Have any of your friends gone Caribbean Med?

[calivianya]

@calivianya If they are research professors then they are doing likely doing overseeing bench work over the summer. If they are active professors on campus then they are teaching classes in September. If they are writing your recommendation letters then you should know where there offices are and who their personnel team is and how to get in contact with them. Did you provide them with a skeleton model for your letter, a resume, a personal statement for why you want to become a physician, and a transcript of your grades?

I did ask for a letter, and asked what they wanted from me and what questions they had, and they both said they don't need anything else. I am wondering if that's because they just don't care/don't want anything else to look at.

I developed pretty close relationships with a few professors. One of them is writing a letter for me, but I asked him at the start of the course last spring if he'd be willing assuming I do well and engage the class. Well I knew it would be a bit before I needed the letter, so fast forward more than a year later, and we are quite close and have done research together.

You don't have to hustle if you just genuinely form relationships with people. A lot of these type As just view it all as a game with boxes to check.

No one wants to be someone else's checkbox.

This was definitely the problem I had. Didn't have the time/energy to develop close relationships. I was interested - I tried to talk to both of them outside of class at various points - but I was working full time and usually had to leave as soon after class as possible. I'd get out of class at 1 most of the time, have an hour drive home, and have to wake up at 6 PM to start getting ready for work so I could work 12 hours, get no sleep, and go to class half in a daze and sleep deprived the next morning. Pretty sure I feel asleep in every class at least once, but I always went up and apologized afterwards if I did. Some days even chasing down a No Doz with two red bulls just did nothing for me, and I wasn't the world's best student those days.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

I did ask for a letter, and asked what they wanted from me and what questions they had, and they both said they don't need anything else. I am wondering if that's because they just don't care/don't want anything else to look at.


This was definitely the problem I had. Didn't have the time/energy to develop close relationships. I was interested - I tried to talk to both of them outside of class at various points - but I was working full time and usually had to leave as soon after class as possible. I'd get out of class at 1 most of the time, have an hour drive home, and have to wake up at 6 PM to start getting ready for work so I could work 12 hours, get no sleep, and go to class half in a daze and sleep deprived the next morning. Pretty sure I feel asleep in every class at least once, but I always went up and apologized afterwards if I did. Some days even chasing down a No Doz with two red bulls just did nothing for me, and I wasn't the world's best student those days.

Yep. I hear you. I was working 80+ hours per week and had two kids under two at home. It's rough. That kind of stuff I think is what makes us non-trads valuable.

 

[PreMedMissteps]

I'm starting to think about investigating Carib a little more closely...

I have 515 MCAT, three degrees (two magna cum laude), cGPA/sGPA ~3.8, ~10,000 hours paid clinical experience, >100 hours clinical volunteering experience... I just can't get either of my science professors, the ONLY TWO professors I had more than once in my most recent degree, to get my letters done. I asked in May, they said yes, but it's now almost September and I have total radio silence.

If I can't get these two letters, I don't have any other professor letters. Every US MD/DO school I've seen requires professor letters. I have two physician letters from physicians I have worked with for years, I could get a couple of supervisor letters, and I could certainly get my volunteer supervisor to write me a letter as well. I'm just SOL on school letters.

Do Carib schools accept applicants without school letters?

It seems ridiculous to do a SMP, or, even more ridiculous, a fourth bachelor's, since I have a decent GPA and MCAT score. I'm not really willing to pay for more school just to meet professors to ask for letters when I feel like I have academically done everything else I need to do.

So you've applied this cycle but have no LORs from science profs? Do you have any LORs submitted at all?

You need to contact those science profs and politely remind them and mention a deadline. I know that sometimes profs ask students to "write up the LOR" and give it to them and they make a few adjustments and send it in. It may not be the most ethically sound way, but it happens more often than you might think.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

So you've applied this cycle but have no LORs from science profs? Do you have any LORs submitted at all?

You need to contact those science profs and politely remind them and mention a deadline. I know that sometimes profs ask students to "write up the LOR" and give it to them and they make a few adjustments and send it in. It may not be the most ethically sound way, but it happens more often than you might think.

Where does it say they applied this cycle?

 

[PreMedMissteps]

Where does it say they applied this cycle?

You're right, it doesn't exactly. That's why I put my words in the form of a question. Since he asked in May, it was possible that he needed the LORs for this cycle. I hope he needs them for a future cycle.

 

[jcorpsmanMD]

Lmfao at the SGU student claiming that MCAT does not predict step preformance
Does the MCAT predict medical school and PGY-1 performance? - PubMed - NCBI

Also we know that each carrib practically drills STEP into your heads as a mandatory course. No **** you'd pass it.

This means nothing. Not everyone has the same opportunity to study for the MCAT in an ideal manner. I scored "average" on the MCAT, I also only took 4 weeks to study and I was working part-time. In medical school, I will essentially be preparing for Step 1 the entire time + I'll have 6 weeks of dedicated Step 1 study time. So that link doesn't mean **** to me or many other people who didn't get to prepare for the MCAT the way it should be prepared for. I'd think this is common sense for everybody, that situations change. To make such a blanket statement like that is stupid.

 

[calivianya]

So you've applied this cycle but have no LORs from science profs? Do you have any LORs submitted at all?

You need to contact those science profs and politely remind them and mention a deadline. I know that sometimes profs ask students to "write up the LOR" and give it to them and they make a few adjustments and send it in. It may not be the most ethically sound way, but it happens more often than you might think.

I have two LORs submitted, both from physicians I work with. I reminded both of my professors this week.

I am applying this cycle. I figured asking everyone in May that I was safe for this cycle; that my letters would be in within a reasonable time. I submitted my primary in June, was verified in July, and finished with my secondaries by the beginning of August. I am going to add in some more schools with the two letters I have now, so at least some schools can be looking at me now since I'm incomplete at all 19 schools I first selected because I preassigned my letters.

If I had known more, I wouldn't have assigned letters to any school until they were already in, but it's too late for that now.

 

[ill be a doc soon]

Post has been deleted by mod as user has been banned for trolling

lmao

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

You're right, it doesn't exactly. That's why I put my words in the form of a question. Since he asked in May, it was possible that he needed the LORs for this cycle. I hope he needs them for a future cycle.

Looks like you were right! That's a shame.

 

[Goro]

lmao

I see the Orangpants troll has been busy. I love the Banhammer smacking sound, so more power to him.

 

[Princeton Medical Student]

This means nothing. Not everyone has the same opportunity to study for the MCAT in an ideal manner. I scored "average" on the MCAT, I also only took 4 weeks to study and I was working part-time. In medical school, I will essentially be preparing for Step 1 the entire time + I'll have 6 weeks of dedicated Step 1 study time. So that link doesn't mean **** to me or many other people who didn't get to prepare for the MCAT the way it should be prepared for. I'd think this is common sense for everybody, that situations change. To make such a blanket statement like that is stupid.

I don't think you seem to understand the link. It isn't my prediction. It isn't my thought process. It's a studied correlation.. Will it always be true? No. I am sure you can find someone who got a 498 who could in theory do 90th percentile on USMLE. The point is that it is entirely incorrect to assume that there is no correlation between MCAT and Step 1 which was what the previous SGU student suggested.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

I don't think you seem to understand the link. It isn't my prediction. It isn't my thought process. It's a studied correlation.. Will it always be true? No. I am sure you can find someone who got a 498 who could in theory do 90th percentile on USMLE. The point is that it is entirely incorrect to assume that there is no correlation between MCAT and Step 1 which was what the previous SGU student suggested.

You're dealing with someone who doesn't get anecdotes versus data.