When does the AMCAS become available

[pico61]

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Does anybody have a clue of when they will put up the amcas for 2006?

Thanks

 

[tinkerbelle]

i'm pretty sure it's available in may

 

[GuyLaroche]

Tinkerbelle is right. Also, you can only submit on the 1st of June. Submit exactly on that date and you're golden. Early bird catches the best worms. Get all your recs together now with your med admissions advisor, and start working on your personal statement. I hate to add to overwhelming premed paranoia, but you simply cannot be too early.

 

[tinkerbelle]

Also, you can only submit on the 1st of June. Submit exactly on that date and you're golden. Early bird catches the best worms. Get all your recs together now with your med admissions advisor, and start working on your personal statement. I hate to add to overwhelming premed paranoia, but you simply cannot be too early.

See, my friends told me to wait a week after AMCAS is available for submission so that AMCAS can iron out any problems.

But submiting your AMCAS between June 15 & July 15 is pretty early. Aim for that time frame. And as GuyLaroche says, get to work on gathering recs. Late recs can really screw you over.

 

[willthatsall]

Maybe a silly question, but how exactly do you gather recs? I have a committee at my school that we must get a letter from, but do I need other letters too? And when are we supposed to send these letters to schools, because we can't send them ourselves if we waive the right to see them, right? Also, what exactly is the personal statement supposed to consist of? How many words?

 

[JohnB79]

Maybe a silly question, but how exactly do you gather recs? I have a committee at my school that we must get a letter from, but do I need other letters too? And when are we supposed to send these letters to schools, because we can't send them ourselves if we waive the right to see them, right? Also, what exactly is the personal statement supposed to consist of? How many words?

Ask the prof's who you want to write you a letter of rec to send it to the committee, also don't forget to give the prof a wavier slip so they know you wont read it.

 

[GuyLaroche]

Well, if you have a committee at your school, I believe that counts as one rec? (SDN-ers correct me if I am wrong). You are then to provide how many other additionals the school requires and this should vary from school to school. At Harvard, you are expected to submit letters from all research supervisors - a maximum of six, I believe. Boston U requires only three, two of which should be from science instructors. You must stress to your recommenders that they present personal statements that not only highlight their vote of confidence but that they know you - and well too.

A personal statement is a sonnet, a breathtakingly perfect prose, a cleverly crafted play of words that sings most loudly your praise in soft, mufled tones that carry within them an equal dose of modesty as wit. Hmmmmm, not really. It is a well-written summary of your interest in medicine and other aspects of your application you could not highlight in the rest of the AMCAS application. It should be as short as is possible and as pleasant a read as you can absolutely make it. You should work on it for as long as you can, and get a lot of input from present medical students, physicians, your premed advisor and any friends you might have in the English department. No grammatical errors are allowed, and no whinny excuses. It should go through several edits with several editors. Mine went through four edits. It's serious. You know you have a killer statement when it's all the interviewers want to ask you about at interviews. Get a book on how to write one. Take a walk. Write.

 

[tinkerbelle]

It should go through several edits with several editors. Mine went through four edits. It's serious.

4? You lucky, lucky guy. I went though 10 drafts before the Writing Center dude told my PS was decent 😡

 

[AzAm34]

How much later do the MCAT scores come out after the AMCAS application can be submitted? Right now, I'm toying with the idea of waiting for the MCAT score to be sent before sending in the application (save some money by not applying to some out of reach schools, or applying to some schools that I thought were out of reach), but I don't want my application to be held up at the same time.

 

[GuyLaroche]

How much later do the MCAT scores come out after the AMCAS application can be submitted? Right now, I'm toying with the idea of waiting for the MCAT score to be sent before sending in the application (save some money by not applying to some out of reach schools, or applying to some schools that I thought were out of reach), but I don't want my application to be held up at the same time.

Well, MCAT scores are released in June for April test takers and October for August test takers. Clearly, your strategy of waiting for score releases will work only if you take the April test. If you attempt this with an August test, 40T or no, you've screwed yourself over.

 

[Skichic56]

How much later do the MCAT scores come out after the AMCAS application can be submitted? Right now, I'm toying with the idea of waiting for the MCAT score to be sent before sending in the application (save some money by not applying to some out of reach schools, or applying to some schools that I thought were out of reach), but I don't want my application to be held up at the same time.

The best advice I was given regarding this was to submit the AMCAS asap, but only indicate a very small number of schools (1 or 2 even) that you are certain you will apply to. Then wait for your MCAT scores, and decide on the rest. This way your application will begin to be processed by AMCAS and you minimize the money you might lose. This worked well for me because my application was submitted June 6th and processed by the 15th, even before scores were released. I didn't receive my first secondaries until July 3rd anyway, so initially indicating only a few didn't slow the process. Get your AMCAS in as soon as you can, though. Good luck!

 

[willthatsall]

Ask the prof's who you want to write you a letter of rec to send it to the committee, also don't forget to give the prof a wavier slip so they know you wont read it.

