Reapplying while waitlisted? Save on application fees? Please help!

[mikaboogerbutt]

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Hi all,

Last year I applied to over 30 schools, got two interviews, no acceptances, and am currently waitlisted at one school. It seems like I have a decent chance of getting off the waitlist (they say they've moved pretty far) but that probably wouldn't happen until later this month or in July/August. I have a Primary Application that's filled out and all ready to go but my question is this:

Can I submit my 2012-2013 Primary Application on the 1st day of submissions to ONLY ONE SCHOOL? My thinking is that this way I'll be one of the first in line to have my application verified by AMCAS in case I don't get off the waitlist.

If I am accepted I'll just decline my 2012-2013 application and have spent less than $200.
If I am NOT accepted then I'll have already been verified by late-June or early-July. I can then add the remaining 30-ish schools to my list and will be one of the first Primary Applications sent out to medical schools on the 29th. This will hopefully help with my poor GPA.

Am I missing anything? Is this the right idea?

Thanks for your help!

 

[DrHoffy]

You can always fill out the AMCAS/AACOMAS and have it ready to submit. I would think that if you are taken off the waitlist then you've only lost time. If you apply later in July or beginning of August you would still be "considered" early. More importantly, is when you are sent secondaries that you get them in quickly.

I always advice people to not submit on the first day the system opens....you want to give it a day to make sure there are no kinks...

If your GPA is poor....then you need to find a way to address that...recent grades are poor or old grades are poor but you have a solid trend up?

better for verification to have all the transcripts, etc there and ready to go.
Just my two thoughts...its been a awhile since I went through this process myself, so feel free to seek out others opinions.
Marcia

 

[FrkyBgStok]

if your MD applicants is right and you applied at the end of June, and you feel your PS and secondaries were good, you should have received many more interviews. you need to revamp your list, you need to get faculty letters. I would bank on NOT getting off the waitlist. there is something in your app that needs addressed. 30 schools with 2 interviews is bad. you should have received more with your app.

Edit: what I meant is that you should have received many more interviews, had you applied correctly. I think it is pretty clear that you didn't.

 

[OldBat]

I looked at your Mdapplicants page and if your GPA is accurate the schools you have listed are mostly reach schools. You do have a fantastic MCAT score but your GPA as you know is in the !0th percentile for some of the schools. If you do not get in this time I would suggest buying the MSAR and applying to schools where the accepted applicants stats are closer to yours.

 

[mikaboogerbutt]

I looked at your Mdapplicants page and if your GPA is accurate the schools you have listed are mostly reach schools. You do have a fantastic MCAT score but your GPA as you know is in the !0th percentile for some of the schools. If you do not get in this time I would suggest buying the MSAR and applying to schools where the accepted applicants stats are closer to yours.

I agree, I think last year I made the mistake of being way too overconfident and putting too much stake into my MCAT. My MCAT comes out into the 90% for a lot of schools but my GPA also rests in the 10% or less according to the MSAR. I've since revised a list of schools to apply to that's more reasonable and on the safe side.

 

[mikaboogerbutt]

if your MD applicants is right and you applied at the end of June, and you feel your PS and secondaries were good, you should have received many more interviews. you need to revamp your list, you need to get faculty letters. I would bank on NOT getting off the waitlist. there is something in your app that needs addressed. 30 schools with 2 interviews is bad. you should have received more with your app.

Edit: what I meant is that you should have received many more interviews, had you applied correctly. I think it is pretty clear that you didn't.

Thanks for responding, I think that first of all my list of schools consisted of more competitive reach schools for my combination of GPA and MCAT. That was a pretty big mistake on my part. I did end up getting more faculty letters for last year's application cycle but I'm not sure how they affected my application. The professors happily wrote letters for me but I don't think they had much to say, I did well in their classes and attended office hours but I wasn't really close with them. I'll be revising my list of schools tonight and try to throw my list up on the reapplicants list.

 

[mikaboogerbutt]

You can always fill out the AMCAS/AACOMAS and have it ready to submit. I would think that if you are taken off the waitlist then you've only lost time. If you apply later in July or beginning of August you would still be "considered" early. More importantly, is when you are sent secondaries that you get them in quickly.

I always advice people to not submit on the first day the system opens....you want to give it a day to make sure there are no kinks...

If your GPA is poor....then you need to find a way to address that...recent grades are poor or old grades are poor but you have a solid trend up?

better for verification to have all the transcripts, etc there and ready to go.
Just my two thoughts...its been a awhile since I went through this process myself, so feel free to seek out others opinions.
Marcia

Hi Marcial,

Thanks for your response. I've already sent in my transcripts (AMCAS confirmed they've been received) and I'll be asking my letter writing service to send my LoR this coming week. Everything's already in place to submit, I just need to finalize my list of schools (I think that was a source of problems last year) and then hit the "submit" button. I'm going to try to throw my list of schools up in the reapplicants page after I finish.