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MCAT on AMCAS App


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Hi,

I'm planning to send in my application on June 1st when it opens.

My application is complete for the most part, but I have a small problem.

I have written the MCAT twice, both have scores on the low end. On my application, I also indicated that I will be rewriting the MCAT in August 2017 (which I am set on taking but have not yet registered). I was told that many schools do not review primary applications before they receive the new score (is this true?). This would defeat the my purpose of submitting my application early and taking advantage of the rolling admissions, right? 

 

In that case, would it be a better idea to submit my application without indicating that I will be taking the MCAT again and pray that my low MCAT, decent GPA, and above average ECs get me somewhere? Or would it be better to indicate that I will be rewriting my MCAT and hope that they don't really take my old, low MCAT into account (because new ones will be coming in) and send me secondaries or even an interview?

 

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I investigated this topic early in the year as I wanted to retake the MCAT for the same reasons. Ultimately the answer is that it is school dependent. I believe that MOST of the schools will keep your application on HOLD if even if you submit early and wait until your scores come in (thus defeating the purposes of submitting early). Some schools may ignore that you are rewriting and if your application (including past 2 MCATs) is good enough for interview they will invite you. 

I think there is some ambiguity on not indicating your MCAT rewrite. It may work - ie schools will see that and review your primary app, either inviting you or rejecting you pre-interview. It may also not work because the MCAT + AMCAS are both under AAMC, thus if you do decide you take your MCAT and register for it I would not be surprised if schools become aware of this. Might work against you because you didn't indicate it on your primary app and they would be turned off because you weren't transparent. Also, if they do see it they might just automatically put your application on hold. I think some schools require that if you change your mind after you submit your primary app and now want to re-take the MCAT you need to update them so they will put your app on hold and wait for the new score before reviewing your app. 


Take what I've said above with a grain of salt though and call schools/AMCAS or read SDN (with a critical eye) for more clarification!

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11 hours ago, PeterPatting said:

I investigated this topic early in the year as I wanted to retake the MCAT for the same reasons. Ultimately the answer is that it is school dependent. I believe that MOST of the schools will keep your application on HOLD if even if you submit early and wait until your scores come in (thus defeating the purposes of submitting early). Some schools may ignore that you are rewriting and if your application (including past 2 MCATs) is good enough for interview they will invite you. 

I think there is some ambiguity on not indicating your MCAT rewrite. It may work - ie schools will see that and review your primary app, either inviting you or rejecting you pre-interview. It may also not work because the MCAT + AMCAS are both under AAMC, thus if you do decide you take your MCAT and register for it I would not be surprised if schools become aware of this. Might work against you because you didn't indicate it on your primary app and they would be turned off because you weren't transparent. Also, if they do see it they might just automatically put your application on hold. I think some schools require that if you change your mind after you submit your primary app and now want to re-take the MCAT you need to update them so they will put your app on hold and wait for the new score before reviewing your app. 


Take what I've said above with a grain of salt though and call schools/AMCAS or read SDN (with a critical eye) for more clarification!

Thanks for the response! Yeah that makes sense. 

I have just one more follow-up question. Does being invited for an interview in US schools mean the same as that in Canadian schools? I guess what I'm trying to say is that if I were to receive an interview invitation, can I assume they they will put the greatest emphasis on my interview and perhaps overlook my flaws (low MCAT and maybe mediocre LORs)? I would really hate to pay all the secondary app fees, fly over for an interview (and maybe acing it if i'm lucky), and only to get rejected because my MCAT was too low. 

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1 hour ago, yych208 said:

Thanks for the response! Yeah that makes sense. 

I have just one more follow-up question. Does being invited for an interview in US schools mean the same as that in Canadian schools? I guess what I'm trying to say is that if I were to receive an interview invitation, can I assume they they will put the greatest emphasis on my interview and perhaps overlook my flaws (low MCAT and maybe mediocre LORs)? I would really hate to pay all the secondary app fees, fly over for an interview (and maybe acing it if i'm lucky), and only to get rejected because my MCAT was too low. 

Np!

Honestly I'm not sure. I think that in general US schools pride themselves on a "holistic review" ie it's pretty subjective and not very transparent in comparison to say McMaster's post interview formula. But you never know with submitting early and getting invited to the first interview date!

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 6/1/2017 at 11:07 PM, yych208 said:

Thanks for the response! Yeah that makes sense. 

I have just one more follow-up question. Does being invited for an interview in US schools mean the same as that in Canadian schools? I guess what I'm trying to say is that if I were to receive an interview invitation, can I assume they they will put the greatest emphasis on my interview and perhaps overlook my flaws (low MCAT and maybe mediocre LORs)? I would really hate to pay all the secondary app fees, fly over for an interview (and maybe acing it if i'm lucky), and only to get rejected because my MCAT was too low. 

Couple things:

 

(1) not indicating you're rewriting your MCAT and then rewriting is completely fine..there is no "transparency issue". The rest of the previous post is correct in that it will really just depend on when they get to your file. 

(2) Yes. Schools don't invite if they won't consider you. There's really no indication that they do this, even though there are always people who claim it happens. It's just a huge waste of time (and money) for everyone if they were to do this. Schools have better things to do than this.

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