VMCAS 2008 questions?

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Just curious...

How many people are checking off boxes in the optional race/ethnicity section? Anyone decide to leave it blank?

What about age? (esp. non-trads)



I think I will probably volunteer my info. As a non-trad and a multiple race/ethnicity box checker, if nothing else, it will make me stand out.
But I was just curious about how many people give/don't give their info.
 
Maybe I missed it, but I didnt think age was optional. ???
 
I think I checked the ethnicity box - perhaps I shouldn't because I have a notably hispanic last name through marriage, and I think that you should do anything you can to make yourself a more appealing applicant (even something as shallow as appealing to schools looking to "diversify" their incoming class). That is, however, my opinion. You should base your choice on your own opinion.
 
Age is not optional. They ask you. I'd love for my parent's information to be optional. I mean, I've lived in my own home and paid a mortgage for some... 14 years. My dad looked at me like I was nuts when I started to ask exactly when (month /year) he moved to the state. [That was last year. This year, I just used the stuff I got from last years VMCAS. 😉]

race/ethnicity portion? I filled it out. It's not like I can hide what I am, and I don't choose to.
 
Here's another question: Does horse riding lessons count as animal experience? I was just going to put it down as a hobby, but I'm sorely lacking in large animal experience. It sure would help if I could finagle that into large animal experience! Is it just in my area or are all equine vets so unaccepting of volunteers?
 
karmapple said:
Here's another question: Does horse riding lessons count as animal experience? I was just going to put it down as a hobby, but I'm sorely lacking in large animal experience. It sure would help if I could finagle that into large animal experience! Is it just in my area or are all equine vets so unaccepting of volunteers?
Click to expand...

Yes, that definitely is animal experience.
 
So, I worked in a small animal clinic for a long time and was able to assist and monitor patients during surgery. In the course of my time there I saw many unusual surgeries such as amputations, eye enucleations, a c-section on a guinea pig, and an OHE involving closed pyometra.
My question is... do you think it would be beneficial to list these types of surgeries under the description section in VMCAS, or would specific types of surgeries that have influenced me fit better into a personal statement?

I'm thinking that as far as the VMCAS veterinary descriptions go, it might be better to stick with general stuff.
What do you all think?
 
I don't have experience to back my answer since I'm applying for the first time, but I'm listing unusual surgeries and such on the veterinary descriptions. I'm putting something like "...assisted with several amputations, eye enucleations, ..., in addition to common small animals surgeries such as neuters and spays." They were, after all, what made the experience unique.

I think it's a good idea to put he details of HOW they influenced you in your PS, though.
 
The section is for "Description of Duties", so I was just going to go with my general duties.

I wasn't going to list any specifics under the veterinary descriptions sections. "Observed fracture repair with pin placement in a 280g monkey, exploratory surgeries in ferrets, wing amputation on an owl, ACL's, patellas, intra-uterine inseminations, pyometras and c-sections weekly." Feels too wordy for that section and I figure "Assist with routine and non-routine surgeries" will suffice. The more interesting ones will end up in the personal statement.
 
So now I can't decide what to put for my "overall GPA" on the VMCAS. Instructions say to put the GPA from your "primary college" and then it seems to define that as either the place you did your bachelor's or most of your vet pre-reqs.

I have a nice solid GPA from my undergrad, but as a Sociology major I took NO science classes.

My pre-reqs are pretty much completely evenly split in terms of credit hours between a community college and UC Berkeley Extension, w/the upper division stuff all at Extension obviously. Not sure what my Extension GPA is but I don't think its as high as either of the other two, seeing as I took Calculus and Immunology there (ugh!)

Thinking of combining all 3 for the "overall" and then putting the individual GPAs down in the "Explanation" section (there are some instructions that imply you need to have all your extra GPAs listed there anyway)

Any thoughts?
 
starlene45 said:
So now I can't decide what to put for my "overall GPA" on the VMCAS. Instructions say to put the GPA from your "primary college" and then it seems to define that as either the place you did your bachelor's or most of your vet pre-reqs.


Any thoughts?
Click to expand...

I have the same problem. I have a GPA for my BA, for my MA (no science classes in either degree) and then my post-bac coursework. I asked a pre-health advisor what he thought, and he sort of waffled between the BA and the post-bac work. So I'm going to add it to my list of VMCAS questions and call the hotline to get the "official word".

