Getting reference letters from CaRMS

[Fuck]

Anyone get their reference letters unmasked by CaRMS? Did any of your references do you dirty?

 

Fill us in with the scoop.

[MDinCanada]

2 hours ago, Fuck said:

Anyone get their reference letters unmasked by CaRMS? Did any of your references do you dirty?

 

Fill us in with the scoop.

how do we get the reference letters?

[bellejolie]

Yes got mine! A while back actually. Along with my Casper score. I did REALLY well on Casper I was shocked haha. I thought I bombed it. I guess the training we get in med school helps us for things like Casper! 

my references were all wonderful. There were some I should’ve used I thought weren’t going to be as strong but were really strong but generally they were all truly wonderful and I could’ve used any of them. 2/3 that I used were exactly what I was expecting and very glowing. The third was great still very nice but had others that were even better. 7 total. Overall really happy with them and so thankful and grateful for what people said about me. 

[bellejolie]

4 hours ago, MDinCanada said:

how do we get the reference letters?

You jsut email the carms help desk and request the documents. It’s the law because the documents belong to you they’re yours! 

[originalname1025]

It's as easy as that? You just

25 minutes ago, bellejolie said:

You jsut email the carms help desk and request the documents. It’s the law because the documents belong to you they’re yours! 

It's as easy as that? You just email help desk?

[bellejolie]

Just now, originalname1025 said:

It's as easy as that? You just

It's as easy as that? You just email help desk?

Yup!

[dooogs]

26 minutes ago, bellejolie said:

Yup!

is it possible to get them before you decide which ones to use?

[bellejolie]

31 minutes ago, dooogs said:

is it possible to get them before you decide which ones to use?

You have to ask 30 days in advance minimum. In jan they had a lot of requests so the turn around was extended by another 30 days. 60 days total. I didn’t get mine before hand but I know colleagues who did just to see what they had before feb 7th (so they asked Jan 7 regardless of how many had been submitted). 

[CaRMS2021]

You can see your LOR before Apps are due?? Wtf? I thought that went against the whole purpose of blinding it to us 

[bellejolie]

56 minutes ago, CaRMS2021 said:

You can see your LOR before Apps are due?? Wtf? I thought that went against the whole purpose of blinding it to us 

Yes I think I explained this to you! You can ask for them at any time they belong to you. You have a right to them as per the PIPEDA act. 

[frenchpress]

4 hours ago, CaRMS2021 said:

You can see your LOR before Apps are due?? Wtf? I thought that went against the whole purpose of blinding it to us 

In theory only get them if they’re submitted really early, given the turn around time - so most people can’t. And my understanding is that they don’t HAVE to be blinded, your preceptor can show it to you if they want I believe, they are just supposed to state they’ve done so. 

[Aetherus]

Interesting, I was not aware this was a thing. Do you know if CARMS keeps the documents from previous cycles?

[aray623]

2 hours ago, frenchpress said:

In theory only get them if they’re submitted really early, given the turn around time - so most people can’t. And my understanding is that they don’t HAVE to be blinded, your preceptor can show it to you if they want I believe, they are just supposed to state they’ve done so. 

One of my preceptors said that they had to sign a confidentially form that stated they wouldn't show me the letter, and I don't think he would have any reason to lie to me (meaning, I didn't ask if I could see his letter). So weird. 

[frenchpress]

6 minutes ago, aray623 said:

One of my preceptors said that they had to sign a confidentially form that stated they wouldn't show me the letter, and I don't think he would have any reason to lie to me (meaning, I didn't ask if I could see his letter). So weird. 

Oh interesting, I must have misunderstood what the preceptor I talked to meant 

[Butterfly_]

6 hours ago, bellejolie said:

Yes I think I explained this to you! You can ask for them at any time they belong to you. You have a right to them as per the PIPEDA act. 

Do you know if our preceptors will get a notification if we do request through CaRMs to see our letters? 

[bellejolie]

41 minutes ago, Butterfly_ said:

Do you know if our preceptors will get a notification if we do request through CaRMs to see our letters? 

They don’t! I also asked about this. No one gets a notification. Not the program and not the person who submitted. 
 

no idea about past years best to just email and ask! If you’re curious. 

[Jarisch]

3 hours ago, Aetherus said:

Interesting, I was not aware this was a thing. Do you know if CARMS keeps the documents from previous cycles?

Yes, I got documents from a cycle from three years ago. 

[Maya565]

On 4/8/2021 at 1:36 PM, bellejolie said:

Yes got mine! A while back actually. Along with my Casper score. I did REALLY well on Casper I was shocked haha. I thought I bombed it. I guess the training we get in med school helps us for things like Casper! 

my references were all wonderful. There were some I should’ve used I thought weren’t going to be as strong but were really strong but generally they were all truly wonderful and I could’ve used any of them. 2/3 that I used were exactly what I was expecting and very glowing. The third was great still very nice but had others that were even better. 7 total. Overall really happy with them and so thankful and grateful for what people said about me. 

How did you get your Casper score!? I thought that was some top secret stuff haha I'm itching to know how I did. Did you email carms and ask for it as well or did they just send it along with your LORs? 

