Ucdavis Is Crazy

[temmie]

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I Was Filling Out My Application And Was Really Excited About Finishing Today,then I Realised That They Actually Had Another Supplementary Application That Requires 4 Or So Eassays. They Are So Crazy In A Pathetic Way/
In Case You Have Not Noticed, I Am Very Mad At Them.anyone Else Feeling The Same Way Here?

 

[NapeSpikes]

What do you mean they have "another supplemental app"? It's just four essays total, right? I only looked at it briefly...

 

[firebird69guy]

Yeah their "bio" section has more essays.. i'm still stuck on the "most influential person of my life" essay

this one sucks


This is the worst secondary, BY FAR!!

 

[SanDiegoSOD]

What do you mean they have "another supplemental app"? It's just four essays total, right? I only looked at it briefly...

No, there are six optional essays at the end of the application. You can submit the application without doing those essays.

 

[NapeSpikes]

Six extra essays?? I didn't see those. Darn. 🙁 How many characters are you guys doing? I'm thinking 1000-2000 or so per essay would suffice?

Edit: holy crap, you're right--it never ends!

 

[SanDiegoSOD]

Six extra essays?? I didn't see those. Darn. 🙁 How many characters are you guys doing? I'm thinking 1000-2000 or so per essay would suffice?

Edit: holy crap, you're right--it never ends!

No way, buddy. They give you 6000 characters for a reason - you really should use them all.













Just kidding. I averaged around 3000, with one essay being really short and another taking the full 6000.

 

[Flopotomist]

Quit complaining - I have been complete for 12 weeks - and they haven't sent me a secondary yet. They haven't rejected me yet either.. geesh..

 

[Messerschmitts]

Is UC Davis crazy? Agreed, Davis is stark raving MAD, completely insane in the membrane. My secondary essays (especially the "optional" ones) are all a patchwork of parts from lesser essays sewn together; a couple of them do actually approach 6,000 characters, however honestly it was a whole lotta styrofoam, if you know what I mean. I guess subconsciously I was being mean, I want some poor sucker to have to read all 9 pages (or however long it was) of my B.S..

 

[MDCali]

Quit complaining - I have been complete for 12 weeks - and they haven't sent me a secondary yet. They haven't rejected me yet either.. geesh..

I agree. I got their rejection e-mail a couple of days ago. As a Cali resident, I presumed I would have gotten a secondary. 🙁

 

[Uegis]

Don't worry too much about reaching the limits. If you can say it in less words, go for it. A lot of people in my class told me they weren't even close to reaching the limit but just said what they wanted/needed to say. Good luck everyone. UCD is a great school so those essays are worth it. Interviews are in full swing because I see people in suits daily now during lunch, but we interview until pretty late, so hang in there.

 

[drmota]

mine were about 4000 characters. they took about a month to get me the secondary. i did the essays drunk but they were actually pretty good, except i wrote spinal cord as "spinal chord". oops. minnesota's secondary is worse.
-mota

 

[mrpankration]

The UC Davis secondary is time consuming, but on the bright side all those essays do give you an opportunity to let the adcoms see what's behind the numbers.

 

[SanDiegoSOD]

The UC Davis secondary is time consuming, but on the bright side all those essays do give you an opportunity to let the adcoms see what's behind the numbers.

Absolutely. That's exactly why they give you all those essays to write - to get to know you as a person, not you as a set of numbers. Look at their average scores - 3.57 GPA, 31 MCAT. Davis could easily fill a class with Harvard's numbers (3.8, 35) with all of California's outstanding candidates, but they choose to look beyond hard numbers and consider soft qualities. I think it's awesome (now, just give me an interview, please! 🙂)

 

[sillystring]

I didn't even bother looking at the optional essays, unfortunately. I've gotten into the habit of doing secondaries at 2am and clicked on the submit button once the required essays were done (I hope they made sense).

So if it's not too much trouble, I was wondering if anyone can post what the optional questions were. It's too late to do them now, but I'm curious and others might be, too. Thanks and good luck with everything!

 

[SanDiegoSOD]

It the same question, asked 6 times: "Pick one item you selected above and describe in the space below what you did and how it will make you a better physician"

The 6 categories are: leadership, volunteer, clinical experience, research experience, work experience, organized extracurricular activity

They give you 6,000 characters to write each essay.

 

[mrpankration]

I think another reason Davis has so many essays is that it is an effective way to gauge someone's motivation to attend their school. For me, the time and effort it took to complete their application would be an extremely small price to pay for the opportunity to attend their school. The person that does a thorough job answering the essay questions is a lot more likely to have Davis high on their list of schools than the person who doesn't even bother filling out the supplemental section of the application.

 

[Highclimber]

How many out of state applicants have gotten secondaries from UCDavis... I got one after my August MCAT scores came back, but then looked a the MSAR and saw that only 4 out of staters went last year... Seems like winning the lottery...

 

[NapeSpikes]

Seems like winning the lottery...

Except it costs $60 for a ticket, and even if you win, you'll be paying THEM for the next 20 years. 😀