Seeking advice

[gingergirl96]

I might be jumping the gun on this because I'm still on four waitlists and it's possible I'll be accepted this year...but I can't help but feel like I'm doing something wrong.

Stats: MCAT 504, cGPA 3.4 sGPA 3.36. I had a strong upward GPA trend and made Dean's List in my final semester.
6 interviews, no acceptances. Four of the interviews were prior to the end of September.
I performed practice interviews with my undergraduate advisor who used to be on the admissions committee for my undergraduate institution's medical school (a relatively competitive state MD program). He is not under the impression that I am a poor interviewer.

I also have nearly 3,000 hours of paid clinical work as a nursing tech in a level one trauma center ED, 40-50 hours of volunteer research work with patients, and good letters of recommendation.
My school forgot to assign me a pre-med advisor, so for half my time there I had a general advisor who had barely any knowledge of the science courses and the med school application process. When they eventually directed me to someone who knew how to help, I had already submitted an application late (I waited for my MCAT score to come back and thought that was an appropriate time to apply) to about 5 MD schools. Surprise, none of them interviewed me. My new advisor set me up for the 2016-2017 cycle with a committee letter and advice on how to send everything on time. I applied to DO schools because I learned about the programs and it fit better with my own values and ideas about medicine. I met a DO for the first time (they are not common in my area) while I was working in that ED; he was very patient with me and let me shadow him. I also did not want to be classified as a reapplicant, so I did not choose any of the same schools the second time around. I applied broadly to DO programs and had 6 interviews. 2 rejections (I didn't feel like a good fit for those schools anyway) and 4 waitlists.
I have a few suspicions as to why these schools did not accept me.
1. I'm on the younger side. The youngest person I have met in my process of applying was at least 2 years older than me.
2. My GPA isn't high enough. I finished my whole bachelor's degree in 2 years and it just looks ridiculous on paper. I shouldn't have taken so many classes at once but that's what happens when you let a super young first generation college student do everything on their own. I can explain this further if anyone wants to hear the story.
3. I did poorly in organic chemistry and although I retook it and got a much better grade, the fact that I had to retake it at all might be making some of these schools nervous.
4. I'm the unluckiest person alive and I'm not destined to have a career in medicine. The universe is trying to steer me in a different direction.

The waiting process is driving me insane, and I currently have nowhere to live and no job if one of these 4 programs doesn't accept me. My job replaced me because I had to tell them I was interviewing for med school, and the place that I was renting got sold by the owner. I want advice on whether I should take a Master's in something, or some type of post bacc program. I know my GPA and age are the issue, and time in school can solve both of those. I also want something that I can use if for some reason I am unable to get into a medical school. I can't do anything with my current degree in the state I live, and I definitely don't want a Master's degree that won't qualify me for a different job if I can't get accepted to a med school program.

TL;DR
6 interviews, no acceptances, going to be unemployed and homeless if I don't come off of one of these 4 waitlists HELP

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[acapnial]

Some SMP's do a better job setting people up for different careers if they decide against medicine than others. If you do find yourself going that route it's not a bad idea to ask the programs themselves what they do to prepare people for non-medical careers, and to ask what sorts of things their grads end up doing other than medical school. You can also ask folks at your undergrad what master's programs they recommend, if they have any idea. This is something that your premed advisor should theoretically have some ideas about.

I promise you the universe isn't trying to tell you anything. My 60,000 foot view gives me the impression that your GPA and MCAT are both in a zone where they're more or less acceptable, but your normalish MCAT doesn't make up for your less than normalish GPA.

I don't think that your age would make schools reject you automatically but they might make schools look at you through the scope of bias. For example- you took double coursework in two years, overextended yourself, and got a not terrible but not great GPA. When they ask you about this in interview do you say something like "I took on too much at once, and it thankfully didn't go as poorly as it could have, but the results are something I'm not pleased with and I learned an important lesson about pacing myself in taking on tasks" or do you say "I was very young and they let me do that, so of course my GPA suffered!". Because when you talk about mistakes you've made you need to A) Recognize that you're ultimately responsible for the mistake and B) Demonstrate that you learned the right lesson from it, and will apply that lesson going forward in your career. If you explain it during interviews the way you've explained it here they might be getting the impression that you don't think it was your mistake and that you didn't learn anything from it. Particularly since you're young they might be less apt to give any benefit of doubt in this arena. But it's very hard to say if this contributes to your waitlisting without knowing how your interviews went. Also, schools don't focus on ochem the way they used to, so I wouldn't worry about that particularly.

Don't fall into the thinking that the universe is controlling your life. You are the master of your own destiny and if you take the right steps, you will get into medical school. Depending on what the right steps are it may be delayed a year or two, but even if you're delayed multiple years you can get there a lot younger than I was. You should also PM goro, I think he said he would still check those during his sabbatical.

Some SMP's have direct links to medical schools that really help you get admitted. For example, the BMS master's program at CSU has a deal with RVU that allows several automatic admissions to RVU every year (at least it did last time I heard about it. This is another good thing to ask about when scoping out SMP's, if you do an SMP).