Has anyone else talked to VMCAS and/or admissions people about which GPA they want as the primary?
 
🙂 Yes, by all means put them into your application, whereever you deem appropriate. It is interesting . Just a few helpful things to add: I know this may sound silly but, make sure you spell everything correct, and are able and willing to talk about it. I was asked about a patellar luxation surgery that I assisted in during my interview. They got this info from my VMCAS as well as I mentioned it in my PS. I had this little feeling that they would ask me in one of my interviews about it, so I made sure I read up on the why, how, and post operative care. Just in case. They don't expect you to know most things of course, but if you share it, they will ask it! 👍Awesome experiences for you. Good Luck. P.S: I got into 4 schools so I promise that noting it on your vmcas won't be bad. :laugh: Just make sure its brief and don't embellish. They know that you most likely were observing and monitoring anesthesia. I told them I observed and blah,blah, blah. Good Luck to you! 👍
EqSci said:
I don't have experience to back my answer since I'm applying for the first time, but I'm listing unusual surgeries and such on the veterinary descriptions. I'm putting something like "...assisted with several amputations, eye enucleations, ..., in addition to common small animals surgeries such as neuters and spays." They were, after all, what made the experience unique.

I think it's a good idea to put he details of HOW they influenced you in your PS, though.
Click to expand...
 
About categorizing experiences; I was one of two student animal caretakers for the animals housed by our science department including tropical fish, goldfish, mice, rats, birds, lizards, and toads. I was recruited to the position by one of the faculty members who has a PhD and all questions about the job were directed to her. However, she was not present for the day to day tasks of the job which mainly included cleaning and feeding. Do you think this would count as being “supervised” by a professional and thus go under veterinary experience or under animal experience? I’m leaning towards veterinary but I’m a little unsure.

Also, how do you go about entering animal experience for pet ownership? Does it really count? My family has owned horses and dogs for my entire life along with some other animals along the way. So do I just estimate the hours over the years that I’ve worked/interacted with these animals? I’m thinking I should split up between the horses, which I’ve done substantial training and caring for, and the at home pet animals. I’m sure there are others who have similar situations, how are you doing it? Thanks in advance!
 
stick91 said:
About categorizing experiences; I was one of two student animal caretakers for the animals housed by our science department including tropical fish, goldfish, mice, rats, birds, lizards, and toads. I was recruited to the position by one of the faculty members who has a PhD and all questions about the job were directed to her. However, she was not present for the day to day tasks of the job which mainly included cleaning and feeding. Do you think this would count as being “supervised” by a professional and thus go under veterinary experience or under animal experience? I’m leaning towards veterinary but I’m a little unsure.
Click to expand...

i would go with animal experience. from the sounds of it, your "supervisor" was just a faculty member with a PhD, NOT a DVM, however, if she actually does have a DVM and that is just not coming across from what you wrote, then i think listing it under veterinary would be fine.
 
I think you need to consider how you would respond to the question "What aspects of veterinary medicine did your experience entail?"

The work under a PhD = Veterinary experience is geared more towards involved in research related projects.

If they are research fish being raised to test the affects of a gene mutation on feed conversion efficiency and your helping with raising them, measurements and biopsies then you could make your case for it being veterinary experience under a PhD.

On the other hand if you are feeding the department pets that might be looked at a couple times a year by some bio classes you are going to have a much harder time explaining how that job is related to veterinary medicine.

Regarding pet ownership, that seems to vary from school by school. Some say specifically general husbandry related to ones pets should not be listed. Others make no mention of it.
 
david594 said:
Regarding pet ownership, that seems to vary from school by school. Some say specifically general husbandry related to ones pets should not be listed. Others make no mention of it.
Click to expand...

I feel like last year they specifically mentioned on VMCAS not to list pet ownership experience. It was confusing since VMRCVM wants you to list it on their supplemental. So last year I didn't list mine on VMCAS, but included it in my hours on Va-Md's supplemental. Maybe this year is different, though. I'd call the hotline and ask to be sure.

Also, about overall GPA, last year the hotline folks told me to list only my undergrad GPA (where I took the majority of my pre-reqs) as overall, rather than averaging in my other pre-reqs and my Masters grades. I thought that sucked, but that's what the said to do. Then I listed out each individual school's GPA in the explanation statement. It seems like other people approached this differently than I was told to last year, though, and it didn't seem to adversely affect them.
 
