2011 Interview Discussion

[takashi]

So in other words, Queen's should go through the 2500+ other applications in very great detail. Do you really think there would be many exceptional students in this pool who (a) won't get into another school or who ( would be worth replacing a student who meets the cutoffs and performs well enough in the interview to get an offer?

 

I think you have to think about the marginal gain from this strategy. They would probably find two or three people who would meet criteria (a) and ( mentioned above, but is this worth going through so much extra work (and spending tens of thousands of dollars) for?

 

I think people need to consider the reality of medical school admissions. They have thousands of qualified applicants and need to select a tiny percentage of these with limited resources. Yes, of course there are a million things they "should" do, but in the real world sometimes there isn't enough money or time to do everything that "should" be done.

 

I understand that it is a lot of work to narrow down the number of applicants but most schools in Ontario look at other aspects of your application other than GPA/MCAT. Is it unreasonable to hope that Queens one day joins the other schools in that regard?

[iicii]

I understand that it is a lot of work to narrow down the number of applicants but most schools in Ontario look at other aspects of your application other than GPA/MCAT. Is it unreasonable to hope that Queens one day joins the other schools in that regard?

 

I really like how Dal utilizes the MCAT...while there's firm cutoff, you can be slightly lower in one category...seems like most of us are having trouble with the VR 9/10 or the WS Q/R

 

Then again...this may raise the number of qualified applicants too much...

[une17]

I understand that it is a lot of work to narrow down the number of applicants but most schools in Ontario look at other aspects of your application other than GPA/MCAT. Is it unreasonable to hope that Queens one day joins the other schools in that regard?

 

...Seems like UWO only considers MCAT and GPA pre-interview. And Ottawa mainly focuses on GPA pre-interview...Northern is a write-off for most people unless your from a rural or Northern location.

 

That leaves U of T and Mac that really take any sort of significant holistic approach. So I don't think Queens is rolling solo in this regard.

 

That being said, it would be nice if every admin process was more closely aligned with U of T's, but that's just my opinion

[Singh]

 

That being said, it would be nice if every admin process was more closely aligned with U of T's, but that's just my opinion

 

U of T ftw

[medisforme]

That being said, it would be nice if every admin process was more closely aligned with U of T's, but that's just my opinion

 

I respectfully disagree,

 

For a lot of people, the Queen's admission process is the only hope for med school admissions in this country. My OMSAS cgpa is 3.71 (did not take a full course load every semester) which gives me about a 1% chance (probably less) of getting an interview at U of T, whereas this gpa gives me a shot at interviewing at Queens, I bet you a lot of other people are in the same boat.

 

The great thing about med school admissions in Canada is that there is at least one school somewhere that a person (given they have at least adequate grades) will have a shot at as long as they work hard on their mcat, volunteering etc...

 

If the med school admissions process in Canada was the same at every school (somewhat similar to the US) you would see basically the same people at med school interviews at multiple schools, while at the same time leaving a lot of people out of the loop.

 

So I am grateful that a school like Queen's puts my 3.71 32S, on the same pedestal as a 4.0, 40R student.

[shikimate]

^ I agree with what medisforme said. UofT is quite unforgiving to people who didn't take full course load every year. There are a lot of people who screwed up 1st year, had to drop some courses, or took bad grades and big hits on CGPA. Therefore despite great MCAT, they basically have no chance at UofT.

 

Given how competitive the Ontario pool is, I think there are quite a number of people who are in this situation (including myself).

 

On the other hand, UWO and QU is quite forgiving to those people because as long as they demonstrate in 2nd, 3rd, 4th year or beyond that they are capabale of doing well acadmically and on the MCAT, they have at least 2 chances for interview.

[kylamonkey]

^I'm going to agree here too.

 

I flunked out in 1999, and those bad marks haunt me. My OMSAS GPA is currently 2.98 because of this, which actually disqualifies me from most schools. My last 2-yr GPA of around 3.7 and 33R will not get me an interview at Queen's this year, but next yr I probably will- I'm pulling off a 4.0 this term.

 

As for UofT, unless I use special consideration I will NEVER get an interview there because even with a full 5 courses dropped my wGPA will still have some Ds included, from 1998-99.

 

I'm the perfect example of the person who has to weigh all the schools individually in order to figure out who will give me a shot. Queen's (amazingly, the school that does not look at me "holistically") will! I realize this is because of my "luck" at getting a high WS, but still. I'm grateful and will be pretty crushed if they switch it up for next yr.

 

[une17]

Don't forget about the grad school option for U of T...It has opened doors there to candidates with GPA's as low as 3.0 as long as your productive in terms of research.

 

But it's clear that the admissions process an individual favours tends to depend upon the strengths and weaknesses of their application and past experiences.

[osmosis]

I respectfully disagree,

 

For a lot of people, the Queen's admission process is the only hope for med school admissions in this country. My OMSAS cgpa is 3.71 (did not take a full course load every semester) which gives me about a 1% chance (probably less) of getting an interview at U of T, whereas this gpa gives me a shot at interviewing at Queens, I bet you a lot of other people are in the same boat.

