Undergraduate college: University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
Undergraduate Area of study: Biological/Life Sciences
Total MCAT SCORE: 523
MCAT Section Scores:
B/B 131,
C/P 132,
CARS 129
Overall GPA: 3.75
Science GPA: 3.73
Summary of Application Experience
Dual credit during high school brought down my GPA by .2 (undergrad 3.96 sGPA and 3.91 oGPA). Moral of the story: don\'t slack off and not expect it to bite you later.
Graduating in two years undergrad has been...interesting. The major thing for people considering graduating early and applying directly to medical school is to keep in mind that you simply have less time than other people to build an application that reflects you (grades, EC\'s, knowing professors and asking for LoR\'s, experiences, etc). That said, go for it!
DATES: 5/28/2010: DMACC transcript received 6/1/2010: UMN transcript received 7/16/2010: MCAT 7/19/2010: Primary submitted 8/12/2010: Verified 8/17/2010: MCAT score back. 39M! That was such a nice surprise since I felt completely drained after the test. Wow, just wow... except the writing. That\'s a different kind of wow. 9/16/2010: Rejected from Indiana. Last letter of rec submitted to AMCAS. Interviews and waiting now : ) 9/27/2010: Iowa interview 10/21/2010: Rejected from Case Western 10/26/2010: Iowa acceptance! <3! 10/29/2010: Withdrew from Einstein, Buffalo, Toledo, PennState, and VCU 11/01/2010: Withdrew from OSU 11/22/10: Rejected from UMN 12/16/10: Rejected from Dartmouth 12/22/10: Rejected from OHSU 1/21/11: Baylor interview 1/24/11: Rejected from Stanford 2/1/11: WashU interview 3/10/11: Waitlisted at WashU 4/13/11: Waitlisted at Baylor
COSTS: MCAT Examkrackers complete set: $75 MCAT: $230 AMCAS practice exams: $245 Transcripts: $5 Primary App: $480 Secondaries: $1200 Suit: $189.81 Iowa Interview (driving and hotel): about $100? Baylor Interview (flight using miles; staying with my brother): $5 WashU Interview (flight; staying at Olin): $139.40 Iowa Get Acquainted Day (greyhound, driving): $100? TOTAL: 2769.21 ;.;
Applied, Rejected
Indiana University
Applying for combined PhD/MSTP? No
Submitted: 08/22/2010
Secondary Completed: No
Interview Invite: No
Interview Attended: No
Waitlisted: No
Accepted: No
Rejected: 09/15/2010
Summary of Experience:
Rejected through email.
Seems heavy on state ties, gives secondaries only to people who it\'s going to interview, notifies pretty quickly of decision.
Summary of Experience:
Rejected through snail mail.
Honestly, this rejection came as a surprise and a huge disappointment. Well, guess this settles it then: gotta hang out with my undergrad friends here a lot more \'cause I won\'t be seeing them as much next year.
Summary of Experience:
Rejected through email. Haha, props to humor (?) though; the first line in the email is \"I am writing to share what I believe will be disappointing news.\"
Summary of Experience:
Rejected through snail mail (no change in online status). Note on interview format: started MMI this year. Also, Stanford does not accept pre-interview invite letters of update/interest.
Summary of Experience:
Notification of rejection (also, of complete application) through online portal only--I didn\'t receive any emails from OHSU other than the one with the secondary link. OHSU divides applicants by mission groups and seems to relatively prefer non-traditional students (don\'t take my word on that second part).
Summary of Experience:
Withdrew after Iowa acceptance.
This decision was pretty hard to make. I liked the ISP idea and in-state tuition after 2nd year possibility. I also got a good vibe from--albeit limited--correspondence with OSU and Dr. Capers. But time and money issues came up, and most importantly, realistically, I would attend Iowa over OSU.
Interview\'s on 12/8, but still, pretty excited! Also, OSU offers interview invites (to OOS) before the application is complete. Nice.
Summary of Experience:
It’s been a while since I logged in here and since my interview at WashU, but here are things that I remember (I’ll try finding materials from the interview day and edit what the schedule was like when I get back home)…
I visited during the snow-pocalypse. It was a bit stressful rescheduling flights to and from St. Louis, but WashU was super helpful by allowing people who had their flights canceled to stay at Olin and by feeding us. The pizza was delicious. And I would definitely recommend staying at Olin. Walls are thin, but nothing is more convenient.