QUOTE:<<<To anyone who has been following the problem with inputting courses taken at foreign schools (NOT transfer courses): I heard back from VMCAS today. They are aware of the problem and hope to have it fixed by early next week (week of July 14th). When the problem is fixed, they will call back anyone who has lodged a complaint.>>>

Has anyone heard anything regarding this issue yet. seems like "the early part..." has come and gone.
 
Hey All

Thought I'd do some legwork of my own-- spoke to the hotline today regarding what to use as overall GPA in my situation (no science pre-reqs as an undergrad). The lady I spoke with said to go ahead and put my undergrad school's GPA as my "overall" GPA, and then list all the others in the explanation section.

Luckily this works out pretty well for me 😎, and hopefully this info will be useful to you guys, too!
 
efab said:
QUOTE:<<<To anyone who has been following the problem with inputting courses taken at foreign schools (NOT transfer courses): I heard back from VMCAS today. They are aware of the problem and hope to have it fixed by early next week (week of July 14th). When the problem is fixed, they will call back anyone who has lodged a complaint.>>>

Has anyone heard anything regarding this issue yet. seems like "the early part..." has come and gone.
Click to expand...


Yeah -- I called VMCAS yesterday to check in. They said they were still working on it...not sure when it will be fixed. Apparently they had to remove the foreign institutions from the drop-down menu on the "courses" page because the system was mistranslating the grades on foreign transcripts (so, if you got the equivalent of an american "A" at a foreign university, it wasn't showing up as an "A" when VMCAS translated it for you).

Anyway, they took my number and email address and said they would be contacting me about it....just didn't have any idea when.
 
It seems like there is a lot of confusion about this, and I'm definitely no exception. My situation is that I've gone to two universities. At the first school, I completed 36 hours of my vet pre-reqs and 50 hours total and I left with a 4.0 GPA. At my second (and current) school I have completed 27 hours of my vet pre-reqs and a total of 36 hours overall with a 3.5 cumulative GPA and 3.7 overall GPA. However, by the end of this fall semester, I will have completed 51 total hours. I also intend to complete a degree from this university (if I don't get into vet school the first time around).
Does anyone have any suggestions about which school I should list as my primary, and which GPA I should list as my overall?
I'm so confused about this! Any help would be greatly appreciated!
 
Lenmaca--

You might want to call VMCAS just to get the official word on your specific situation, it worked for me! However, interpreting the instructions and applying them to your situation, it seems like you've done "most" of your vet school pre-reqs at your first college, where you had the rockin' 4.0 GPA. If you take the VMCAS instructions literally, since you haven't yet finished a bachelor's, the institution where you've done the "most" prereqs should be listed as your overall, and then all your other GPAs listed in the explanation section.

Good luck and let us know what VMCAS says, if you talk to them.
 
Soooo confused about the enrollments and institutions sections. Anyone know the answers to these? Maybe I should just call.

- I attended a college for two years and then transferred out, would I say that I withdrew from this school or completed the program?

- I have no idea what month (Jan? Feb? March?) in 2003 I was accepted to different schools for undergrad, does it matter if I just guess and put February for all of them?

- If you just took a summer class somewhere are you guys putting NO MAJOR or NO ANSWER in the degree boxes?

AHHHHH! And I haven't even started on my PS yet! 😱


Oh and for everyone about the overall GPA thing. I've taken soooo many classes for sooo many different places that I'm going to just average all the grades and use that as my overall rather than use the GPA of the school I eventally graduated from. I don't really anticipate it causing any problems, but I might call to double check.
 
What are goats(pets) classified as? Food animal, exotic, ???
 
I would go with large animal for goats. Unless your family runs a farm raising them for meat/milk.

On the other hand, they are pets, so your 10,000 hours taking care of your pet goats is something half the schools say to not bother listing.
 
two of my sponsors got their email within a day of my sending it, but one of them did not receive it - two weeks later. i double checked the email address i input and it is correct. anyone else have this trouble? i am hesitant to delete it as the instructions say you must get VMCAS permission to re-input the same person - who knows when you'll get an their attention for an answer (still awaiting reply on international school issue plus what to do with semesters i attended 2-3 schools). am i reading the instructions wrong?