My committee doesn't ask for letters from any other professors. Instead, I am allowed to appoint 2 people (professors most likely) to go to the committee meeting and speak on my behalf. Since I will only have one letter, should I be asking other people to write letters before I apply to schools? Here's my situation: I play basketball and we start our official practice in mid October and start playing games in November. I want to have all of my applications complete as soon as possible so I can start interviewing hopefully before october/november. Should I start collecting LOR's now before I even know how many I need? My pre-med committee guy seems like he isn't really on the ball as far as getting everything done as quickly as possible. He is telling me that as long as I get my letters sent out my next august/september I will be fine, but I am trying to do it at the first possible moment.

 

[GuyLaroche]

My committee doesn't ask for letters from any other professors. Instead, I am allowed to appoint 2 people (professors most likely) to go to the committee meeting and speak on my behalf. Since I will only have one letter, should I be asking other people to write letters before I apply to schools? Here's my situation: I play basketball and we start our official practice in mid October and start playing games in November. I want to have all of my applications complete as soon as possible so I can start interviewing hopefully before october/november. Should I start collecting LOR's now before I even know how many I need? My pre-med committee guy seems like he isn't really on the ball as far as getting everything done as quickly as possible. He is telling me that as long as I get my letters sent out my next august/september I will be fine, but I am trying to do it at the first possible moment.

To interview in October/Dec, letters should be in end of July/early August. This means AMCAS should be completed sometime mid June as it takes 4 weeks to process and 2 weeks for the schools to send you secondaries. So, I guess the answer to the question of whether to start collecting LOR now is a big "yes". Your premed advisor is right if you do not have restrictions on your interview scheduling. But since you do, he appears to be wrong. You should have your LORs out at about the time you send out the secondaries, which as I mentioned earlier should be mid to late July. Start working on your application now. It is much easier to take your time over a long stretch than to try to get everything in on a tight time scale.

 

[Medikit]

4? You lucky, lucky guy. I went though 10 drafts before the Writing Center dude told my PS was decent 😡

I bet your writing center owns

 

[willthatsall]

To interview in October/Dec, letters should be in end of July/early August. This means AMCAS should be completed sometime mid June as it takes 4 weeks to process and 2 weeks for the schools to send you secondaries. So, I guess the answer to the question of whether to start collecting LOR now is a big "yes". Your premed advisor is right if you do not have restrictions on your interview scheduling. But since you do, he appears to be wrong. You should have your LORs out at about the time you send out the secondaries, which as I mentioned earlier should be mid to late July. Start working on your application now. It is much easier to take your time over a long stretch than to try to get everything in on a tight time scale.

Ok, so say I get the letters written... I can't see them, right? So do I have to tell each letter writer every time I want them to send a letter to a school? Because I can't actually send an LOR myself or I could have looked at it. It seems like it will be hard to make sure all the people send out letters when I need them to.

 

[GuyLaroche]

Ok, so say I get the letters written... I can't see them, right? So do I have to tell each letter writer every time I want them to send a letter to a school? Because I can't actually send an LOR myself or I could have looked at it. It seems like it will be hard to make sure all the people send out letters when I need them to.

If you have a premed advisor, then she will make a composite for you. All you have to do is provide the letters to the premed office, and pester them till you know they have compiled the composite letter for you. The composite letters will be made up of letters from all of the recommenders and a final letter from either the advisor himself/herself or the premed committee. Do not ask busy professors to send letters out. They won't do it on time. Ask them to send the letters to your premed advisor. Make sure to confirm that the premed office in your school provides this service. They should.

 

[ShyRem]

If you have a premed advisor, then she will make a composite for you. All you have to do is provide the letters to the premed office, and pester them till you know they have compiled the composite letter for you. The composite letters will be made up of letters from all of the recommenders and a final letter from either the advisor himself/herself or the premed committee. Do not ask busy professors to send letters out. They won't do it on time. Ask them to send the letters to your premed advisor. Make sure to confirm that the premed office in your school provides this service. They should.

NOT ALL OFFICES DO THIS. My college is small and has NO pre-med "office", just a bio professor doing double-duty (and the pre-med advisors aren't worth sh$t - they really sucked). So for me, I had to ask my professors to send out letters each and every time. Really held me up - I wasn't complete until November (and I asked for them in June). Sometimes there's not much you can do about it. We also don't have a composite letter since there's no committee - just lots of individual letters. *sigh*. what a mess.

 

[willthatsall]

If you have a premed advisor, then she will make a composite for you. All you have to do is provide the letters to the premed office, and pester them till you know they have compiled the composite letter for you. The composite letters will be made up of letters from all of the recommenders and a final letter from either the advisor himself/herself or the premed committee. Do not ask busy professors to send letters out. They won't do it on time. Ask them to send the letters to your premed advisor. Make sure to confirm that the premed office in your school provides this service. They should.

So this composite letter is all the letters you submit pasted one after the other, or does the pre-med office actually edit them and choose bits and pieces of each letter to make the composite? I wouldn't think med schools would want edited letters... Hopefully my pre-med office will do this for me even if they don't normally do so.

 

[GuyLaroche]

So this composite letter is all the letters you submit pasted one after the other, or does the pre-med office actually edit them and choose bits and pieces of each letter to make the composite? I wouldn't think med schools would want edited letters... Hopefully my pre-med office will do this for me even if they don't normally do so.

Nope, your premed advisor cannot edit another professor's letter. It is just the letters pasted one after the other, as you put it.