apply June 1st but I'd rather apply later in the cycle in order to beef up my volunteer experiences.

medical school admissions is random. posters on this forum make rational (and often discouraging) arguments that go down the toilet in the randomness / human factor of admissions. however, the following is almost always true:

when you are complete, there is a delay of 1 day to 2 months before someone even considers inviting you for an interview. the range is random. when you receive the invite, the interview dates are backed up. as an extreme example, in the Albany thread, someone got an II in November for a March interview date! that's a 3-4 month back up! typically, the back up is 2 weeks - 2 months. January is a busy month for interview invites (a good thing) but after that the season has cooled big time. so, you want to interview by Dec. If you are complete by Aug 1, you'll get your interview hopefully by Dec 1 at the latest (typically). that's a good position to be in. nevermind how late schools interview up to - mind how quickly they run out of II!

honestly, for something like volunteering, I would submit the application early and submit an update letter later on.

 

[YamNMangos]

You don't need to wait to apply to beef up your ECs, because when you fill out AMCAS you list the total amount of hours you expect to do in the next year. So list whatever you're doing (or will do), and estimate how many hours total you'll have done by the time you matriculate.

Do note though this advice only applies for existing ECs (ex. you already worked a year in a lab and is continuing to do so). If what you are estimating is based on an EC that you have not started or have put very little time in (unless substantial and you know you will 100% commit to it), I would not put that into your application.

 

[YamNMangos]

medical school admissions is random. posters on this forum make rational (and often discouraging) arguments that go down the toilet in the randomness / human factor of admissions. however, the following is almost always true:

when you are complete, there is a delay of 1 day to 2 months before someone even considers inviting you for an interview. the range is random. when you receive the invite, the interview dates are backed up. as an extreme example, in the Albany thread, someone got an II in November for a March interview date! that's a 3-4 month back up! typically, the back up is 2 weeks - 2 months. January is a busy month for interview invites (a good thing) but after that the season has cooled big time. so, you want to interview by Dec. If you are complete by Aug 1, you'll get your interview hopefully by Dec 1 at the latest (typically). that's a good position to be in. nevermind how late schools interview up to - mind how quickly they run out of II!

honestly, for something like volunteering, I would submit the application early and submit an update letter later on.

I would say the range is higher. I got an interview invite in late January for an app I submitted in late June 😛. It truly is a random process.

 

[JB1977]

There are so many people applying for medical school, and so few seats in every class. Applying after schools have already begun giving out interviews and/or acceptances just narrows the (already small) window you are shooting for. I applied late last cycle, didn't get any interviews, and really felt like I shot myself in the foot. In contrast, this cycle I applied within a week of the day AMCAS opened and I got 8 interviews and was accepted at my #1 choice. There obviously were other contributing factors, but I do feel that getting my foot in the door early helped immensely.

Applying late is not a death knell, but you have to do whatever you can to avoid shooting yourself in the foot. I would advise that you apply early, and send update letters in October/November or whenever you have new experiences to talk about.

 

[aspirantmed]

What others have said. It's not necessarily impossible to get in if you apply late, but applying earlier will give you better odds and (since you tend to hear back sooner) better peace of mind. I submitted my application within the first day possible and all my secondaries within 3 days of getting them, and I was done with interviews by the middle of November. Consequently, I heard back from most schools by mid-January, and that has given me the time to make a reasoned decision these last few weeks. You won't hear back about interviews till mid- to late-July, at the very earliest, so I'd reason that June is early, July and August are about 'normal,' September is late (but still not necessarily detrimental) and October or later is risky.

 

[aspirantmed]

Do note though this advice only applies for existing ECs (ex. you already worked a year in a lab and is continuing to do so). If what you are estimating is based on an EC that you have not started or have put very little time in (unless substantial and you know you will 100% commit to it), I would not put that into your application.

I'm not sure about this - the "future hours" thing was a new addition to AMCAS this year, so it's open to interpretation as to how you "should" do it. That being said, schools will hold you accountable at interviews for the activities you listed, so you should be prepared to discuss anything that you write on your application. For example, I put on my application that I was planning to start an activity and then talked about it during interviews as a strong aspect of my application. At the same time, I quit an activity that I had originally planned to continue through the year, and had to explain at interviews that the number of hours I expected to complete for that activity had since been revised.

 

[YamNMangos]

I'm not sure about this - the "future hours" thing was a new addition to AMCAS this year, so it's open to interpretation as to how you "should" do it. That being said, schools will hold you accountable at interviews for the activities you listed, so you should be prepared to discuss anything that you write on your application. For example, I put on my application that I was planning to start an activity and then talked about it during interviews as a strong aspect of my application. At the same time, I quit an activity that I had originally planned to continue through the year, and had to explain at interviews that the number of hours I expected to complete for that activity had since been revised.

In the AMCAS, you physically cannot put a start date for an activity after the submission date of your AMCAS, so if you haven't already started an activity and you put it in, technically you are lying. As such, this should only be done if the activity is crucial to your application and you are 100% ready to defend your decision to put it in. For activities you just started, like a summer internship etc., that's usually fine. In most cases, it's better to play it safe for future activities - you can always send an update later once you actually get the activity going.

 

[aspirantmed]

Oh, good point - I should add that I put a note in my description about the 'actual' start date. My reasoning was that I wanted schools that don't take pre-interview update letters to consider it. If it's important enough .. I'd suggest doing that. Otherwise, if it can wait (and provide good enough fodder for an update letter) leave till later.

 

[mmmcdowe]

Moving to pre-allo