So I heard this rumor...

[TheFogHat]

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I heard that when applying to schools as an overqualified applicant (high GPA MCAT etc), many times safety schools will reject you simply because your stats are too high. They assume they are plan B (whether or not this is the case) and essentially ignore the application. Is this true? Is there any data to support this? Or am I just paranoid 😱

 

[NotAsking4Much]

Yes that is very true. That's why people say this is a crapshoot process. For example, if you get into UC Berkeley, you probably would get into UC Santa Cruz for college. However, for med school, they want to actually consider students who will go there because they have a limited number of interview spots.

 

[BlitzSleep]

I doubt there's any 'data' to support this, we can only speculate why the 4.0/40 applicant that we always hear about that didn't get accepted to a state school.

The correct answer is: Maybe and maybe not

 

[austinap]

I heard that when applying to schools as an overqualified applicant (high GPA MCAT etc), many times safety schools will reject you simply because your stats are too high. They assume they are plan B (whether or not this is the case) and essentially ignore the application. Is this true? Is there any data to support this? Or am I just paranoid 😱

I haven't seen any strong evidence for this other than anecdotal evidence, but there's probably some truth to that. More likely, it's going to be about fit: top schools are very research/academically oriented, so if you have a strong research background (along with killer scores, etc), they might assume that you want research to be a significant part of your education, and that you'll go to the schools that can offer that to you.

 

[WholeLottaGame7]

I heard that when applying to schools as an overqualified applicant (high GPA MCAT etc), many times safety schools will reject you simply because your stats are too high. They assume they are plan B (whether or not this is the case) and essentially ignore the application. Is this true? Is there any data to support this? Or am I just paranoid 😱

I don't know that there's any data to support it, but anecdotally I felt like it was the case. I got interviews everywhere I wanted, but then didn't get in to some surprising schools based on my acceptances. I think in retrospect that I just did not show those schools enough "post-interview love" to let them know I was serious about going there.

I would say that you probably won't get rejected outright to "safety schools," but the burden of proof as to why you want to go there is probably higher at those places.

 

[runawayclock]

Completely unverified gut feeling but I feel like it would be more of a fit issue than a purely stats issue, especially HBC or schools that have a strong emphasis on one area of medicine or another. Maybe the person with great stats is applying to a "safety" with not much knowledge of what that school is about (underserved medicine, research, primary care, or whatever it is), and the adcom doesn't think they'd be a good fit... then they'd get rejected.

 

[morning]

I could see a "safety" school perhaps not offering you an interview, but I doubt they would withhold an actual ACCEPTANCE for being "overqualified." It's not like if they accept you and you refuse, that's it, they can't find anyone to fill that empty space. They'll just pick someone off the waiting list.

Is it possible "overqualified" students just give the distinct impression that they don't care?

 

[FrazzleSnazzle]

Completely unverified gut feeling but I feel like it would be more of a fit issue than a purely stats issue, especially HBC or schools that have a strong emphasis on one area of medicine or another. Maybe the person with great stats is applying to a "safety" with not much knowledge of what that school is about (underserved medicine, research, primary care, or whatever it is), and the adcom doesn't think they'd be a good fit... then they'd get rejected.

Pretty much this. All med schools are very seasoned and familiar with the holding multiple acceptances/waitlists game that applicants play later on in the cycle. Part of a school's goal is to be successful at holding onto as many of their initial acceptees as possible to the point of matriculation (in fact, I think this is even one of the factors that US News uses to rank med schools). Thus, many middle and lower tier schools find in their own best interest to hold off automatically accepting too many people with very high stats. A few schools (such as Wake Forest and Pitt) do this very blatantly, basically waitlisting almost everybody post-interview and then slowly pulling people off that list later on (the theory being that those that bother to stay on the list that long are the ones most likely to actually choose the school). Others are more subtle about it.

Thus, even if you're a superstar applicant with a 4.0 and 45T, don't think that you're automatically a shoo-in at any school. You will have to work hard at every school you've applied to in order to convince the adcom that it is worth it for them to accept you. My personal advice: imagine yourself at an interview for School X and say that the interviewer asks you, "Why do you want to go to School X?" If you cannot answer that question convincingly, then don't bother applying to that school.

I could see a "safety" school perhaps not offering you an interview, but I doubt they would withhold an actual ACCEPTANCE for being "overqualified." It's not like if they accept you and you refuse, that's it, they can't find anyone to fill that empty space. They'll just pick someone off the waiting list.

Is it possible "overqualified" students just give the distinct impression that they don't care?

