What is more predictive of match success step score or # of interviews?

[mr_Hat]

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Just a random fourth year feeling powerless while waiting for match day and ended up spending the morning looking at charting the outcomes and the interactive portal focusing on interviews attended and step scores. I noticed a significant % change in match chances were if I focused on one or the other for my preferred specialty. I was thinking about what is the best predictor of match chance, do you guys think step score or # of interviews is more important. In my mind it's two different phases before ERAS and after ERAS. Before ERAS I feel like it would be step score since it kind of determines your likely hood of receiving an interview. After ERAS when you have your interviews I feel like that's all that matters now. If you have a 270 you might have a 99% chance to match because you should expect X number of interviews. But if you only got 3 interviews when everyone else is doing 10 I feel like your match chance wouldn't be 99% any more and would be much closer to the match chance for a person with only 3 interviews.

 

[CidHighwind]

To me, it’s number of interviews. Assuming every place ranked you, it gives you a higher probability that you’re high enough on one list to match. Step won’t matter if you’re interview skills are bad.

 

[ciestar]

I think step scores are more predictive of getting interviews and then number of interviews are more predictive of a successful match

 

[CherryRedDracul]

Depends. There are diminishing returns for both. You want to have adequate numbers in both.

Thirdly, there's also how you interview. If you give off creeper vibes, you won't even rank to match at a program (true story).

 

[CyrilFiggis]

This has your answers. Your raw data affects interviews, your interpersonal skills affect your ranking. Every program I interviewed at said we wouldn’t be there is they didn’t think we could succeed. Maybe that’s just for EM. But I was also never asked about my step score (which was poor) or my grades. It was all interpersonal.

The charting data isn’t the whole story because it only accounts for highly quantifiable data.

https://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/NRMP-2018-Program-Director-Survey-for-WWW.pdf

 

[Dantrolene FC]

I think the best predictor, although there is no data available, would be the percentage of programs who offered you an interview compared to the number of programs you applied to.

Say applicant A applied to 10 programs and got 8 interviews. And Applicant B applied to 100 programs and got 12 interviews. I would predict applicant A would have a higher chance of matching.

 

[Goro]

I think step scores are more predictive of getting interviews and then number of interviews are more predictive of a successful match

This

 

[CyrilFiggis]

I think the best predictor, although there is no data available, would be the percentage of programs who offered you an interview compared to the number of programs you applied to.

Say applicant A applied to 10 programs and got 8 interviews. And Applicant B applied to 100 programs and got 12 interviews. I would predict applicant A would have a higher chance of matching.

I don’t think this is a good metric because it excludes where the applicant applies. Applicant A could have applied to less competitive community programs. What about Applicant C who applies to 40 programs and gets 16 interviews? Is he less likely to match because it’s 40% vs 80%?

 

[Dantrolene FC]

I don’t think this is a good metric because it excludes where the applicant applies. Applicant A could have applied to less competitive community programs. What about Applicant C who applies to 40 programs and gets 16 interviews? Is he less likely to match because it’s 40% vs 80%?

In your example, I would say no because by that threshold, the curve has probably already topped off at ~98% match rate.

And I agree that it’s also important to look at the type of programs you applied to.

I think as long as you have a good number of interviews and get a 20% conversion rate from applications to interviews, then you probably are sitting in a desirable spot to be in right now.

 

[NickNaylor]

At our program, step scores are essentially irrelevant when it comes to the final ranking of applicants. There is an essentially negligible bonus given to applicants with high (>250) step scores, but it's so little that it doesn't have a meaningful impact on the outcome. Granted, I'm in psychiatry, but the interviews are far more important when it comes to ranking applicants. My program uses rubric-based scoring to form the final rank list, and interviews are the largest contributor to the final score, followed closely by third year academic performance.

However, this topic is much more complicated than just "which is more important." The type of students that get high step scores are, generally, going to be strong students in general: they are going to be the same people that get great clerkship grades, participate in research and get publications, get outstanding LORs, etc. Rare is the student that gets a great score on step but is otherwise a horrible student. There's a significant amount of confounding going on: do people with high step scores succeed on that merit primarily? Or do they succeed because they are generally excellent students and the high step score is simply one manifestation of that fact? I argue the latter.

 

[hallowmann]

Depends. There are diminishing returns for both. You want to have adequate numbers in both.

Thirdly, there's also how you interview. If you give off creeper vibes, you won't even rank to match at a program (true story).

Yeah, but I imagine if you get enough interviews and interview at enough places, chances are higher that either they'd miss the creeper vibes or you'd fit in with them. The vast majority of "creepers" we've DNRed have gone somewhere.

I think the best predictor, although there is no data available, would be the percentage of programs who offered you an interview compared to the number of programs you applied to.

Say applicant A applied to 10 programs and got 8 interviews. And Applicant B applied to 100 programs and got 12 interviews. I would predict applicant A would have a higher chance of matching.

I'd say that's generally true, but I interpreted the question a bit differently: Say applicant A got a 230 and 10 interviews, is that better than applicant A getting a 225 and 12 interviews regardless of how many places they applied?