WAMC? 3.9 sGPA | 516 MCAT |Canadian

[mrjan]

Hi all,
I posted a little while back and received a couple suggestions, though I'm still looking for some more insight regarding my chances as a Canadian at USMD schools. I've also switched my school list up a little, so it's not completely redundant.
Canadian schools are mostly out of the running due to CARS, but I'm pretty hopeful that I can find some love south of the border.

MCAT (score/percentile): 516 (95th)// 131(99th)/125(62nd)/129(92nd)/131(99th)
[I've been told to rewrite my MCAT due to that 125 in CARS, but I don't know if I can part with my overall 95th percentile score. Damn proud of that muddafudda right there.]

cGPA: 3.85 sGPA: 3.9

Graduate Degrees: MSc in global health, specialization in global diseases

ECs:
Clinical volunteering: 600+ hours of surgical and clinical shadowing overseas
-Volunteer emergency medical responder with St John Ambulance; was just promoted to sergeant of medical first response training (I oversee and lead all the medical training); too many hours to count

Non-clinical volunteering:
-Student Advisory Committee for my MSc program
-several humanitarian initiatives
-random soup kitchen/clothing drive type things that I don't know whether to even include on my app because they're random weekends here and there (nothing structured)


Research:
-currently researching health systems strengthening in LICs (was hired on after an MSc placement); publication should be out in the fall, national and international workshop presentations (1 year+)
-nephrology wetlab research during undergrad (2 years); basic lab protocols (westerns, IHC, IF, cell culture, animal studies);two publications, neither first author

Employment:
-your reg. uni student jobs (waitressing, summer parks, etc)

Misc.:
-mandatory field placement in India for my MSc; research and collaboration with international MSc students

Current List of Schools (after consulting MSAR)
-George Washington
-New York Med College
-Rosalind Franklin
-Oakland Beaumont
-Sidney Kimmel (Thomas Jefferson)
-Dartmouth
-Uni of Virginia
-Boston
-Case Western
-Wisconsin
-Stony Brook
(Still need to fulfill the Orgo II prerequisite for the following schools - will have that done by the end of the summer)
-Wayne State
-Michigan State
-Mayo
-St Louis
-Maryland
-Virginia Commonwealth

Reach Schools
-Stanford
-Cornell
-Duke
-Harvard

Any help is appreciated! Even if you just want to comment about whether I'm wasting my money, or if I might potentially be looking at an II in the fall.
Thanks!

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[gyngyn]

U of WI does not consider internationals, Mayo matriculated none and Stanford only matriculated 2.
The last tab in the MSAR (acceptance information) has this information.

 

[nonamesleft]

mandatory field placement in India for my MSc; research and collaboration with international MSc students

Did you do your undergrad in US/Canada?

 

[mrjan]

I did my undergrad (and masters) in Canada - McMaster University in southern Ontario

 

[mrjan]

Did you do your undergrad in US/Canada?

Whoops - forgot to quote you.
I did my undergrad and MSc at McMaster University in southern Ontario, Canada.

 

[mrjan]

U of WI does not consider internationals, Mayo matriculated none and Stanford only matriculated 2.
The last tab in the MSAR (acceptance information) has this information.

Noted, re: Mayo and Stanford
And by Wisconsin, I mean MCW, not UWisconsin. I emailed MCW to ask about how they view Canadians, and they responded saying Canadians are considered OOP applicants. They elaborated that approximately 50% of one of their campuses (I forget which one) are OOP, and 25% of one of their other campuses are OOP.

 

[gyngyn]

I emailed MCW to ask about how they view Canadians, and they responded saying Canadians are considered OOP applicants. They elaborated that approximately 50% of one of their campuses (I forget which one) are OOP, and 25% of one of their other campuses are OOP.

While their response may be technically true, in practice it amounted to only 3 interviews and a single international matriculant.
This is another example of how the MSAR is a better source of information than calling the school in most cases. Look at the acceptance information tab.

 

[mrjan]

While their response may be technically true, in practice it amounted to only 3 interviews and a single international matriculant.
This is another example of how the MSAR is a better source of information than calling the school in most cases. Look at the acceptance information tab.

I definitely appreciate your response! I might be misguided then - perhaps you can correct me. I have been advised that there are a handful of schools that would not consider me as an international applicant, but rather as an "out-of-state" applicant. Thus, I'm considered in the same pool as the OOS American applicants, and am consulting the second column on MSAR, not the third (which is what I've been doing this whole time). All of the schools listed above are those that that operate in this way.
Is this myth?
Thanks again for your feedback!

 

[gyngyn]

I definitely appreciate your response! I might be misguided then - perhaps you can correct me. I have been advised that there are a handful of schools that would not consider me as an international applicant, but rather as an "out-of-state" applicant. Thus, I'm considered in the same pool as the OOS American applicants, and am consulting the second column on MSAR, not the third (which is what I've been doing this whole time). All of the schools listed above are those that that operate in this way.
Is this myth?
Thanks again for your feedback!

Even though the school may consider you OOS, AAMC will still put internationals in the international data in the MSAR.

 

[nonamesleft]

I definitely appreciate your response! I might be misguided then - perhaps you can correct me. I have been advised that there are a handful of schools that would not consider me as an international applicant, but rather as an "out-of-state" applicant. Thus, I'm considered in the same pool as the OOS American applicants, and am consulting the second column on MSAR, not the third (which is what I've been doing this whole time). All of the schools listed above are those that that operate in this way.
Is this myth?
Thanks again for your feedback!

Instead of asking if/how a school looks at Canadian applicants, the question i asked these schools was "how many canadians are in the first year class/overall in the school". if they actually had more than zero, my follow up question was "how many of these were children of alumni from the med school." sometimes, Id also ask how many canadians they interviewed.

Not all schools will give you exact information, but the ones that actually truly take canadians will be able to ballpark something for you.

 

[gyngyn]

Instead of asking if/how a school looks at Canadian applicants, the question i asked these schools was "how many canadians are in the first year class/overall in the school". if they actually had more than zero, my follow up question was "how many of these were children of alumni from the med school." sometimes, Id also ask how many canadians they interviewed.

Not all schools will give you exact information, but the ones that actually truly take canadians will be able to ballpark something for you.

You've hit upon a real factor here.
When very few international applicants are interviewed or matriculate, they are often "internal" or special consideration candidates.

 

[mrjan]

Instead of asking if/how a school looks at Canadian applicants, the question i asked these schools was "how many canadians are in the first year class/overall in the school". if they actually had more than zero, my follow up question was "how many of these were children of alumni from the med school." sometimes, Id also ask how many canadians they interviewed.

Not all schools will give you exact information, but the ones that actually truly take canadians will be able to ballpark something for you.

You've hit upon a real factor here.
When very few international applicants are interviewed or matriculate, they are often "internal" or special consideration candidates.

Oooooooohhhh. Okay, now I get what you're saying re: MSAR data. Looks like I've got a night of editing my spreadsheets ahead of me. Thanks so, so much both of you! This clarification will probably save me a lot of time and rejection.

 

[victorias]

Oooooooohhhh. Okay, now I get what you're saying re: MSAR data. Looks like I've got a night of editing my spreadsheets ahead of me. Thanks so, so much both of you! This clarification will probably save me a lot of time and rejection.

Hey,

I am also a Canadian applicant. I am also working on putting together a spreadsheet and contacting schools with similar questions.
If you are interested, we can share and compare our school lists.

Thanks