Out of curiosity, you mentioned having multiple interviews. Did you apply to different medical schools before starting the program and have the opportunity to interview throughout the year? I have been accepted to the in-person MABS program, and I am trying to find out if I can also apply to other schools and if so, when. VCOM's mission does not seem to fit my "premed journey" exactly.
I applied to a bunch of schools at the beginning of the program before things got really stressful. I think it was around the end of July to early august when I sent in primaries and completed all secondary's by October. I basically had no time to write secondary's so I would try to find an hour or two to do them on the weekends. Its best to apply to many medical schools and take your MCAT before you start the program. I had to do interviews the second semester which was extremely hard to do, setting aside a whole day for one interview while in the program is pretty tough. Keep in mind the interview with VCOM will not be given to you until the second semester after meeting the GPA benchmark of 3.5 for the first semester. Other schools may offer you an interview invite much earlier while you're in the first semester if you have a strong application without the SMP grades but in my case, I only got interview invites once they saw I had all A's in the program. You are absolutely allowed to apply to others schools while in the MABS program and they actually highly encourage that you do so. Again, the program not only will help you get into VCOM but other medical schools too! I would begin working on the applications and submitting them before starting the program and prewriting secondary's so its much easier to crank them out. Best case scenario would be to have your primaries, secondary's, and MCAT done before you start the program so you can fully focus on meeting the GPA requirement.
To add to this, I did not have all A's in MABS (I had all B+ and one A, so a little higher than a 3.5) and I got interview invites with that. People I know who had lower GPAs in MABS also got interview invites this current application cycle and were accepted to schools besides VCOM. You don't need straight A's in this SMP to get noticed; it's a pretty reputable program on its own.
Thanks so much for all this info! I will be working on my primary apps for this cycle after my MCAT and I will be trying my best to get all my primaries in before class starts this summer. I can’t say the same for secondaries that I may get later in the cycle. With that in mind I am worried that I might not have the time to finish them like you said though. Also, do professors from this send updates such as grades or letters to other schools that students apply to?
Of course! It may take a bit to get the secondary's in but try to do one or two a week you will eventually get there! As long as you try your best, that's all you can do and that is okay. If you are applying through aacomas you can put down that you are in an SMP once you accept (mark it as in progress) and then once a semester has finished you can update the grades and send the transcript from the school to have it verified and updated to your application for all the schools you applied to.
All special masters programs including this one are notoriously hard. There is a lot of content to go through with little time. You will have weekly exams and for some classes may have quizzes, assignments, projects, etc. All SMPs are truly a make or break type of deal. Do well and you will get many interview invites, do bad and your chances of getting into any medical school are greatly diminished. The only thing more important than your MCAT or undergrad GPA is an SMP since nothing shows you are able to handle medical school better than literally taking the classes that you'll see in medical school. Most of the classes in this program are 1 for 1 what you will see at VCOM, some are very similar with some minor differences. When you enter the program they will be very honest and upfront and tell you that this is the hardest thing that you will ever do in your life. At first I thought "why would they try to scare us like that?" but now that I'm at the end I see that they were just being very direct about how hard this SMP is (and others). To provide some more clarity, at the beginning of the program I spent around 8 hours going through lectures and studying. Now that I am at the end I'm spending at least 10-12 hours everyday going through 3-4 lectures and studying whenever I possibly can (this includes lunch and maybe a break or two). Some classes may be easier than others for you. Some classes you will never have taken in undergrad and is all brand new material so you may be spending more time studying during those blocks. Time management is a very important skill to have in this SMP. My daily routine consists of waking up around 9am, eating breakfast, going to the gym, and then by noon I'm at my computer going through lectures which are usually 40 min- 1 hour long but I like to take notes and really digest the info so It takes me about 3 hours to go through one lecture. So I spend the next 10 hours going through 3 lectures and have an hour break to eat. 3 days prior to an exam I stop going through all lectures and review for the upcoming exam as much as I possible can. 3 days out may only be 8 hours of studying, 2 days out may be 10 hours of studying, 1 day out is closer to 12+ hours of studying, and then I do a quick skim on exam day and take it. I then immediately start over the next day with no breaks and go through lectures until 3 days prior to the next exam again. This is my study method and it has worked wonderfully, however, you may have a more efficient method than me. While this earned me a 4.0 you may just be shooting for the 3.5 and may not need to get perfect exam grades like I tried to do. Is it possible to have some free time? Absolutely. but that depends on many many factors in your life. I will be honest and tell you that whatever free time you have now will likely be greatly reduced if you want to do really well. They do tell you that they expect you to study everyday but I've spoken with other students who have done well and they take at least 1 day on the weekend off and the other day is them studying just for a little. If you have any other questions, feel free to message me!
1) Can anyone speak for the competitive nature of this program?
I applied 3 weeks prior to the start of the program and got in. Yes, you definitely have a chance to get in.
how long till you heard back? and do you think i have competitive stats to get in? i’m nervous my gpa is on the lower end
If I recall correctly it took about 1.5 - 2 weeks to hear back. Yes you are definitely competitive. While I had a 3.7 cGPA 3.64sGPA I know people that got accepted with a cGPA below 3.5. Everything happens for a reason and if its meant to be you will be accepted! If not don't worry at all, there are many other SMPs or other parts of your med school application you can work on to stand out.