-efab
 
Oh, they aren't my pets. I don't have any goats. We see the occasional goat and donkey with the vet I am shadowing - most are pet goats. Thanks, I'll stick with large animal.
 
We distinguish the two halves of the vet school using "large animal" and "small animal" and then the large animal side is divided into "food animal" and "equine." So I would call the goats food animals and the donkeys equine if you wanted to, well, make it seem like more? Large animal works just as well otherwise.
 
i have a quick question, at my undergrad school, we had to put in a certain number of hours doing aviary duties with parakeets, kennel duties with cats and dogs as well as vivarium duties with mice, rats and rabbits. these hours were a part of three different classes, do you think i could put down these hours as experience with birds and mice and rats and rabbits since i haven't worked with them anywhere else since my vet practice i work at only sees cats and dogs. or do u think i should do it as one topic like animal duties at my school and then list it all under there??
 
So I was wondering how you record your AP scores on the VMCAS. I took them during high school, but they are listed on my transcript for college, saying that I recieved credit for them. I only worry because some of them are my required courses for vet school.

Do I list them at the college I went to and if so what term, because I can't add a high school as an institution obviously. Any insights?
 
Okay, so I am trying to copy and paste my personal statement into the nice little box on the VMCAS application and despite the fact that the character count says I am at 4997, whenever I try to save, it rejects my save and states the character limit is 5000. Anyone have this problem or have any ideas on how to resolve???

help...! 🙁
 
Is your character count including spaces?
 
Yup! My total was like 4997 including spaces according to the VMCAS counter at the bottom of the box where you type your statement. It's driving me nuts. I managed to trim it down to 4988 according to the VMCAS counter and now it will save...but I have no idea what the problem is with 4997!
 
If you have any new paragraphs, where you hit enter, that counts as a character. Not sure if word includes those, but the VMCAS does. Might want to look into that.
 
This might be a stupid question, but I can't seem to find the GPA or explanation section... Can someone point it out to me. Thanks
 
EqSci said:
Oh, they aren't my pets. I don't have any goats. We see the occasional goat and donkey with the vet I am shadowing - most are pet goats. Thanks, I'll stick with large animal.
Click to expand...

Goats are food animals, if they are pets or not (meaning there are certain drugs you are not supposed to use in them) as far as a veterinarian is concerned. We classify the animal by what is the majority usage (most goats are food supply so they are "food animals".
 
How do you enter distance ed/online class? Taking Animal Nutrition online from Oklahoma and not sure where to put it
 
Is anyone else getting the "Out of Office" automatic reply when you try to email <[email protected]> with questions??

This was the message I got after sending an email to them today (Aug 20th) with questions:

"Greetings, the VMCAS Student and Advisor Hotline will close for calls and emails at 12:30 PM EDT Friday, August 15, 2008. You are welcome to leave a voicemail or send an email and we will respond as soon as possible. Thanks, 1 (877) 662-2740 (Toll-free Hotline) [email protected]"

Does anyone know if this means that they are closed for calls and emails for the rest of the application cycle?!?! or are they closing during these few days just to spite me because I have an important question for them?? 🙄
 
Hey Ferral -
I don't think you should worry too much as I received the same message when I emailed them and I got a reply within 24-48 hrs. I actually forgot that I received the annoying out of office reply because I received a timely response from them. Hopefully it will be the same for you!

🙂
 
PattiCPNP said:
How do you enter distance ed/online class? Taking Animal Nutrition online from Oklahoma and not sure where to put it
Click to expand...

I could be wrong because I'm not applying this year and therefore am not seeing any of these things for myself to refresh my memory... but I think that you should enter it as if you had actually taken the course at OKSU. Meaning... it should look the same as if you had actually driven to Oklahoma to take the class in person. I think this is correct because I don't recall there being a distinction for online vs. in person classes.

Perhaps someone else has some idea if I'm right?
 
i believe what twelvetigers said is correct. granted, i'm in the same boat (applied last year, not applying this year) so i can't totally verify, but last year i took a distance/online course from the same university i was actually attending full time, and it got entered the same way.
 
You enter the college as if it was one you physically attended, or will attend. Then when you enter the individual course, it will give you an option to say if it is distance or online. It is under the classification description.
 
