AdamP Posted January 21, 2009 Report Share Posted January 21, 2009 I think Obama said it best yesterday 'we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist'...which is similar to something ghandi said years ago Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dayne67 Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 Does anyone know if the cutoffs (gpa or mcat) has EVER come down from one year to the next? asking out of desperation Well, about five years ago, the GPA cut-offs at Western increased from 3.60 to 3.70. Obviously, since then, the cut-offs have not gone down. They stayed the same until this past year. I am inclined to think that the GPA cut-offs will not go down next year from 3.75. I personally don't see the number of applicants decreasing. And the CBT version of the MCAT (as much as I hate to admit it) has yielded too many applicants with scores in the 30-32 range. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
young_n_ambitious Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 I think Obama said it best yesterday 'we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist'...which is similar to something ghandi said years ago You mean Gandhi, right ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mk08 Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 Med school admissions keep going up and will probably increase next year. If governments don't open up more seats, it's disturbing to think about where the increasing number of rejected qualified intellectuals will end up. This country needs to better manage its talent and open up more seats for a profession it's in dire need of. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silvermen85 Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 I see where you're coming from, but would you rather have something as subjective as McMaster's 5-question method? At least you know that if you take the MCAT again and get a 10 on verbal, you are highly likely to get an interview next year. McMaster, on the other hand, you never know what's going to happen... No I think the admission selection process should be much more comprehensive than just having a hard number cut-off. What about all the other things that demonstrate a person's quality like EC activities, reference letters, research endeavors. This is the difference that I find between TOP US schools and some Canadian schools is that the American schools tend to go beyond numbers and actually trying to evaluate the person from the whole application package. And frankly, those schools have just as many if not more applicants to go through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cling Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 No I think the admission selection process should be much more comprehensive than just having a hard number cut-off. What about all the other things that demonstrate a person's quality like EC activities, reference letters, research endeavors. I am going to play devil's advocate. What is stopping "bad candidates" from getting great ECs? What is stopping candidates from writing their own reference letters? (you would be surprised how many profs tell students to do this) Your research record (publications, presentations,etc)depends much more on luck and the prof than anything else including the candidate yourself. Now grades and MCAT...MCAT is probably the most objective measure of your "smarts" as GPA has too much variance between majors, courses, colleges, etc. Should there be a cutoff for MCAT? No, a cutoff puts people who got a 30R in the same bin as the people who got 42S and that throws away a significant amount of MCAT's med school performance prediction value. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastriss Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 A lot of what cling said is true. Esp true about some of that research experience. Secondly, if you want comprehensive go to UofT. Or the US. Thanks to the fact that my first and second year GPA being lower than average, I will never be sufficiently competitive there. And before anyone chimes in about how they drop the lowest x number of credits, most of the people that do score an interview and are in undergrad had high gpas throughout that had the weighting formula drop their 3.7s and 3.9s, raising their GPA further. This has been said before and it will be said again. If we have a homogenous system, we would exclude a lot of good applicants that are just not "fit" for the admissions system. The diversity in the approaches is what ensures that different applicants with different strengths get noticed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastriss Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 No I think the admission selection process should be much more comprehensive than just having a hard number cut-off. What about all the other things that demonstrate a person's quality like EC activities, reference letters, research endeavors. This is the difference that I find between TOP US schools and some Canadian schools is that the American schools tend to go beyond numbers and actually trying to evaluate the person from the whole application package. And frankly, those schools have just as many if not more applicants to go through. Im not sure if you have applied yet, but I have. And I speak from experience that US schools admission is so unpredictable I will go ahead and say it is random for the most part. You can beat a school's average in all aspects and have GOOD ECs, good LORs, and good everything and still not score an interview. There have been applicants on this forum more competitive than me, not score the same interviews I did even though their application was better. So Frankly, the US admissions system's randomness throws out the bulk of the merit you have given to its comprehensive approach. (I don't know why I bolded the last part, I think i forgot what I had to say regarding that). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
silvermen85 Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 Im not sure if you have applied yet, but I have. And I speak from experience that US schools admission is so unpredictable I will go ahead and say it is random for the most part. You can beat a school's average in all aspects and have GOOD ECs, good LORs, and good everything and still not score an interview. There have been applicants on this forum more competitive than me, not score the same interviews I did even though their application was better. So Frankly, the US admissions system's randomness throws out the bulk of the merit you have given to its comprehensive approach. (I don't know why I bolded the last part, I think i forgot what I had to say regarding that). Applying to US schools as a Canadian, simply beating those schools average might not be enough for interview. Consider most US school only recruit a couple of international applicants out of their 100ish spots, your application really have to be vastly superior than the domestic ones. