UofM statistical analysis

[vip_138]

so it turns out i have nothing better to do with my time but look through old threads repeatedly and figure out my chances. Maybe i'm going crazy but i'm gonna try and make sense of this whole application process. Thus i have looked through as many threads as possible for acceptances and their stats and compiled a data set of 20 (i know its not a lot but work with me).

 

I applied a calculation that i thought they would use and gave a 'score' out of 60: 50% mcat (set 0/15 = 0/50, 15/15 = 50/50 - saw this on a back thread) and 10% gpa (3.6/4.5 = 0/10 and 4.5/4.5 = 10/10 - just a guess) and ignored PAS (this is too hard to accurately identify).

 

Here's what i found:

 

1st acceptance:

avg mcat - 10.5

avg gpa - 4.12

avg score - 42.5

 

2nd acceptance:

avg mcat - 10.36

avg gpa - 4.07

avg score - 39.8

 

accepted off waitlist

avg mcat - 9.75

avg gpa - 3.93

avg score - 36.1

 

I'm not sure how accurate my 'score' is to the real thing but i'ld assume that's what they do. I think the stats are fairly consistent, with enough variation to account for the PAS. If you have any opinions or want to add any data to my set (friends you've heard of - not already posted on this site) feel free to post. If you have rejected or waitlist data that would be good too since i didn't find too much.

 

*disclaimer* - this is all conjecture so don't base your hopes on this. If you have a score of 40 don't take this as a garuantee that you're accepted

 

if you want to see the full set with variance and stuff pm me with your email

[liszt]

Glad to see I'm not the only one the U of M is driving crazy

[Freedom]

You're just gonna worry yourself out.

 

But let me point out something for you.

 

You stated:

50% mcat (set 0/15 = 0/50, 15/15 = 50/50)

10% gpa (3.6/4.5 = 0/10 and 4.5/4.5 = 10/10 - just a guess)

 

If you are going to use in your pseudo-stats 3.6 gpa as the starting point of your gpa curve. You should also use the minimum 8 MCAT as the starting point of your mcat curve.

 

However, I think you should also take into account averages of the interviewing pool and accepted students pool in your calculations when making your bell curve cause your score is relative to everyone else's score right? IE. 25/50 should be the average interview pool mcat. 5/10 should be the average interview pool gpa.

 

Yes, I did it give it some thought, just didnt turn on excel or graphical analysis.

 

[vip_138]

You're just gonna worry yourself out.

 

But let me point out something for you.

 

You stated:

50% mcat (set 0/15 = 0/50, 15/15 = 50/50)

10% gpa (3.6/4.5 = 0/10 and 4.5/4.5 = 10/10 - just a guess)

 

If you are going to use in your pseudo-stats 3.6 gpa as the starting point of your gpa curve. You should also use the minimum 8 MCAT as the starting point of your mcat curve.

 

However, I think you should also take into account averages of the interviewing pool and accepted students pool in your calculations when making your bell curve cause your score is relative to everyone else's score right? IE. 25/50 should be the average interview pool mcat. 5/10 should be the average interview pool gpa.

 

Yes, I did it give it some thought, just didnt turn on excel or graphical analysis.

 

 

for your 1st point, i set the mcat that way because that was mentioned on another thread that that was the way it was scored. I thought this also made some sense because if you set the 8 = 0/50 then i think those who have 11's and up are guaranteed acceptance (probably even 1st) because of the distance away from the average - which isn't always the case. from ppl's stats, it seems like the mcat matters, but not THAT much. I presumed the gpa was set like that becuase otherwise there would be absolutely no difference in a 3.6 and a 4.5 (in a 0 = 0/10). This also happens to be the case in UofA, where mcat is 0=0 and gpa is min gpa=0 except for the writing score which is looked at seperately.

 

for your 2nd point, there is no need to look at interview pool becuase i'm only looking at someone's 'score' dependent on their acceptance. I didn't bell-curve anything. These are just the score that they work out to and their variation is due to whatever variation shows up in the population. Obviously uofm ranks ppl depending on three things, giving you a score out of 100 (or whatever) and just accept the top 100. Thus there must be a # that probably keeps popping up as the cut-off point for that 100 mark. Now there is variation due to the interview so you can't account for it fully, but it seems like a score of around 35ish give or take a few points is probably that # excluding the interview.

[Freedom]

Yup. All valid points.

 

Either way, all we can do is offer conjecture.

 

The end result is the same, makes ourselves feel a bit better and pass the time.

[vip_138]

Yup. All valid points.

 

Either way, all we can do is offer conjecture.

 

The end result is the same, makes ourselves feel a bit better and pass the time.

 

chocolate also makes me feel better. mmm . . . turtles

 

i'll probably put on 10lbs before may 15th

[liszt]

chocolate also makes me feel better. mmm . . . turtles

Indeed! Damn Shell and their "buy chocolate for 2x the airmiles" deals.

