What can I do better for next cycle?

[use_these_data]

Hi all!

I hope everyone's been powering through these last few months of I's, R's, and A's! I personally have been collecting R's and so I'm reflecting on where I might have gone wrong this cycle. I interviewed at two schools and haven't heard back yet, so there's still hope, but I'm looking toward the next cycle and thinking about how I can be a better applicant. The main thing that will have changed since last cycle is research--a publication that I listed as under review is now published, and I've been working full-time in a neurobiology lab since just prior to AMCAS submission last summer. I'll continue working in this lab if I don't get accepted this cycle.

I would be grateful if anyone could take a look at the below and give their two cents on where I can improve.

I was verified on 8/12 and submitted secondaries <2 weeks after getting them.

School list

Arizona-Tucson, BU, Colorado, Duke, Harvard, OHSU, UCLA-Caltech, UCSD, UNC, UPenn, USC-Caltech, Utah, UW

Stats etc.

Undergrad GPA 3.9, postbac GPA: 4.0, MCAT 522

Research hours: 2800 with 2 first author pubs in cognitive neuroscience (Master's work) and stroke rehab/service delivery, 1200 in lab at time of application (+1800 since applying--I included in my app that I was employed full-time in a lab for the next year)

Clinical hours: 300 scribing last year, 350 with patients 5+ years ago (I'm non-trad!), 6 shadowing

Faculty with whom I interviewed were complimentary about my essay writing and letters of recommendation, so I don't think either was my downfall. I'm wondering whether a paucity of strictly biomed research was. Also, does my school list need tweaking, other than bumping off some T10s to save on fees?

Thank you, and good luck to everyone still waiting on A's!

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[gnΩhmChild]

Similar MCAT/GPA as you this cycle. I think you identified it at the end of your post - unless there are any red flags on your application (which I'm guessing there aren't since you interviewed), I think the number of research hours is the main thing to 'improve'. Some would also consider your list top heavy. I also applied to most of the schools you listed and got rejected at a rate of 100% but found success at other schools. Good luck

 

[Fencer]

You only list 13 applications with a mix that includes high dreamer, no sufficient match, and poor number of school/programs where your academic benchmark numbers might overcome other components that might be lower than average... PM me

 

[use_these_data]

Similar MCAT/GPA as you this cycle. I think you identified it at the end of your post - unless there are any red flags on your application (which I'm guessing there aren't since you interviewed), I think the number of research hours is the main thing to 'improve'. Some would also consider your list top heavy. I also applied to most of the schools you listed and got rejected at a rate of 100% but found success at other schools. Good luck

Thank you for the feedback! I didn't do my undergrad in the States and my advisors weren't very experienced with MD-PhD applications, so I have a hard time identifying "tiers" of schools. How do you know whether a school is a reach or not, other than things like US News rankings?

 

[gnΩhmChild]

Someone on this forum once said something wise - every school is a reach when you're applying to MD/PhD. Having been through it now, I totally agree with that. Every school you think is a reach is an incredible reach, schools you think are a match are a reach, and there's no such thing as safety schools. I'd go about this as conservatively as possible. Fencer's insight will be useful for this.

US News ranking are basically a proxy for total research funding, which isn't a particularly useful metric but directionally its ok. PM me and I can send you a ranked list that I used. You can try to use average MCAT and GPA, but honestly with so many other components of the application those aren't really useful. You might try to look up some people in each program and get a sense of where they were as applicants in terms of publication, background, other notable experiences. That being said, there's no 100% guaranteed to win formula as far as I can tell.

 

[MSTPadvocate]

Someone on this forum once said something wise - every school is a reach when you're applying to MD/PhD. Having been through it now, I totally agree with that. Every school you think is a reach is an incredible reach, schools you think are a match are a reach, and there's no such thing as safety schools. I'd go about this as conservatively as possible. Fencer's insight will be useful for this.

US News ranking are basically a proxy for total research funding, which isn't a particularly useful metric but directionally its ok. PM me and I can send you a ranked list that I used. You can try to use average MCAT and GPA, but honestly with so many other components of the application those aren't really useful. You might try to look up some people in each program and get a sense of where they were as applicants in terms of publication, background, other notable experiences. That being said, there's no 100% guaranteed to win formula as far as I can tell.

US News rankings is a poor metric. 30% of the ranking is reputation and that is essentially unchangeable. 25% of the ranking is based on total NIH funding - which basically tells you one school is bigger than another. 15% is based on total NIH funding per faculty member, but the definition of a "faculty member" is vague. For instance, a clinical urologist or primary care pediatrician or an interventional cardiologist, all of whom might be 90% clinical/10% education, don't have the job of obtaining NIH funding but they may count as faculty in this metric. 13% is MCAT score, which is generally uniform between the top 30 schools (deviance of 10% maybe). 6% is GPA, which suffers the same problem as MCAT. "Faculty resources" is 10%, but US News doesn't really outline what that is.

A better way to assess is student outcomes - F grants, first author papers, total papers, % matching in their 1st choice, and then of course, student happiness and class cohesiveness.

My two cents.

 

[use_these_data]

Someone on this forum once said something wise - every school is a reach when you're applying to MD/PhD. Having been through it now, I totally agree with that. Every school you think is a reach is an incredible reach, schools you think are a match are a reach, and there's no such thing as safety schools. I'd go about this as conservatively as possible. Fencer's insight will be useful for this.

US News ranking are basically a proxy for total research funding, which isn't a particularly useful metric but directionally its ok. PM me and I can send you a ranked list that I used. You can try to use average MCAT and GPA, but honestly with so many other components of the application those aren't really useful. You might try to look up some people in each program and get a sense of where they were as applicants in terms of publication, background, other notable experiences. That being said, there's no 100% guaranteed to win formula as far as I can tell.

Your first paragraph is consistent with my experience, too--in hindsight I feel pretty naïve picking my school list.

I reached out to programs a year before applying to get a feel for the sort of students they were looking for/weaknesses I could address. I came away from those conversations feeling that I fit the profile for most of the schools I applied to...but you can never predict how excellent other applicants will be! So yeah for most of us, everything is a reach.