Seemingly unsuccessful cycle - need advice

[M3dhop3ful]

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hey all, I just wanted an opinion about how to improve my application because it seems like I am going to have to reapply.

cGPA:3.87 but when/if I apply next it will be 3.9
sGPA: 3.85
MCAT: 11/11/12 R (PS/VR/BS)

Canadian (international) applicant

I applied to a whole bunch of schools (interviewed in bold):

AECOM
Case western
Sinai
Dartmouth
UVM
Penn state
Umaryland
George Washington
NYU
Vanderbilt
Rosalind franklin
SUNY upstate
Mayo

Put on hold at Case and alternate listed at George washington, still have to hear back from NYU.

rejected or haven't heard back from the rest.

My ECs include:
- 10 day volunteer abroad trip with approx 20 hours of shadowing in it
- ~100 hours hospital volunteering
- First responder (so get to see/treat casualties from time to time)
- 14 months of research (summer - school year - summer) with some presentations, abstract publication, and a few abstracts at national conferences
- otherwise relatively average ECs

Decent LoRs.

I am considering a few things:
- Getting a lot of clinical hours (Virtually impossible to shadow here, but I can do a lot of volunteering).
- Doing a Masters in epid or public health to make my application stand out and give my application more depth.
- rewriting my mcat - I think as an international student I need to shoot for higher tier schools, a lot of instate schools don't take internationals or have a tight quota for them. Even so, given my test conditions I feel I can *reasonably estimate* I will be able to get a 35-36-37. Is that a significant enough improvement?

Do you guys have any advice? I think that I can use a little more clinical experience, since a friend of mine with almost identical stats got a lore more interviews than me with this being virtually the only difference

 

[Decicco]

I don't think you need to do any of the things you mentioned (retake the MCAT, take more coursework, etc). I think you have a competitve applicaiton as it is now, and you just need to apply more broadly next time. The schools you applied to most all have very high stats, so situations like yours can happen. If you need to reapply, I would say to focus on your ECs and essays next year. Mabye get a job in healthcare for the year. The hard parts (GPA and MCAT) are behind you, and I think if not this year you will ultimately be successful next year.

Good luck!

 

[scarletgirl777]

hey all, I just wanted an opinion about how to improve my application because it seems like I am going to have to reapply.

cGPA:3.87 but when/if I apply next it will be 3.9
sGPA: 3.85
MCAT: 11/11/12 R (PS/VR/BS)

Canadian (international) applicant

I applied to a whole bunch of schools (interviewed in bold):

AECOM
Case western
Sinai
Dartmouth
UVM
Penn state
Umaryland
George Washington
NYU
Vanderbilt
Rosalind franklin
SUNY upstate
Mayo

Put on hold at Case and alternate listed at George washington, still have to hear back from NYU.

rejected or haven't heard back from the rest.

My ECs include:
- 10 day volunteer abroad trip with approx 20 hours of shadowing in it
- ~100 hours hospital volunteering
- First responder (so get to see/treat casualties from time to time)
- 14 months of research (summer - school year - summer) with some presentations, abstract publication, and a few abstracts at national conferences
- otherwise relatively average ECs

Decent LoRs.

I am considering a few things:
- Getting a lot of clinical hours (Virtually impossible to shadow here, but I can do a lot of volunteering).
- Doing a Masters in epid or public health to make my application stand out and give my application more depth.
- rewriting my mcat - I think as an international student I need to shoot for higher tier schools, a lot of instate schools don't take internationals or have a tight quota for them. Even so, given my test conditions I feel I can *reasonably estimate* I will be able to get a 35-36-37. Is that a significant enough improvement?

Do you guys have any advice? I think that I can use a little more clinical experience, since a friend of mine with almost identical stats got a lore more interviews than me with this being virtually the only difference

You need to apply to more schools and a broader range. I think retaking the MCAT is a mistake. I don't think you NEED the master's, but something to make your ECs more interesting might be nice.

 

[cliffhuxtableDO]

What about canadian schools?

 

[M3dhop3ful]

You need to apply to more schools and a broader range. I think retaking the MCAT is a mistake. I don't think you NEED the master's, but something to make your ECs more interesting might be nice.

Thanks for the advice. The reason why I didn't go broader is because there aren't a lot of schools that take international students. There are others that are not friendly towards canadians/accept canadians regularly either. Unfortunately, it seems that the ones that do take us in happen to be the more competitive ones. That's why I couldn't go broader, although I may try to reconsult the msar and see.

 

[dragonfly99]

Thanks for the advice. The reason why I didn't go broader is because there aren't a lot of schools that take international students. There are others that are not friendly towards canadians/accept canadians regularly either. Unfortunately, it seems that the ones that do take us in happen to be the more competitive ones. That's why I couldn't go broader, although I may try to reconsult the msar and see.

You need to apply to a lot more schools...try 30 or 40. This because you are Canadian. What about the Canadian schools? It seems you'd be competitive there?

I agree with getting more volunteer hours in, and if possible get a good LOR from a physician. Try to get a unifying theme to your volunteer experiences +/- some extracurriculars. For example, if you do mass casualty response, ER volunteering, etc. then maybe you have an interest in emergency medicine. Or if you did research related to HIV then maybe you could volunteer at an HIV outreach program, etc. Make sure your essay is really good.

I don't think improving the MCAT a couple points will help much. It might be helpful to get input from other Canadian student(s) but I think the risk/benefit of retaking the test is not there. Your score might stay the same, only go up 1 or 2 points, or even go down, none of which might help you. If you got a 40 combined score then yes, it would help, but if you studied right the first time that probably won't happen.

I think you applied to not enough schools and a lot of the ones you applied to are pretty competitive (or very competitive, like NYU, Mayo, etc.). Last time I looked, Mayo has very small class sizes which isn't going to help you much as far as getting in...

 

[M3dhop3ful]

You need to apply to a lot more schools...try 30 or 40. This because you are Canadian. What about the Canadian schools? It seems you'd be competitive there?

I agree with getting more volunteer hours in, and if possible get a good LOR from a physician. Try to get a unifying theme to your volunteer experiences +/- some extracurriculars. For example, if you do mass casualty response, ER volunteering, etc. then maybe you have an interest in emergency medicine. Or if you did research related to HIV then maybe you could volunteer at an HIV outreach program, etc. Make sure your essay is really good.

I don't think improving the MCAT a couple points will help much. It might be helpful to get input from other Canadian student(s) but I think the risk/benefit of retaking the test is not there. Your score might stay the same, only go up 1 or 2 points, or even go down, none of which might help you. If you got a 40 combined score then yes, it would help, but if you studied right the first time that probably won't happen.

I think you applied to not enough schools and a lot of the ones you applied to are pretty competitive (or very competitive, like NYU, Mayo, etc.). Last time I looked, Mayo has very small class sizes which isn't going to help you much as far as getting in...

thanks for the advice. I am just wondering what went wrong, considering I got interviews at the most competitive schools I applied to, but no the lesser competitive ones. I have a very research oriented application, so could it be a matter of fit? Oh I also applied to georgetown but I don't think I added that to the list.