Pomona2006 said:
Hey Ferral -
I don't think you should worry too much as I received the same message when I emailed them and I got a reply within 24-48 hrs. I actually forgot that I received the annoying out of office reply because I received a timely response from them. Hopefully it will be the same for you!

🙂
Click to expand...

Thanks.

Yeah they did get back to me within 24 hours. I retract my unwarranted panic 🙄
 
Any news on being able to enter classes taken abroad (non study-abroad) into the VMCAS transcript page??

It still doesn't seem to work on my application, I know some of you guys had given them your contact info, so wondering if you'd heard about resolving this issue.

Now, I got an email today from my school in the UK saying even though they know who I am, they can't seem to find *any record* of my having been there.... While my official completion certificate is sitting in front of me, and that lists the correct school.... hahahahahhahahahah oh dear. Think good thoughts for me here, people, I've already paid the transcript evaluation company! Hopefully they'll actually get some transcript material!:laugh:
 
starlene45 said:
Any news on being able to enter classes taken abroad (non study-abroad) into the VMCAS transcript page??

It still doesn't seem to work on my application, I know some of you guys had given them your contact info, so wondering if you'd heard about resolving this issue.
Click to expand...

Funny you should mention this, Starlene, because this is actually exactly what I just emailed them about.

I asked about listing coursework for my summer semester abroad on the VMCAS "Coursework" page and got this extraordinarily helpful 2 sentence answer 😉

"You will not be able to list the actual coursework, just the institution. However, you will have to get your transcripts translated and sent to each of your designations."

What I am planning to do is just list the name of the institution and the coursework in the Explanation section. Anyone else have any different ideas?

b.t.w. upon contacting a few of the schools I'm applying to, most have said that they won't require a evaluation service if the foreign transcripts are in english and the grading system is clearly stated 😀
 
Thanks for the update Ferral! Actually that situation is fine with me, I was at an ag college in the UK and the grading system is not letters like ours, classes ran all year instead of in semesters, and basically it would've been difficult to put it on the web page in their format. I'll see if I can put my institution down, and enter the rest into the "Explanation" section.

About 1/2 of my schools wanted transcript evaluations, and 1/2 not... I decided that since I'm having such a hard time just getting one copy of the records out of the UK I will just pay the extra $$ and have the evaluation service send it out to all my schools, then at least I know they'll get there!
 
I was wondering what the general opinion was about creating a category for personal pets under animal experience. I thought I would just list the types of pets that I have had over the years as it includes small, exotic, food animal, and equine- but I'm still unsure about it. I am applying to UGA CVM and they previously had a supplemental application for information on personal pets, but they decided to remove it from the requirements for this application cycle!
I think I remember reading a post about this topic, but I tried searching and I can't find it, so I apologize if this is mis-posted.
 
lenmaca said:
I was wondering what the general opinion was about creating a category for personal pets under animal experience. I thought I would just list the types of pets that I have had over the years as it includes small, exotic, food animal, and equine- but I'm still unsure about it. I am applying to UGA CVM and they previously had a supplemental application for information on personal pets, but they decided to remove it from the requirements for this application cycle!
I think I remember reading a post about this topic, but I tried searching and I can't find it, so I apologize if this is mis-posted.
Click to expand...

Last year's VMCAS instructions indicated that personal pets should not be entered, but I don't know what it says this year. Like you said, though, some schools do want you to tell them about personal pets on the supp (VMRCVM like UGA also wants to know about your pet experience) and others don't, so I would think putting pet ownership info into VMCAS would be received differently by different schools.
 
starlene45 said:
since I'm having such a hard time just getting one copy of the records out of the UK I will just pay the extra $$ and have the evaluation service send it out to all my schools, then at least I know they'll get there!
Click to expand...

TELL me about it!!!! 🙄
I faxed my transcript requests to my international study abroad school 2 weeks ago and have been emailing them non-stop trying to get a confirmation that they received the fax. Finally, today, after emailing the dean of the school, I got a response. Apparently, THEY NEVER RECEIVED THE FAX!!!! 😱
Now I'm in a major time crunch to get the transcripts that need to be evaluated to the evaluation service. I'm gonna have to fork over the big bux for international fed ex. 👎

Anyways, I hope your situation goes more smoothly than mine😳
 
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