As far as living and job situation goes, could you stay with a family member while you find a job, if you don't get accepted this year? Then you could work for a year while applying for an SMP or reapplying to medical school. Times sound pretty tough for you right now but you can get through it, and you CAN still go to medical school, you just have to follow the right steps to get there. But it's too late to start SMP apps for 2017-2018 and it's too late to do anything about the medical school situation so I'd try to put all your energy to find a living situation and temporary job for now. If you want to reapply this year, you can do that over the next few weeks, and since you got multiple interviews you can probably pretty much recycle your app to minimize the amount of work put into that, I think.

 

[gingergirl96]

Some SMP's do a better job setting people up for different careers if they decide against medicine than others. If you do find yourself going that route it's not a bad idea to ask the programs themselves what they do to prepare people for non-medical careers, and to ask what sorts of things their grads end up doing other than medical school. You can also ask folks at your undergrad what master's programs they recommend, if they have any idea. This is something that your premed advisor should theoretically have some ideas about.

I promise you the universe isn't trying to tell you anything. My 60,000 foot view gives me the impression that your GPA and MCAT are both in a zone where they're more or less acceptable, but your normalish MCAT doesn't make up for your less than normalish GPA.

I don't think that your age would make schools reject you automatically but they might make schools look at you through the scope of bias. For example- you took double coursework in two years, overextended yourself, and got a not terrible but not great GPA. When they ask you about this in interview do you say something like "I took on too much at once, and it thankfully didn't go as poorly as it could have, but the results are something I'm not pleased with and I learned an important lesson about pacing myself in taking on tasks" or do you say "I was very young and they let me do that, so of course my GPA suffered!". Because when you talk about mistakes you've made you need to A) Recognize that you're ultimately responsible for the mistake and B) Demonstrate that you learned the right lesson from it, and will apply that lesson going forward in your career. If you explain it during interviews the way you've explained it here they might be getting the impression that you don't think it was your mistake and that you didn't learn anything from it. Particularly since you're young they might be less apt to give any benefit of doubt in this arena. But it's very hard to say if this contributes to your waitlisting without knowing how your interviews went. Also, schools don't focus on ochem the way they used to, so I wouldn't worry about that particularly.

Don't fall into the thinking that the universe is controlling your life. You are the master of your own destiny and if you take the right steps, you will get into medical school. Depending on what the right steps are it may be delayed a year or two, but even if you're delayed multiple years you can get there a lot younger than I was. You should also PM goro, I think he said he would still check those during his sabbatical.

Some SMP's have direct links to medical schools that really help you get admitted. For example, the BMS master's program at CSU has a deal with RVU that allows several automatic admissions to RVU every year (at least it did last time I heard about it. This is another good thing to ask about when scoping out SMP's, if you do an SMP).

As far as living and job situation goes, could you stay with a family member while you find a job, if you don't get accepted this year? Then you could work for a year while applying for an SMP or reapplying to medical school. Times sound pretty tough for you right now but you can get through it, and you CAN still go to medical school, you just have to follow the right steps to get there. But it's too late to start SMP apps for 2017-2018 and it's too late to do anything about the medical school situation so I'd try to put all your energy to find a living situation and temporary job for now. If you want to reapply this year, you can do that over the next few weeks, and since you got multiple interviews you can probably pretty much recycle your app to minimize the amount of work put into that, I think.

I know that's how I posted it here, but when I interviewed I did explain that I understood the mistake in overloading myself with course work. It obviously would have helped if someone was advising me but I still made the choices myself. I'm beyond happy that it didn't turn out worse than that. If I could do it again I would definitely take a different approach, and that's what I tried to explain in my interviews. That's basically the definition of learning your lesson. I posted it that way on here more for clarity purposes, ie lack of studying or understanding the material was not what caused my lower GPA. It was the structure of how I put my classes together, with no breaks and too many high level classes all at once.

This really is what I want to do with my life, I just need to sort out a plan. I'll do some research on programs and see if there is anything that makes sense for me. I can stay with family for now, but the issue is that they live in such a rural area I can't live with them and have a job that will help me with this career path. That's why I moved out in the first place. I am worried that not working in this field will hurt my application, but nursing techs don't make enough to survive the cost of living here (and research assistants have it even worse, I checked that out too)

 

[Trollest]

If you were born in 96, i dont see how your age is the issue.

 

[acapnial]

I know that's how I posted it here, but when I interviewed I did explain that I understood the mistake in overloading myself with course work. It obviously would have helped if someone was advising me but I still made the choices myself. I'm beyond happy that it didn't turn out worse than that. If I could do it again I would definitely take a different approach, and that's what I tried to explain in my interviews. That's basically the definition of learning your lesson. I posted it that way on here more for clarity purposes, ie lack of studying or understanding the material was not what caused my lower GPA. It was the structure of how I put my classes together, with no breaks and too many high level classes all at once.

