WA or CA Resident

[Brooke3]

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I grew up and went to college in Washington but came down to California to do my master's. I'm planning on staying down here and working for a couple of years before applying to med school and am trying to decide if I should keep my WA residency or apply to be a CA resident (I already have my CA driver's license and have been here for a year). I see good and bad to both sides:

WA: Better chance of getting into UW, cheaper tuition if I did get into UW, probably won't affect my chances of getting into any of the UCs

CA: If I did happen to get into a UC- free tuition! (I think?) I also might have a better chance of admission as a CA resident.

Ideally, I'd love to stay in the bay area, but UCSF and Stanford are such a crap shoot. I'd be happy to return back home to Seattle, but would prefer the bay area. I'd be happy to take any advice! (If my stats help: 3.3 in Chemical Eng UG from UW, 3.95 in Bioeng MS at UCSF/Berkeley, still need to take a year of bio and Ochem to apply (any advice on where to take these?), no MCAT yet, ~100 hours volunteer in ER at SF General, Took the GRE and got V 490, Q 800, W 4.5, lots of research experience)

 

[0919mmk]

I grew up and went to college in Washington but came down to California to do my master's. I'm planning on staying down here and working for a couple of years before applying to med school and am trying to decide if I should keep my WA residency or apply to be a CA resident (I already have my CA driver's license and have been here for a year). I see good and bad to both sides:

WA: Better chance of getting into UW, cheaper tuition if I did get into UW, probably won't affect my chances of getting into any of the UCs

CA: If I did happen to get into a UC- free tuition! (I think?) I also might have a better chance of admission as a CA resident.

Ideally, I'd love to stay in the bay area, but UCSF and Stanford are such a crap shoot. I'd be happy to return back home to Seattle, but would prefer the bay area. I'd be happy to take any advice! (If my stats help: 3.3 in Chemical Eng UG from UW, 3.95 in Bioeng MS at UCSF/Berkeley, still need to take a year of bio and Ochem to apply (any advice on where to take these?), no MCAT yet, ~100 hours volunteer in ER at SF General, Took the GRE and got V 490, Q 800, W 4.5, lots of research experience)

I would recommend WA. Being a CA resident is brutal, truly. My SO got 10+ interviews and 5 acceptances last cycle. She is a CA resident, and out of the interviews she got, none were at CA schools! Crazy. I would do WA.

 

[DrMidlife]

First off, figure out the rules. You can probably claim WA residency because your parents paid taxes there, presumably your whole life. You may not be able to claim California residency if you've only been a student there (you haven't paid in, so CA has no obligation to pay your way, particularly given the CA budget catastrophe). Be prepared to have to document your source of income, your voter registration, your driver's license, your car registration, and the same for your parents...for WA or for CA.

California is the most competitive state to apply for med school. If you go that way, be prepared to need to apply multiple times and/or to not get in in CA at all.

WA has historically had a strong in-state (meaning WA, AK, WY, MT & ID) bias, and your odds are surely better in WA than in CA, but again, there's no guarantee.

Make sure to get A's and only A's in your remaining classes, so that your cumulative undergrad GPA is as high as possible. And don't screw around with the MCAT: do serious prep (not content review, test prep) and get your score back in time to apply early (which means early June). You'll want to get an MSAR and read lots of med school admissions web pages. For a painful reality check, take a tour of the school-specific threads in pre-allo and see how many 3.8/38's don't get into UCs.

Best of luck to you.

 

[Brooke3]

Thanks for the great advice! I do like the idea of having a slightly easier time getting in to UW- but it worries me only having one school as an in-state option. I know the UCs are an incredible long shot for me- but at least there is 5 or so of them.

Also, thanks for the advice on class as well as MCAT. I'm still fairly new to this process and don't plan to apply until either 2012 or 2013. Any advice is great 🙂

 

[V FIB]

UC schools are definitely NOT free. Cheaper than many privates, but still 30K in tuition.

