Why do NOVA interviewers ask if you are applying to other schools and what your interview status is? Will it affect your chances of being admitted?
why does nova ask "what other schools"?
- Thread starter dangit
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I don't think so. I was asked about that like you and I was asked in the interview "What would you do if you were not accepted to medical school?" Well I had been accepted to 3 other schools at that point so I tried to make something up. Then they asked the question again and I just plain told them I had been accepted other places. I still got accepted so I think its just fine to be honest. It is strange though and did throw me off. I also had to list last cycle (got all messed up last cycle and had to apply again...long story...) as well. It didn't seem to be a barrier. I would love to know the purpose for asking this.
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When I interviewed at Nova I'd been rejected from 23 MD schools, was waitlisted at one, had ten more active MD apps, and had 11 active DO apps. My AMCAS app, which I submitted with my secondary, was 18 pages long.
Didn't hurt me.
Didn't hurt me.
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honest, this is the reason I didn't apply to NOVA.
why do we need to list in our secondary the schools we've applied to, whether we got 2ndaries, interviews and why we were not accepted to each and every school?
i'd rather answer the question in interviews...
why do we need to list in our secondary the schools we've applied to, whether we got 2ndaries, interviews and why we were not accepted to each and every school?
i'd rather answer the question in interviews...
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I've read a lot of people writing down 20, 30, or even more schools in this section for NSU. It didnt seem to hurt them in the process. I wrote down 10 MD and 10 DO and it didnt hurt me. I would just be honest and not think twice about it.
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out of principle, i dont think its any of their business
i'm not putting down nova, just saying they dont need to know where i apply
if it doesn't make a difference in their decision making, then why ask?
i'm not putting down nova, just saying they dont need to know where i apply
if it doesn't make a difference in their decision making, then why ask?
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I applied to like 46 schools, listed them on the secondary and was accepted to Nova. In the interview they said something like Wow you applied to a lot of schools. I laughed and said something to the effect of "ya I did", they then asked the standard "Why nova over other places" question.
Hm, I guess Nova wants to know how likely you are to slip out of their fingers if they take you. Or else they want to know how desperate you are to get in somewhere.
This whole mythology that a med school is insulted or offended that you applied to 50 others, I just don't buy it. They have to know that it's super competitive and arbitrary and you have to apply to 20 or 30 schools these days, unless you have top scores and experience--and even then you're not a shoo-in.
If they ask--why did you apply to so many schools--I would simply respond that I really, really want to become a physician. If they ask--why Nova? I would tell them all the things I like about Nova: the weather, location, good clinicals, whatever. It's all that they can reasonably expect.
This whole mythology that a med school is insulted or offended that you applied to 50 others, I just don't buy it. They have to know that it's super competitive and arbitrary and you have to apply to 20 or 30 schools these days, unless you have top scores and experience--and even then you're not a shoo-in.
If they ask--why did you apply to so many schools--I would simply respond that I really, really want to become a physician. If they ask--why Nova? I would tell them all the things I like about Nova: the weather, location, good clinicals, whatever. It's all that they can reasonably expect.
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It depends on your answer.
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I think it is one of those questions that comes off abrasive and unusual but they really don't have any intention of that. I applied to 32 schools and it wasn't even brought up. (accepted)
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I was asked about it in the interview. They told me the amount of schools I applied to simply made me look more serious about becoming a doctor. Maybe they just want to know how badly you want it. It did make me nervous about it but in the end it didn't hurt me either. I go accepted. 
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You didn't need to list all that. All I listed was what schools I applied to. Why do schools ask half the questions they do? I got asked what year my dad graduated medical school. I got asked how many siblings I have and how many nephews and nieces I have. I was even asked what kind of tree I'd be. None of those questions really have any relevance towards anything.
I personally WOULDN'T rather answer the question in interviews. Then I'd feel like they are judging me. If I answered it earlier and got an interview invite then I assume it didn't matter. It just opens the door for a list of questions I'd prefer to not get into.
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...Really. May I ask what school asked you that?
Were you given options or did you have to think of a tree on your own? This is the most creative question I've ever heard for a medical school interview...
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I was asked if i was an Indian or a chief. When I replied "all chiefs are Indians, (or have at least probably been raised as Indians) they aren't mutually exclusive" , I thought my interviewer was going to fall over.
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If anything, by saying you've been accepted somewhere , you're showing that even with an acceptance you still want to go to nova.
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Good point.
I listed all of my wonderful rejections from the previous cycle, plus all of the schools I applied to this year on my app. I applied to equal numbers of MD/DO schools, and NSU didn't seem to care at all. They didn't even ask "why us?"!
Given the amount of stress this seems to cause people, I cannot imagine that they want to read of all of this. Even if people only applied to 15 schools, reading it all would be mind-numbing.
I was asked if i was an Indian or a chief. When I replied "all chiefs are Indians, (or have at least probably been raised as Indians) they aren't mutually exclusive" , I thought my interviewer was going to fall over.
Now that's the kind of question they should quit asking. At the risk of taking this thread tangentially off topic, in my opinion interviewers should stick to the point, which is to figure out what makes you want to become a physician, and what stands out about your background, how would you contribute to the healthcare profession, and how would you fit in at their school.
I was lucky that at my six interviews, they only asked me those relevant kinds of questions and left out the "What kind of kitchen appliance would you be" and similar nonsense. I will say, asking me how I would fix the healthcare system in the U.S. was kind of a toughie, but I think I answered it well enough to satisfy them (they gave me an acceptance, and I ended up at their school)--I would try to improve public awareness about health care through education efforts, starting in K-12 schools, I would get the public to recognize that healthcare is a scarce resource and not a "right" and burgeoning new technologies only make it more scarce and expensive, and so forth. Obviously it's not like I had any answers, nor do I today, but they just wanted to see if I was at least thinking about these issues in an intelligent way.
I think that's the kind of thing admissions committees should be asking, in addition to the personal kinds of questions based on the candidate's own background.
By the way, and this is slightly off topic, would candidates please, please stop dressing in black for interviews? We see these hordes of black-clad undertaker clones wandering around the campus and it's like the March of the Penguins. Who advises these people to dress this way? Personally I used to love wearing black, but for interviews I specifically bought a tan suit just to not look like another gullible premed. OK back to the topic