 

Hopefully I'll get to work it off at Joe Doupe! Woo!

[samsara]

Hi...

checked out your post and found it interesting. I tried doing a similar assessment with the GPA and MCAT scores. But i was trying to figure out the probability of getting rejected with a certain MCAT/GPA profile. I am sure there is a fairly strong positive correlation between the two, but the MCAT obviously holds much more weight than the GPA. If you look at the AGPA - MCAT graph of the class of 2005, you'll see what i mean - for scores above 10.5, they accepted around 45 and rejected 6. Nobody with a score above 12 was rejected. AGPA was a bit odd though, because there were more people accepted with a 3.8 than a 3.9 and a 4.0 combined (which reflects the fact that it is only worth 10%). Anyhow..I doubt that they use 15 as the upper end of the scale for the MCAT - because getting a 15 is quite rare. Maybe they bell curve it with the highest MCAT score serving as 50%? I dunno..just throwing ideas out there. It's difficult to accurately gauge the minutiae of the interview though, and the numbers game definitely provides some solace

[UBCstu]

I spoke with Beth and apparently things will be a bit differently for OOPs this year. Now ppl from the Thundrbay area, who were previously considered as in province, will be given positions out of the 10 seats available to OOP students. The catch is that these applicants will be given OOP seats but will still be assessed in the in province pool. that is why only 50 actual OOPs were interviewed this year. I guess that makes the chances for us OOPs a little lower.

[vip_138]

Hi...

checked out your post and found it interesting. I tried doing a similar assessment with the GPA and MCAT scores. But i was trying to figure out the probability of getting rejected with a certain MCAT/GPA profile. I am sure there is a fairly strong positive correlation between the two, but the MCAT obviously holds much more weight than the GPA. If you look at the AGPA - MCAT graph of the class of 2005, you'll see what i mean - for scores above 10.5, they accepted around 45 and rejected 6. Nobody with a score above 12 was rejected. AGPA was a bit odd though, because there were more people accepted with a 3.8 than a 3.9 and a 4.0 combined (which reflects the fact that it is only worth 10%). Anyhow..I doubt that they use 15 as the upper end of the scale for the MCAT - because getting a 15 is quite rare. Maybe they bell curve it with the highest MCAT score serving as 50%? I dunno..just throwing ideas out there. It's difficult to accurately gauge the minutiae of the interview though, and the numbers game definitely provides some solace

 

that is interesting. I know which graph you're talking about but i didn't save it and now they took it down from their website. Do you or anyone else have it?

 

oops, screwed up entering in equation in excel a little, i re-edited original post

[moose]

I spoke with Beth and apparently things will be a bit differently for OOPs this year. Now ppl from the Thundrbay area, who were previously considered as in province, will be given positions out of the 10 seats available to OOP students. The catch is that these applicants will be given OOP seats but will still be assessed in the in province pool. that is why only 50 actual OOPs were interviewed this year. I guess that makes the chances for us OOPs a little lower.

 

what!!!! are you serious? this sounds completely illogical. how can you consider people in the IP pool and give them OOP seats? Seems preposterous and I just hope it's not the case. (not that I'm doubting you... but seems as I said... illogical)

 

Moose

[UBCstu]

what!!!! are you serious? this sounds completely illogical. how can you consider people in the IP pool and give them OOP seats? Seems preposterous and I just hope it's not the case. (not that I'm doubting you... but seems as I said... illogical)

 

Moose

 

I was shocked as well. Beth said that a lot of times all OOP seats dont fill up , only 7-8 so this would make sure all 10 are. I just asked Beth about why there were only 50 OOps being interviewed this year and she said that its because of this. So if you counted the students from these areas it would make 60 ppl interviewed in total.

[Freedom]

Adding to the previous post...

 

The OOP waiting list last year went all the down to the 40th person

That would have really delayed things (ie. e-mailing/calling/waiting for acceptance/declines).

 

Being IP, this is helpful to me. So yay!

 

http://www.umanitoba.ca/faculties/medicine/media/admissionsreport_06.pdf

[samsara]

They will take about 80 IP people once you exclude the special consideration category (7?) and the people who deferred from last year (3) and op (10). if there were 309 interviews and as someone mentioned earlier, 60 of them are going to the op spots...and around 10 more to special consideration (given previous years' trends) that means around 240 interviews for ip...and a 1 in 3 chance. But you have to keep in mind that more females than males apply and other than the class of 2004, where there were significantly more males getting in - 66%, most years have been pretty evenly balanced around 50% for each give or take 2 points. so...i think there will be around 40 spots for the guys, and 40 for the girls. also - looking at previous years - it seems that they interview around 90 males and 110 females. However, this year it seems that they have interviewed more people, but i will assume that the females still outnumbered the muchachos. so...next odds... would be around 40 in 110 for the guys, and 40 in 130 for the femmes ( in previous years about 1 in 2 males has gotten accepted ip once they have received an interview - see 2005 and 2006 stats). And then you can factor in the people ip who will get in and decline for various reasons - getting in other schools or extenuating circumstances- which adds around 5 accepted to each list. so- final odds are around 45 in 110 for the herrs and 45 in 130 for the frau(leins). This is assuming many many things of course - it's possible u of m will go the McMaster way as well ( i think they hover around a 60-70% female class- just what i heard- so don't quote me on this). And then the MCAT and gpa get thrown into the mix, and there ya have it.