Basics of the interview: Interviews offered M-F, with a pizza party the night before. I think I was among the last bunch of interviewees offered dates (on 1/7). About 10 people/day. Interview day starts at 7am with breakfast; talks on admissions, curriculum, and financial aid; either tour or interview (some people had had a 2nd one in the afternoon—no one in my group), then switch whenever finished; lunch; free time (penthouse is nice place to hang out).
Interview was open file. We focused on AP credit and early graduation first, which is specific to my case, but still, just know your application well. Pretty standard for rest of interview. At the end, my interviewer told me straight out “WashU loves students that love it.”
(Extra)Curricular Stuff: -Traditional curriculum: mostly lecture-based and only midterms/finals, I think. Also, 4 weeks to study for the Step 1. This may be good or bad depending on learning styles, but WashU students were fine with the traditional curriculum and/or learned with their classmates. -Lots of research opportunities: everyone I talked with about research was involved in some lab and they emphasized it was super easy to join one. There’s a long list of investigators, and students are welcome to email anyone on it.
Summary of Experience:
Waitlisted...no ranking available. I\'m hoping for a lot of movement, maybe even before 5/15!
Interview day just blew me away. It was really well done, had great food, and allowed you to really see what Baylor was like. Best thing, imo, was how friendly the students were. They loved Baylor, and I think I can see why. More below.
Interview invite for 1/21! YES. < 3!
My status just changed to \"not supported\" (12/14)...I really, really hope this means I\'m getting an interview invite next week or soon. Aah!
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Basics of the interview day: Baylor holds interviews on basically every Friday (last one this cycle will be 2/25/11); 50-60 people/day; optional sit-in on classes (8am-12pm), introduction at 12pm; 2, 30-min, 1-on-1 interviews (one student, one faculty) or basic science tours of teaching facilities from 1-4pm; student presentation on curriculum; hospitals tour; presentation on housing ends at 7pm; optional student gathering at Brian O\'Neill\'s Irish Pub/Grill at 7:30pm
Interview format: Very conversational. Open--both my interviewers started by asking me things they thought were interesting from my primary, and we just went from there.
Highlights: -Accelerated 1.5 years of (P/F) pre-clinical curriculum isn\'t \"too fast\" for the students; works in favor of students actually: average Step 1 last year was 241. -Geriatrics track--unique to Baylor among the schools that I\'ve applied to; very few other schools in general have such a focus. All tracks except for the research one take no extra time (international health, care for underserved, and ethics are the other 3 out of 5 tracks). -Great value. Baylor costs just a bit less than or equal to my in-state school. Wow. -MS1 (who drop in the main room for pizza) and other students that I\'d bumped into were super friendly and seemed very happy.
Facilities: It is the -Texas Medical Center-. Enough said. -Okay, maybe some more info. TMC is the largest medical center in the world. Ben Taub is the county hospital. MD Anderson, Children\'s, St. Luke\'s, Methodist--the list goes on; all of these are great hospitals, and Baylor students rotate can rotate through all of them.
Summary of Experience:
Found out at Get Acquainted Day that I\'m in Bean (one of the four learning communities)!
<3! First acceptance!
Very quick turnaround. UI offers interview invites to (IS) people before applications are marked complete.
Basics of the interview: I think interviews began on 9/17 this year. MWF choices; 15 people/day; talks on admissions, curriculum, and financial aid; lunch and tour with M1; either CBL with M4 or interview with 2 faculty; switch at 2:45pm. Structured interview was definitely different. My structured questions dealt with \"why medicine?\", organ donation shortage, and personal characteristics that make you a good physician.
(Extra)Curricular Stuff: -Service distinction track (one of three). I\'d been interested in IowaCare, the mobile clinic, and the free medical clinic before I heard about the tracks. It sounds like a good 30+% of each class takes this opportunity and ends up completing a track. -H/NH/P/F grading for most things.
Facilities: -State of the art buildings...in the shape of DNA strands and syringes :D Many facilities are connected, which would be a plus in the winter, to form the health hub. -UIHC is very impressive. I had hoped to see more during the tour, but there\'s only so much you can fit into 45 mins.