This really is what I want to do with my life, I just need to sort out a plan. I'll do some research on programs and see if there is anything that makes sense for me. I can stay with family for now, but the issue is that they live in such a rural area I can't live with them and have a job that will help me with this career path. That's why I moved out in the first place. I am worried that not working in this field will hurt my application, but nursing techs don't make enough to survive the cost of living here (and research assistants have it even worse, I checked that out too)

Excellent, sounds like a plan. Fwiw i dont believe that not working in the field will hurt you in the slightest (my residency is my first healthcare related job!). They might ask you why you stopped but you have a reason any interviewer would accept.

 

[leturbinator]

I think that it might be a good idea to do an SMP. Some schools are still accepting, but if you can maintain a good GPA (3.6<) then you'd be competitive for a lot of DO schools. Apply early and broadly.

 

[gingergirl96]

Excellent, sounds like a plan. Fwiw i dont believe that not working in the field will hurt you in the slightest (my residency is my first healthcare related job!). They might ask you why you stopped but you have a reason any interviewer would accept.

That's really all I was afraid of, having them think I wasn't committed or something because I stopped. I did love that job I just couldn't survive off of what they were paying me, and I wasn't able to work there and live somewhere rent free. It definitely showed me what I liked about the field though. I greatly appreciate the advice!

 

[gingergirl96]

If you were born in 96, i dont see how your age is the issue.

Username is unrelated, I originally posted my age but I edited the post because I wanted to take away a few identifying details. Not that there was anything bad in my post, but just on the off-chance I don't want to give myself any worse odds of being accepted at this point!

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Interviewing is the issue. I highly suspect you didn't do anything wrong per se but your starts are very normalish as acapnial put it and if you are that young then you also probably have very normalish to below average ECs. I am going to go out in a limb and that your interviews were probably just average as well and so the schools looked at everything and went, "well they aren't a super candidate but they aren't terrible either, let's put them on the waitlist and see what happens."

With 4 waitlists there is a good to great chance you get off of one. DO waitlists tend to move a lot. I wouldn't stress too much, but still prepare for a reapplication. What are the 6 schools you got interviews at?

 

[gingergirl96]

Interviewing is the issue. I highly suspect you didn't do anything wrong per se but your starts are very normalish as acapnial put it and if you are that young then you also probably have very normalish to below average ECs. I am going to go out in a limb and that your interviews were probably just average as well and so the schools looked at everything and went, "well they aren't a super candidate but they aren't terrible either, let's put them on the waitlist and see what happens."

With 4 waitlists there is a good to great chance you get off of one. DO waitlists tend to move a lot. I wouldn't stress too much, but still prepare for a reapplication. What are the 6 schools you got interviews at?

Because of my age, I was only permitted to work in a hospital/clinic/research setting and shadow AFTER I graduated. Which sucked. So yeah, I would venture to say my ECs are worse than most people who had 4 years to work on them. I am doing my best now to make up for it, but there is only so much I can cram into that short period of time.
I was interviewed at BCOM, CUSOM, LECOM Erie, WVSOM, NYITCOM, and UNECOM. Unfortunately the 2 in my area waited until Spring to interview me.

 

[IdealNFP]

Well it's impressive that you were able to obtain 6 interviews, so clearly your application was deemed worthy of interviews. I think you're on the fence for a lot of these schools and you're so close to getting in. I feel like an SMP would be a waste of time/money because that's one whole year you have to pay/study when you could be taking a few classes at a community college and working part/full time. Maybe netting some other volunteer experiences that aren't necessarily healthcare related, but something worthwhile that you're passionate about.

You're almost there and I can't imagine the kind of angst you're feeling. Best of luck, I believe!

 

[gingergirl96]

Well it's impressive that you were able to obtain 6 interviews, so clearly your application was deemed worthy of interviews. I think you're on the fence for a lot of these schools and you're so close to getting in. I feel like an SMP would be a waste of time/money because that's one whole year you have to pay/study when you could be taking a few classes at a community college and working part/full time. Maybe netting some other volunteer experiences that aren't necessarily healthcare related, but something worthwhile that you're passionate about.

You're almost there and I can't imagine the kind of angst you're feeling. Best of luck, I believe!

That's why I feel so upset over it, because it feels like I was SO close and I barely missed it. All that application money wasted. The first year I applied late and got no word back from any school and I was not upset at all because I knew I had no chance. It didn't feel like I got so far only to fail.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

If you don't get in then take a year to beef up your ECs because those sound like your biggest issue honestly. Your GPA isn't great but it isn't bad either. Don't reapply too fast, it's one of the biggest mistakes reapplicants can make.

 

[gingergirl96]

If you don't get in then take a year to beef up your ECs because those sound like your biggest issue honestly. Your GPA isn't great but it isn't bad either. Don't reapply too fast, it's one of the biggest mistakes reapplicants can make.

I mean I did have other things also, like I was vice president of a club for the two years I was in school, and I was also working for/volunteering in a major non profit organization for 5 years. And I have some pretty intense hobbies that I spend a lot of time volunteering in also. That's in addition to the year and a half I spent in that hospital working full time (sometimes more than 60/70 hours a week). Maybe it seems like a lot just because I squished it all into 2 years, but how much should I be shooting for? Is it that I should ideally have more ECs to make up for the lower GPA?