Disclaimer - I hope none of the above is perceived as sexist in the least - not my intention or predilection - just some statistics i've spent time checking out. And if someone quotes Churchill (I think) that "there are lies, damn lies and statistics", i'll understand

[liszt]

Mark Twain

[peachy]

Mark Twain

Actually it's unclear who coined it; it's most commonly attributed to Benjamin Disraeli even though this is probably wrong. [wikipedia]

[samsara]

oooh, i was way off...i'm going to support Disraeli's case though...atleast that way i can lean on the "british prime minister" similarity for future credibility

[liszt]

Actually it's unclear who coined it; it's most commonly attributed to Benjamin Disraeli even though this is probably wrong. [wikipedia]

 

Lol. So my stats prof was wrong (and, consequently, me too). Interesting stuff! Thanks for that!

[xylem29]

Oh - crap. I was really counting on them making about 48 offers (for 60 interviewees) again this year. I figured that most of the OOP students have an amazing application (those that make the interview cutoffs) and will likely get into other schools - now if they offer 10 OOP interview slots for thunderbay residents, who are competing for OOP seats but are only placed against the IP MCAT and GPA standards, then they just may very well have no trouble filling the 10 seats this year, and they will not have to go all the way to the 48th applicant - hell, they may not even go to the 20th, if even 5-8 seats gets offered to the thunderbay residents...all OOP students like me who are borderline get screwed...Manitoba is like the only shot I have at staying in Canada....I'm writing a letter to Dr. Aoki and the dean too...and whomever else I need to contact...I know everything is ranked and such, but I think it's kinda unfair if OOP seats are given away to IP students just b/c a lot of OOP applicants turned down the offer last year...I know that only 8 seats were filled - but they could have gone all the way down to the 60th person, but it appears that they didn't. So the 49th applicant got totally screwed.

 

I know the problem last year was that a lot of OOP students treated Manitoba as a back up to other back ups - especially Ontario students. But Manitoba is the FIRST choice for this ON resident....

[Freedom]

Just relax and let things happen. I'm sure they'll do what's best and fair. Besides, nothing is confirmed. Just discussion on a forum in cyberspace.

 

Manitoba may be your first choice, but for a lot of us, Manitoba is our ONLY choice.

[xylem29]

That's what I sorta mean man - this is my only choice. I'm quite sure I really messed up my Queens interview and my MCAT and GPA doesn't mean squat at Queens post-interview.

 

Manitoba is my only other interview and since MCAT and GPA is still about 60% of the score, I think I might have a shot at this school - I don't think I'll be in the top 10 of 60 students, if I were, I would have interviewed at more schools. So I'm really counting on the waitlist...this is essentially my only shot. US schools are looking more and more impractical to me - especially after I sat down with my mentor and discussed it. I think I want to stay, and Manitoba is really my only shot...if you are an OOP as well and it's also your only shot, then we're in the same boat.

 

And ur right about "best and fair" - this is best and fair to the school, but not for OOP students. I totally understand why they would do this though...I just don't think it is fair to OOP students.

[moose]

That's what I sorta mean man - this is my only choice. I'm quite sure I really messed up my Queens interview and my MCAT and GPA doesn't mean squat at Queens post-interview.

 

Manitoba is my only other interview and since MCAT and GPA is still about 60% of the score, I think I might have a shot at this school - I don't think I'll be in the top 10 of 60 students, if I were, I would have interviewed at more schools. So I'm really counting on the waitlist...this is essentially my only shot. US schools are looking more and more impractical to me - especially after I sat down with my mentor and discussed it. I think I want to stay, and Manitoba is really my only shot...if you are an OOP as well and it's also your only shot, then we're in the same boat.

 

And ur right about "best and fair" - this is best and fair to the school, but not for OOP students. I totally understand why they would do this though...I just don't think it is fair to OOP students.

 

i completely agree with you. when are you writing this letter?

[vip_138]

so i'm kind of absent minded and forget things easily (good trait for a doc). Someone sent me a pm corroberating my analysis with Jody recently

 

They said the gpa thing is exactly right and by the sound of it, so is the mcat thing. so it looks like it IS gpa: 3.6=0 - 4.5=10 and MCAT: 0=0 - 15=50. Don't know if this puts peace of mind to you or freaks you out. If anyone wants the exact spreadsheet with the real data, send me a pm with your email.