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abcwxyz Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 Applying to US schools as a Canadian, simply beating those schools average might not be enough for interview. Consider most US school only recruit a couple of international applicants out of their 100ish spots, your application really have to be vastly superior than the domestic ones. This is too great of a generalization. This applies to certain schools, where it may in fact be extreme (ie: Canadian applicants are completely rejected). Most schools that Canadians would be applying to consider Canadian and American applicants similarly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastriss Posted January 22, 2009 Report Share Posted January 22, 2009 Applying to US schools as a Canadian, simply beating those schools average might not be enough for interview. Consider most US school only recruit a couple of international applicants out of their 100ish spots, your application really have to be vastly superior than the domestic ones. That's blatantly false. I can already tell your information is picked up by heresay from here and there. Many schools don't make it harder for canadians (especially the ones that are private). The ones that do are the ones that have quota to meet for IP, in which case you are in the same ballpark as a lot of OOS students. I e-mailed a lot of schools some time ago and that's the response I got. The only other rebuttle you can use is that our schools are not as known, and that may be true, but my interviewer at NYU had no idea about anything regarding my school and still acknowledged my gpa to be very competitive. So school reputation and GPA doesn't nearly play as big as a role as we make it out to be on these forums. Take a look at the numerous threads on SDN about applicants scoring interviews at top institutions but no acceptances. Take a look at the thread where the guy who scored an interview at harvard but no other places can't figure out what's wrong then asks LizzyM who still can't figure out why he hasn't score any other interviews. She herself couldn't figure out why he had so many failures. That's pretty much evidence that there is a lot of randomness in their application system, which is only corrected by the sheer number of schools they have down there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Egorema@hotmail.com Posted January 23, 2009 Report Share Posted January 23, 2009 GPA is at 3.75. Was that the case last year too or did that go up from 3.70. last year was 3.7 if i remembered correctly Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redfox Posted January 24, 2009 Report Share Posted January 24, 2009 did anybody get an interview invite yet? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigManOnCampus Posted January 24, 2009 Report Share Posted January 24, 2009 did anybody get an interview invite yet? nope, not yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cling Posted January 26, 2009 Report Share Posted January 26, 2009 I also have strong extracurriculars. Ugh you made me puke. It should be you cleaning this up, not my maid. This does not even take into account the fact that many people in this country speak English as a second language! Should it? I mean if someone who spoke English for 8 months is beating you on the WS... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
In_Valid Posted January 26, 2009 Report Share Posted January 26, 2009 the issue with the WS, is that it isn't very objective. They really should just eliminate it. If they want to know how well you can communicate they should just make it mandatory to submit a personal statement with your application. The AAMC said itself that the WS was not very indicative of anything and that is why a lot of US medical schools just ignore that section. Why Canadian schools are so hardcore with the WS is beyond me. Maybe I'm just bitter cuz i got a P. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
supafield Posted January 26, 2009 Report Share Posted January 26, 2009 My problem with the writing sample is it is so unbelievably formulaic. Do exactly what princeton/kaplan says to do and use decent examples and you seem to do well. The first time I wrote... of the 3 good friends i had writing the 4 of us got R's. The second time, all but one of my friends and I got S's..... All we did was learn the formula better and get reasonable markers.... neither time did we all score 13's and 14's in a subject. So while I don't think it's that hard.... nor unreasonable... because most americans could care less what they get it's not testing competency but rather your ability to seek the right practice material. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psychopath Posted January 26, 2009 Report Share Posted January 26, 2009 No matter what system is utilized to determine who gets in to medical school, there will always be qualified people that are left out in the cold. It's just the nature of the game when the number of applicants is this high. I think we should be happy that every medical school in Ontario employs a different system, thereby giving different people a shot at a different school. Good luck everyone! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alastriss Posted January 26, 2009 Report Share Posted January 26, 2009 omgosh. I just napped, got on this site, and saw this thread name and my heart jumped. Then I realized that it was UWO, I knew all this 10 days ago and frequently posted in this thread. the POSTED in caps really made me jump. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kalia Posted January 26, 2009 Report Share Posted January 26, 2009 lol, same here. I thought I was on the Queen's forum for a sec. I think the title "Cutoff Postings" on the Queen's forum also startled some ppl (it startled me!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
In_Valid Posted January 28, 2009 Report Share Posted January 28, 2009 so does making the cutoffs guarantee an interview? I've heard conflicting things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rmorelan Posted January 28, 2009 Report Share Posted January 28, 2009 so does making the cutoffs guarantee an interview? I've heard conflicting things. I think the consensus is that yes it does mean you will get an interview. The publications from western even say if you meet them but don't get one to contact them. Seems like a rather strong indication of their intentions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
In_Valid Posted January 28, 2009 Report Share Posted January 28, 2009 sweet. haha I would very much like to attend UWO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
newton13 Posted January 28, 2009 Report Share Posted January 28, 2009 is uwo admission strict about the 30 MCAT cutoff? stats are: GPA 3.87 MCAT PS - 8 , VR - 10 , BS - 10 (28) WS - P from SWOMEN region. possibility of interview? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
newton13 Posted January 28, 2009 Report Share Posted January 28, 2009 is uwo admission strict about the 30 MCAT cutoff? stats are: GPA 3.87 MCAT PS - 8 , VR - 10 , BS - 10 (28) WS - P from SWOMEN region. possibility of interview? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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