[bellejolie]

19 minutes ago, Maya565 said:

How did you get your Casper score!? I thought that was some top secret stuff haha I'm itching to know how I did. Did you email carms and ask for it as well or did they just send it along with your LORs? 

Nope i specified and asked! Same thing as the LORs. They just provide you with a Z score and if you were red flagged. Then I had to dig to find out what it meant lol. 

[zoxy]

Would this PIPEDA act include CASPer in general?

If I had money to burn(and didn't need to take it again for CaRMS), I'd lawyer up and try to sue Altus to reveal scores. My hate for CASPer and Altus is unrivalled.

I can't think of any sort of test anywhere else in the world where they don't tell you how you did.

[Haruba]

15 minutes ago, zoxy said:

Would this PIPEDA act include CASPer in general?

If I had money to burn(and didn't need to take it again for CaRMS), I'd lawyer up and try to sue Altus to reveal scores. My hate for CASPer and Altus is unrivalled.

I can't think of any sort of test anywhere else in the world where they don't tell you how you did.

Totally agree, it's ridiculous you don't even get to know your score. Apparently, their justification is that they don't want people who did well to know that they did well, so that they can't advertise themselves as "tutors who scored in the top X% percent." 

[zoxy]

On 4/9/2021 at 7:49 PM, Haruba said:

Totally agree, it's ridiculous you don't even get to know your score. Apparently, their justification is that they don't want people who did well to know that they did well, so that they can't advertise themselves as "tutors who scored in the top X% percent." 

I hate the fact that it's a private company funded by venture capitalists, including BMO's venture capital fund, and tries to portray itself as a saint. They're out there to line their own pockets, nothing more. It's a huge conflict of interest that there are some Mac faculty who have financial stakes in the company, including the former dean of admissions.

There are basically no studies examining its efficacy beyond one they initially ran in 09 that showed a very weak correlation with MMI performance. They claim that they've run the data and it's best in class. Well where's the data? The only studies that they're publicly released show that unlike the MCAT and GPA, it doesn't correlate with SES and should be used more to counter bias. Rolling a dice doesn't correlate with SES either, should it be used for medical school admission? They don't actually say if it's good at measuring what it's supposed to measure.

Wish I could run a study examining the correlation between typing speed and CASPer performance.

Edit:LMAO, the CASPer folks had to correct a study examining CASPer's efficacy. Link below:

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10459-017-9798-6

[bellejolie]

1 hour ago, zoxy said:

Would this PIPEDA act include CASPer in general?

If I had money to burn(and didn't need to take it again for CaRMS), I'd lawyer up and try to sue Altus to reveal scores. My hate for CASPer and Altus is unrivalled.

I can't think of any sort of test anywhere else in the world where they don't tell you how you did.

Haha it might! You should look into it. In CaRMS they submit the score so you get access to it that way and it belongs to you that way. Not sure how it would work in other domains but I’m sure legally they can’t withhold that info. Also agree with the other stuff you wrote. All this money grabbing. 

[bread]

On 4/9/2021 at 8:11 PM, zoxy said:

I hate the fact that it's a private company funded by venture capitalists, including BMO's venture capital fund, and tries to portray itself as a saint. They're out there to line their own pockets, nothing more. It's a huge conflict of interest that there's Mac faculty with financial stakes in the company, including the former dean of admissions.

There are basically no studies examining its efficacy beyond one they initially ran in 09 that showed a very weak correlation with MMI performance. They claim that they've run the data and it's best in class. Well where's the data? The only studies that they're publicly released show that unlike the MCAT and GPA, it doesn't correlate with SES and should be used more to counter bias. Rolling a dice doesn't correlate with SES either, should it be used for medical school admission? They don't actually say if it's good at measuring what it's supposed to measure.

Wish I could run a study examining the correlation between typing speed and CASPer performance.

Edit:LMAO, the CASPer folks had to correct a study examining CASPer's efficacy. Link below:

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10459-017-9798-6

This is so interesting! And it’s expanding so rapidly, too - a few years ago, just a few select med school admissions were using CASPer. Now it’s more med schools, residency programs, allied health like midwifery and physio...

[zoxy]

On 4/10/2021 at 8:41 PM, bread said:

This is so interesting! And it’s expanding so rapidly, too - a few years ago, just a few select med school admissions were using CASPer. Now it’s more med schools, residency programs, allied health like midwifery and physio...

It's proliferation is astounding and I can't believe how big an emphasis some other programs put on it. At Saskatchewan it's worth 40 percent of the admission score for nursing and physiotherapy. For MD admissions at Manitoba it's worth 30 percent of the pre-interview score and 10 percent of the post interview score. To give you some perspective, GPA is only worth 20 percent pre-MMI and 15 percent post-MMI for Manitoba MD admissions.

The thing that I find most appalling is that the dean of MD admissions at the UofS basically admitted that there's not much evidence that it's actually effective as a ranking tool. That's why they use it very conservatively for MD admissions at the UofS and only eliminate the bottom 2-3 percent of CASPer performers. It's not actually used for ranking the other 97-98 percent who pass the CASPer cutoff since it's such a poor tool. Didn't stop the nursing and physiotherapy people from going haywire and aggressively adopting it.