 

[Kphrogg]

I have bad news for you. WA has insanely strict residency rules. If you are not domiciled in WA for at least one year leading to the date of the start of classes, WA does not consider you a WA resident. So, if you are planning to live in CA for a couple of years, you may be out of luck. Additionally, the fact that you changed your driver's license to CA may signal a lack of intent to return. Imagine you're an admin and you see and application in which the person (1) has not lived in WA for several years; (2) has changed their drivers license to CA; (3) doesn't pay any taxes in WA; (4) is domiciled out of state; (5) has no domicile in WA; and (6) works in another state. Are you really going to think that they are sincere when the claim WA residency and an intent to live and work in WA?

 

[wavewheel]

Actually, as long as the OP plans ahead, she should have no problem getting residency in either Washington or California. As long as she has changed her driver's license and paid taxes in California she is probably already considered a California resident - if you are a grad student in CA and do those things, you get residency after a year, even if you're in school.

The rule in Washington state is pretty explicit: you have to be a resident for 6 months before you apply to medical school to be considered in state. (This means that you end up being a resident for about 1.5 years before you start school.) You can read more here: http://www.washington.edu/students/reg/residency/medicalStudents.html

So as long as you move back home over Christmas the year before you apply in June, you should be fine. The only caveat is that you can't take more than six credit hours per quarter that spring, unless you're working at least 30 hours a week, because Washington IS one of the states where you can't establish in-state status while a student.

If I were making this decision, I'd go the UW route, but I can see plusses and minuses to both.

 

[DrMidlife]

WA has insanely strict residency rules. If you are not domiciled in WA for at least one year leading to the date of the start of classes, WA does not consider you a WA resident.

That's not insanely strict - that's typical.

So, if you are planning to live in CA for a couple of years, you may be out of luck. Additionally, the fact that you changed your driver's license to CA may signal a lack of intent to return. Imagine you're an admin and you see and application in which the person (1) has not lived in WA for several years; (2) has changed their drivers license to CA; (3) doesn't pay any taxes in WA; (4) is domiciled out of state; (5) has no domicile in WA; and (6) works in another state. Are you really going to think that they are sincere when the claim WA residency and an intent to live and work in WA?

Parents factor into this a great deal. Being a student outside your parents' state (even if you get a license there) doesn't negate your parents' contribution to your home state. Imagine what your mom & dad would have to say to their state assemblyman if Johnny goes off to Harvard for undergrad and that makes him ineligible for in-home-state tuition for med school.

You can usually find a school's residency questionnaire on the school's website. There's a whole bunch of parental info on there.

 

[Brooke3]

Wow- thanks for all the information! I knew this was the right place to ask! 🙂

When considering my parents (both from WA, working in WA), does it matter that I'm 26 and no longer a dependent?

 

[Kphrogg]

You can usually find a school's residency questionnaire on the school's website. There's a whole bunch of parental info on there.

Any tips for tracking it down? Searching for "residency" on a medical school website usually doesn't help you find what you're looking for in terms of determining your residency status.

 

[DrMidlife]

Any tips for tracking it down? Searching for "residency" on a medical school website usually doesn't help you find what you're looking for in terms of determining your residency status.

For UW it's here: http://www.washington.edu/students/reg/residency/medicalStudents.html

If a med school site doesn't have a search hit for "state resident" or "domicile" then try the host university main site.

When considering my parents (both from WA, working in WA), does it matter that I'm 26 and no longer a dependent?

Depends on what you mean by "matter" and by "dependent." You'll want to look at the rules.

UW's site above should be a pretty good place to look for guidelines specific to UW. I don't have a link for the UC's - and I'd bet CA will tighten its policies as the budget continues to hemorrhage, so stay on top of changes.

Best of luck to you.

 

[mmdp]

Well this just answers my questions about California med schools, so thanks to the OP! I just got back to IL from my 3rd vaca this year in CA and really want to apply there. We have family near Berkley so I was thinking about the whole residency thing too. I guess I will stick to being IL resident and hope for the best (I don't want to stay in the Midwest but just might have to apply all over).