Not completely true. Schools don't like to pull off too many people off the waitlist, they like keeping as many of the people they originally accepted as possible. Say you have a School A and a School B. If both schools accept a bunch of people but most of them drop out of School B to go to School A, that makes School B look bad and hurts them in ranking factors. And as much as people on SDN like to yell the chorus of "med school rankings don't matter!!", I would find it hard to believe that school adcoms don't worry at all about how others perceive them.

 

[Law2Doc]

I heard that when applying to schools as an overqualified applicant (high GPA MCAT etc), many times safety schools will reject you simply because your stats are too high. They assume they are plan B (whether or not this is the case) and essentially ignore the application. Is this true? Is there any data to support this? Or am I just paranoid 😱

No data for this. This "rumor" no doubt starts every time someone with good stats doesn't get into what he deems a school "beneath him". But since admissions are only partly objective based, and actually put more weight on some of the subjective aspects (such as the interview), it's actually not uncommon for a school to deem someone with high stats as not a "good fit". Don't kid yourself into thinking you are overqualified. It's more likely that the school's "just not that into you". You also see folks with very good numbers getting cocky and arrogant at interviews at programs they consider "safety" and this tends to rub the adcoms the wrong way. So yeah, if you didn't get in the school didn't reject you because you were overqualified. They were looking for something else - and hence you were underqualified in whatever it was that they needed to see to deem you a "good fit".

 

[searun]

Anecdotal but I attend a top ten private med school, and was admitted to several other reasonably competitive med schools like USC, Dartmouth, and Georgetown, but I could not get an interview at Creighton. I went to a Catholic high school and I thought I fit the profile of Creighton. I was really interested in this school but I could not get an interview. Who knows? Was I cocky? I don't think so, I do not believe that I come across that way. But the school decided that I was not a good fit, for whatever reason.

 

[ErmaBoBurma]

No data for this. This "rumor" no doubt starts every time someone with good stats doesn't get into what he deems a school "beneath him". But since admissions are only partly objective based, and actually put more weight on some of the subjective aspects (such as the interview), it's actually not uncommon for a school to deem someone with high stats as not a "good fit". Don't kid yourself into thinking you are overqualified. It's more likely that the school's "just not that into you". You also see folks with very good numbers getting cocky and arrogant at interviews at programs they consider "safety" and this tends to rub the adcoms the wrong way. So yeah, if you didn't get in the school didn't reject you because you were overqualified. They were looking for something else - and hence you were underqualified in whatever it was that they needed to see to deem you a "good fit".

Like someone with lower scores?

 

[deleted6669]

For example, if you get into UC Berkeley, you probably would get into UC Santa Cruz for college.

hey, so what are you sayin here?....🙂
emedpa
ucsc alum.
* also accepted ucsb, ucd.

 

[chman]

That makes sense economically for them.

 

[SweetRain]

It's true. I have a friend who had a 4.0/38 with amazing ECs and applied to a DO school for some reason as his safety school. (I think he just applied because it was a part of TMDSAS)
Never got an interview

 

[md2010hopeful]

.

 

[Longshanks]

It's true. I have a friend who had a 4.0/38 with amazing ECs and applied to a DO school for some reason as his safety school. (I think he just applied because it was a part of TMDSAS)
Never got an interview

This will happen with DO schools if its obvious you are using them as a safety.

Don't kid yourselves people, the amount of effort you put into schools' secondaries, what you write, and what you say and how you act at an interview are plenty of opportunities for someone to read your purposes, however subtle or implicit.

The situations described in this thread reminds me of when people post here about how they had 6-8 interviews and didn't get any acceptances, yet they knew they interviewed well. Obviously you didn't, or the school didn't deem you as a good match for them. The explicit facts demonstrate that. The application process is highly subjective, which is why you need to present yourself as positively as you can also apply to schools where believe you'd fit.

 

[cpants]

I think a lot of it probably has to do with how you approach your safety schools. Most of these students getting rejected are probably not spending as much time on their secondaries, coming off as arrogant at their interview, and generally assuming acceptance based on their stats. This behavior shines through pretty clearly. A big-stats applicant with a lukewarm secondary would be a huge warning sign to me. Schools don't want to be your safety, they want students who genuinely want to go there as their first choice (or at least high on the list).

 

[Geekchick921]

Does this supposed screening typically happen before or after a secondary? Due to my husband's job I am only applying to schools in the Philadelphia area, including PCOM, and not to toot my own horn, but I am anticipating a 35+ MCAT (I find out on Tuesday). I really would be interested in attending any of the schools I'm applying to, not just applying to them as a safety, and I hope I get the chance to express that in a secondary before they decide I'm using them as a fallback.

