When is a good time for vacation when applying to medical school such that you avoid having to worry about secondary submissions or potential interviews? Would it be right after the primary submission in early June or mid-late August?
When is a good time for vacation when applying to medical school?
- Thread starter hugh2012
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Secondaries get turned around very quickly and if you return secondaries quickly, interviews can start quickly. I would suggest finishing your primary ASAP and having it queued up and waiting to be sent to med schools. You can submit AMCAS on May 31st and it doesn't get submitted to schools until June 29th, so within those dates would interfere with application stuff the least.
Edit: I'm less familiar with ACOMAS, so I'm not sure about that
Edit: I'm less familiar with ACOMAS, so I'm not sure about that
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I went to Europe for 2 weeks August 8th and it worked out well for me. Finished my secondaries before leaving, though I did get 2 secondaries while there and 2 IIs. I was able to do everything on my phone no problem. Granted, if you don't think you'll be able to finish ~20+ secondaries in July I would wait until late August or go immediately after submitting your primary app.
I had a couple interviews in October you may be able to move them but one school just gave me a date and expected me to be there.
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Do most schools allow you to choose from a date or just assign you one?
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It varies. For some schools, I could select whichever I wanted from a few weeks of options. For others, I was given 1-2 dates to choose from.
I would avoid all travel Sept-Apr, personally. August is great. July is good too if you can whip out your secondaries in enough time.
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June is probably the best time, but honestly you could really go any time. I took a trip in June after I submitted my primaries, one in August after I finished my secondaries, a small one in September. Most schools allowed me to choose my interview date, but if a school assigns you a specific date, they will usually allow you to change it.
I prewrote my personal statement, activity description, and all the secondaries that haven't changed in the past few years.(Bc i was initially going to apply last year) So hopefully I will have a less painful summer and more rest time.
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I do believe that you can safely vacation from December 20. 2018 to January 6, 2019. Most schools will have a skeleton crew on duty in the adcom office during that time and most medical students are on break during that time and not available as interviewers, tour guides, hosts, etc.
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Prior to Labor Day (first Monday in September) might be relatively safe. After Labor Day, you run the risk that a school will offer you interview dates that are while you're unavailble due to vacation travel. How badly would you feel to miss an interview because you are on vacatoin. That said, a school that is enthusiastic about your application and trying to interview you in September, might be flexible in accomodating you later in the month (or in October) but you are taking a chance.
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