These forums make it seem like it is a crime against humanity to submit your amcas anytime after July. Such as submitting at the end of august when I plan to. I just want to get some real opinions that recognize the total application pool and not just the overachievers on this site! With good numbers and good experiences submitting at the end of august and early september wont hurt you at all, IMO.
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haha, you're talking about a website full of gunners here. The general consensus seems to be, if you apply and your AMCAS is submitted in the summertime and verified by August sometime, you should be considered early. If you submit anytime in August to September, you'd be thrown in with every other student who's taking the MCAT in august, and you'll be in a larger pool of applications thats going to get throw at med schools (I suppose this is about the time when they start getting a large chunk of applications). The idea is, that by the time you submit in August or September, you'll be verified by late september or late october (since by then it wouldnt really be that much of a shock if your app does take the full six weeks to verify). By then, especially for rolling schools, students will have already gone through interviews, early decision students will already be hearing back about results, and some students might already be given acceptances, all while your application is still awaiting to eb verified. Odds are, if you are given an interview, it will be in december or, more likely, later. So, you might ask, does it hurt your application itself that you are submitting it "later" then others? No. Not really. But, for rolling schools, you might be fighting for less spots now that seats have already started to be given out to students who submitted AMCAS the day that they could be submitted in early June and had theirs verified within a week.shook33 said:
there seems to be one consensus of a regret among mdapplicant profiles from previous years
"apply early...i wish i had applied earlier"
"apply early...i wish i had applied earlier"
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I figure if I do as well as I expect to this august I will get into one of the MD schools Im applying to and that is just fine with me. I dont care if I get in with the last seat open at a particular school or I am the first student on a ranked waitlist and once someone inevitably declines an acceptance, Im in.
my main view is it doesnt matter if you are accepted early or late your still accepted and IMO as long as I get into a US MD school Im happy! thanks for your opinions!
gunners... gunners ... gunners!
my main view is it doesnt matter if you are accepted early or late your still accepted and IMO as long as I get into a US MD school Im happy! thanks for your opinions!
gunners... gunners ... gunners!
If you're taking the august MCAT, then your app won't be looked at until the scores are realeased anyways, so i would aim to have it verified by that point so that you're not held up. The earlier you're verified, the earlier you'll get secondaries...If you can have secondaries at schools before you get the MCAT scores back, then there'll be nothing holding you up.
I still think with the August MCAT, the earlier the better. If you're starting now, there shouldn't be anything to keep you from submitting in the next two weeks---besides maybe PS editing? I'd have your transcripts sent ASAP as those held my app up a little bit
Not everyone with a good MCAT and gpa gets in to medical school, and a lot of the applicants who are around sdn reapplying do seem to think that applying to more schools and applying earlier would have helped. I think an attitude that every part of your app counts and that you're among a competitive group of applicants, regardless of what your mcat score ends up being will work to your advantage
I still think with the August MCAT, the earlier the better. If you're starting now, there shouldn't be anything to keep you from submitting in the next two weeks---besides maybe PS editing? I'd have your transcripts sent ASAP as those held my app up a little bit
Not everyone with a good MCAT and gpa gets in to medical school, and a lot of the applicants who are around sdn reapplying do seem to think that applying to more schools and applying earlier would have helped. I think an attitude that every part of your app counts and that you're among a competitive group of applicants, regardless of what your mcat score ends up being will work to your advantage
yeah but like taylor said, one of the main things people say when they look back on this application process is that they wish they had applied earlier. some people applied later in the process one year and then applied earlier the next year with completely different (and better!) results.shook33 said:
if there's one thing you have control over in this process, it's when you turn your applications in. why not turn them in as early as possible, since that seems to have definitely helped other people?
i agree. its not relaly that much harder to submit it now. you have to take into account that verification will only get longer as time goes by, probably leaning towards the 6 week mark. Then, not to mention you'll have to do secondaries, and all,a nd then wait for that to get processed, and then wait for your primaries to be looked at, wait for screens, wait for this and that and A and B and oranges and pears. submit it now, ull be verified by mcat time, ull get invites to secondaries, and u can then get em all done by the time your mcat scores are out.
you should apply as soon as you think you can put together the best possible application. If it takes waiting for summer grades, summer vounteer stuff, or better LOR's until the fall, I have to believe you'd be better off waiting.
I'd hate to break it to you, but frequently schools will not accept ANYONE off their waitlist.shook33 said:
You might think it's cool to put off applying to med school and have a lazy summer, but like everyone else was saying, give yourself every advantage that you can. If you submit at the end of August, plan on 1-2 weeks for AMCAS to verify your information, 2-4 weeks for schools to process your information and send you secondaries, 2 weeks to complete and submit secondaries, 1-4 weeks for schools to act on submitted secondaries, then 2-6 weeks until you can interview on the next open interview date.
Best case that's 2 months before you can even interview, but more like November and December. On the other hand, some of your peers who submitted in June and early July will have acceptances in mid-late October.
Spending your last year of college having already been accepted to medical school is A LOT more fun than waiting until your summer off to learn your fate.
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"cool" .....I dont think its cool to submit later, but its a fact of life for me. I work about 65 hours a week right now in addition to studying most waking hours for the MCAT fast approaching. I figure once the MCAT is over then I will finish up my amcas; but I dont want to rush thorugh my application and submit a poor application or statement. And as far as having a nice relaxing year of college with an acceptance its not that important to me; considering I work full time in a research lab. But thanks for climbing up to your big chair, and talking down to me! I appreciate your input!
Woe unto thee ... look around some of the waitlist threads from this past cycle and you will see that this past year was nearly stagnant with movement. Apply as early as possible so you will get interviews as soon as possible so as not to necessitate the whole waiting game. Trust me, I've done the waiting game two years in a rowshook33 said:
its alot more then 2 weeks now for AMCAS to verify, id say 4-6 (and most likely 5) is more like where it will stand nowDarko said:
i understand your commitment to other things, but is it detrimental to take off one week to finish off your AMCAS and get some more MCAT studying in? Its understandable that you dont want to submit an application that you slopped together because of your own time committments, but i would think it to be helpful in your case to just take a week off of work and focus on one of the more pressing priorities in your life- MCAT and AMCAS.shook33 said:
In your OP and second post you derided applicants who apply to AMCAS immediately as gunners and overachievers. You also indicated that you *want* to submit late Aug, but it looks like now that's kind of the hand you're dealt.shook33 said:
I'm sorry that you feel I'm talking down to you, but just know there's a strategic reason why a lot of people apply before Aug and it's not because of OCD. I'm another person that had to reapply, and I'd hate for someone else to have go through that process themselves.
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i love these threads! guess ill be in the reapp category next year...Ill keep yall updated!