 

[mspeedwagon]

I think if you have a good reason to stay in a geographic area (which you do), make sure to express it to the school (I know a few people who were well above stats of school who were able to convince the schools that if admitted they would likely attend because of geographical preference).

What the OP is referring to also happens at the undergrad level. I got into two Ivy League schools, other schools in the Top 20 and was rejected from my state school (UMass). I contacted them to ask why and they said since I attended boarding school and my parents were not in MA at the time, they did not feel strongly that I would attend UMass even if admitted.

Does this supposed screening typically happen before or after a secondary? Due to my husband's job I am only applying to schools in the Philadelphia area, including PCOM, and not to toot my own horn, but I am anticipating a 35+ MCAT (I find out on Tuesday). I really would be interested in attending any of the schools I'm applying to, not just applying to them as a safety, and I hope I get the chance to express that in a secondary before they decide I'm using them as a fallback.

 

[Geekchick921]

I think if you have a good reason to stay in a geographic area (which you do), make sure to express it to the school (I know a few people who were well above stats of school who were able to convince the schools that if admitted they would likely attend because of geographical preference).

I'm assuming I'll get the chance to do this in their secondaries, right? Or would it be prudent to send a separate correspondence to the school during the summer and let them know?

 

[mspeedwagon]

From those I know (sample size of about 4-5), they all got secondaries and explained it in them. The schools want your money.

I think the one exception where I would go out of my way to explain your ties is on OOS that may reject you not realizing you have strong ties to that state. In this case I would contact them during the summer. This is not relevant in your case.

I'm assuming I'll get the chance to do this in their secondaries, right? Or would it be prudent to send a separate correspondence to the school during the summer and let them know?

 

[taciturngirl]

Does this supposed screening typically happen before or after a secondary? Due to my husband's job I am only applying to schools in the Philadelphia area, including PCOM, and not to toot my own horn, but I am anticipating a 35+ MCAT (I find out on Tuesday). I really would be interested in attending any of the schools I'm applying to, not just applying to them as a safety, and I hope I get the chance to express that in a secondary before they decide I'm using them as a fallback.

I got interviews at Penn, Jefferson, and Temple with a 36, so don't worry. (Straight up rejected by Drexel, though.)

 

[Geekchick921]

From those I know (sample size of about 4-5), they all got secondaries and explained it in them. The schools want your money.

I think the one exception where I would go out of my way to explain your ties is on OOS that may reject you not realizing you have strong ties to that state. In this case I would contact them during the summer. This is not relevant in your case.

I got interviews at Penn, Jefferson, and Temple with a 36, so don't worry. (Straight up rejected by Drexel, though.)

Thank you both, very much. 🙂

 

[JokerMD]

asdf

 

[SpaceDementia]

I believe this is true at some schools. Georgetown and Boston, to name a couple of examples, have a reputation for it.

 

[BrainBuff]

I do not believe it is a rumor, but almost a true fact. The term "being tufted" actually appeared as a result of students with excellent credentials being rejected from Tufts, because adcoms felt they were really interested in attending Harvard and were using Tufts as a safety. I have also seen a pattern of a lot of students from the North East getting rejected from UCSF (and not Stanford) while they are holding admissions to Harvard, Columbia or Yale. University of Washington does the same.

Unless you can show some type of connection to the school (either parents attended, you want to go and live in the area and show it in your essays, etc) it would not be surprising to get rejected, in spite of great stats.

 

[longhorn09]

That's true and Texas A&M comes up to my mind.

 

[boaz]

This is true, in my experience at least. I had much less success at schools where it must have been obvious that they are far from top choice.

 

[Siggy]

I have also seen a pattern of a lot of students from the North East getting rejected from UCSF (and not Stanford) while they are holding admissions to Harvard, Columbia or Yale. University of Washington does the same.

You can't really compare out-of-state public school admissions decisions to private school admissions decisions. The entire purpose of schools like UCSF is to educate students from instate, not to educate students from other states.

 

[ThaliaNox]

I go to MSU, which has relatively low average stats. TONS of OOS people apply because of this, thinking to use it as a safety. Most never get an interview because they don't fit the profile of the school: To provide doctors to underserved areas. Even those who get an interview are often not accepted because it becomes obvious that they are only parroting our mission back to us. "Uh-huh... So you grew up in NYC, love to go to plays and opera, your whole family is in New York, but you're very interested in being a family doctor in rural northern michigan." Right. Rejection.