When should I start submitting my primaries to school if I’m not planning on sending secondaries until July 29 at the earliest?

[tsqd002]

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Because I’m taking the MCAT on June 27th and getting my score back on June 29th, I sent my application in to get verified using a burner school and was planning on adding schools after getting verified. My plan is applying to all my schools outright instead of waiting for my MCAT score to get back, and then spending July writing secondaries.

But because the earliest I could possibly submit all my secondaries is July 29th (MCAT score release), I’m wondering when I should add the schools I want. Since if I send my application to schools right after getting verified, the soonest most of my secondaries would come is beginning of July, but I essentially would be forced to wait to submit for like 4 weeks because of the MCAT score. Would it be better to send my primary application a little later in July, just so I’m in the 2 week range by July 29th- or is it better for schools to receive a primary application as early as possible, even if it means sitting on a secondary for close to a month?

My absolute goal is to have everything submitted to every school by the time my MCAT comes back on July 29- I've already been prewriting secondaries and the official prompts/essays for these schools would be out there in July, so it’s not like I couldn’t start writing some of these essays before I actually receive the secondaries.

 

[LizzyM]

Don't be hasty. Errors like the ones in paragraph 1 and 2 (getting score back on June 29th or July 29th) can't be corrected after you submit.

I'd say wait for the MCAT score as your list might change depending on the score.... No sense wasting secondary fees if the school is no longer in your target zone (which could be higher or lower). Also, while turning around secondaries in 2 weeks is good practice, there may be schools that don't send a secondary until they have your MCAT score.