Yeah I found it interesting how we cant get individual LORs but I will say that Dr. Hills LOR is a culmination of feedback from all the professors you've had. Its not exactly like a pre-med committee letter but something close to it and does give good insight into you as a student.
To add to what StudentDOcter said, Dr. Hill's letter counts as a committee letter when you're applying to schools. He will write you a letter in December at the soonest after Fall grades come out. Truthfully, you don't get a whole lot of time to develop relationships with professors in MABS and sometimes there are multiple professors for a given subject who are also teaching at the Med school so I can see how they would want to streamline LORs. Also, MABS is a highly regarded post bacc in the community and Dr. Hill's letter supposedly holds weight. I've seen him personally get people into medical school. Not to play devil's advocate, I agree there are a lot of things that are done to give admin a whole lot of power over the students and it's an expensive program to only have one professor deciding your fate.
I submitted my application even later than you did (including my transcript) and they still got mine in time. I think it takes way less time than 20 days for them to process but they say that just in case. Also, when I applied last year the deadline was pushed back which will likely happen again. No need to sweat it! You've done all that you can
I'm not on the admissions team so I cant say with certainty that there are spots still left but at this time last year they were still accepting students (especially for the online program) so it doesn't hurt to try!
In your application there is a portion that is designated for your preference in which campus you'd like to attend which they go off of. They do really well with giving you your top choice and its also based on proximity of where you live and the closest campus.
Do you know anyone from your class who did OMBAS who got into VCOM-A? Also how much is the spot guaranteed if I meet the benchmark? I've heard amazing things but sometimes I can see one negative comment and it makes me question how guaranteed the spot really is.
I've only stayed in contact with 2 other classmates throughout the program and both of them including me met the benchmarks and were accepted, me and another had an interview at VCOM-VA while the last student had an interview at VCOM-A. In the past I've said that there is about a 98% acceptance for any student that met the benchmarks and did their interview. I've specifically asked our program director what has happened in the case of those few students that were rejected and was told they were either very nervous in the interview to the point it overpowered what they were saying (I was told one student would brush their hair with their hand every time they talked as a nervous habit and just seemed very nervous stumbling over words which lead to the interviewers focusing more on that than anything they were saying) or those that got rejected did not prepare properly and raised some serious red flags. Meeting the benchmarks does guarantee an interview 100% and it is very very likely you will get accepted but if you don't treat it like a real medical school interview and do your research and present yourself well then there is a chance you get rejected. You are trying to get into a professional school and so you need to come off as someone who is professional and basically give off the demeanor of a doctor (being calm, collected, and able to socialize). This is why I say there is a 98% chance you are guaranteed to get accepted. As the user Diagnosticdilemma stated above, even though they were one of the few that got rejected, the program did help get them into another medical school. And in the cases of the student with the nervous habits/that raised red flags I have heard from Dr. Hill directly that they were able to get them accepted into other medicals schools. The program isn't just to guarantee an acceptance at VCOM but it will grant you connections to get you into many other medical schools.
I keep in touch with one of our classmates who met the benchmarks that got accepted to VCOM-A. I really didn't mean to be that one negative comment but just giving my experience. It seems the vast majority that do meet the benchmarks do get accepted and I think I'm really the only one with this experience. As long as your prepare for the interview like a real medical school interview you should be fine, I made the mistake of assuming that because I met the benchmarks that my previous academic history wouldn't be critiqued so heavily but this is not the case. So that would be the point I was trying to make. You need to prepare and be ready to answer for anything and everything in your application as well as your typical interview questions. For me, my interview was right in the middle of our weekly exams and I really didn't get to prepare as much as I should and that combined with the other factors I discussed was a recipe for disaster. VCOM does have someone that can help you prepare for interviews as well, I wish I knew about that before my VCOM interview because had I used that resource beforehand, it might've changed my fate as they really helped me prepare for my other interviews.
Congratulations on your acceptance! I'm glad I could help! I will send you a PM with a lot of information I have provided other incoming students. Regarding your trip in August it is very likely that you will have to cancel but since the courses are online its possible you could be on vacation and go through lectures as well but I would not recommend this (it would be a pretty stressful vacation lol). Since you are in an online environment it is pretty hard to build relationships with the professors. It is best to build a strong relationship with Dr. Hill since he is the one that will write the letter of recommendation for you (the individual professors cant provide you with one but Dr. Hills LOR is like a committee letter and you will meet with him throughout the program). The only way to do well in this program is to find the study method that works best for you individually and study, study, study. The more times you go over the material the more you will memorize. Remember, you only need to go over the powerpoint slides to get an A, no other material like books are needed even though they are said to be "required". I actually also took my MCAT at the end of July while doing the program, applying to many med schools, and working for the last few weeks. It was by far one of the hardest things I've ever done juggling so much at once but the only advice I can give here is to grind as much as you can for the MCAT before entering the program, you will start with Biochemistry in block 1 and those first few weeks of lectures actually helped me significantly on the MCAT and the course is designed in a way to help with your MCAT as well.