 

The great thing about med school admissions in Canada is that there is at least one school somewhere that a person (given they have at least adequate grades) will have a shot at as long as they work hard on their mcat, volunteering etc...

 

If the med school admissions process in Canada was the same at every school (somewhat similar to the US) you would see basically the same people at med school interviews at multiple schools, while at the same time leaving a lot of people out of the loop.

 

So I am grateful that a school like Queen's puts my 3.71 32S, on the same pedestal as a 4.0, 40R student.

 

i absolutely agree with this post.

 

having gone through the admissions process this year and carefully reading the OMSAS admissions booklet, every school is different with regards to its applicants.

 

it's up to each individual applicant to determine the admissions criteria at each school and figure out where they have the best shot.

[Ab_Med]

So, considering the Dec 15. remark sent out by Queens, does anyone have an idea when we should start hearing about interviews?

 

Ab

[Broccoli]

Dec 15 remark? The "mid-December" email a few months ago? scrap that, they said definitely not until the new year, possibly even mid to late January (hope not!)

[Ab_Med]

how do you know this? Where does it say this?

[m1428]

how do you know this? Where does it say this?

 

Says here:

 

I called admissions last week and spoke to Jennifer, and was told the interview offers will most likely be sent towards the end of January, so I guess we still have quite a bit more waiting to do...

[Ab_Med]

Thanks for the post! Appreciate the update! Enjoy your holidays!

 

Ab

[Typical Premed]

The review process is a bit more thorough than it used to be this year, so that is likely why it is taking them longer to send out the invites.

[Broccoli]

The review process is a bit more thorough than it used to be this year, so that is likely why it is taking them longer to send out the invites.

 

What evidence is there for the process being more thorough? I hope it is more thorough too, but there's been nothing published by the admissions committee about pre-interview changes. All I know is that the admissions woman on the phone said there was a system problem that caused some delays in November/December.

[Typical Premed]

PM me for details.

[anxious_101]

PM me for details.

 

You have my curiosity piqued. Would be great if you could post it here for everyone to read.

 

Here's to hoping the VR goes down to 9 this year.

[Guest PULSE]

I doubt the credibility of such information, because if this was the case, that they are using another approach to screen applicants pre-interview, I figure they would be more transparent.

[HBP]

I doubt the credibility of such information, because if this was the case, that they are using another approach to screen applicants pre-interview, I figure they would be more transparent.

 

Transparency has never been a primary factor for Ontario schools.

 

According to TP, they'll be using the MCAT/GPA as a screen, but will then use the ABS to further cut down the number of applicants.

 

If this is true, it could be possible to have a more forgiving MCAT cutoff (i.e. less than 10/R).

[simpy]

Transparency has never been a primary factor for Ontario schools.

 

According to TP, they'll be using the MCAT/GPA as a screen, but will then use the ABS to further cut down the number of applicants.

 

If this is true, it could be possible to have a more forgiving MCAT cutoff (i.e. less than 10/R).

 

Could be true, TP seems to have a pretty good scoop.

 

But I still am not certain, the website clearly states that there is a GPA and MCAT cutoff before the interview. I think they could open themselves to students appealing the decision if they made the cutoffs but were not granted interviews.

 

That said, my guess is they run into the issue of people who make the GPA/MCAT cutoffs and then have virtually nothing to talk about during the interview (light extracurricular experience etc). Lowering the cutoffs a little and then doing a quick and dirty ABS cut (i.e. drop the worst 10-20%) would probably be an easy way to interview a higher proportion of good candidates.

[Typical Premed]

While I do know for sure that these changes are planned. I'm not 100% certain whether they will be implemented in time for the decisions this year due to the reasons you have stated.

Could be true, TP seems to have a pretty good scoop.

 

But I still am not certain, the website clearly states that there is a GPA and MCAT cutoff before the interview. I think they could open themselves to students appealing the decision if they made the cutoffs but were not granted interviews.

 

That said, my guess is they run into the issue of people who make the GPA/MCAT cutoffs and then have virtually nothing to talk about during the interview (light extracurricular experience etc). Lowering the cutoffs a little and then doing a quick and dirty ABS cut (i.e. drop the worst 10-20%) would probably be an easy way to interview a higher proportion of good candidates.

[thatonekid]

Transparency has never been a primary factor for Ontario schools.

 

According to TP, they'll be using the MCAT/GPA as a screen, but will then use the ABS to further cut down the number of applicants.

 

If this is true, it could be possible to have a more forgiving MCAT cutoff (i.e. less than 10/R).

I have heard this from people at Queen's as well. But from what they understand, the process will not be ready in time for this current application cycle. I've been told that the current delay in interview invites is due to some type of system malfunction that they experienced when processing the applications

[quackster]

^^way to get people's hopes up for something that 'aint probably gonna happen...

[Broccoli]

Yeah. In light of the e-mail we received in November (stating that invites would come out mid-Dec) I'm skeptical that the pre-interview admissions process has changed. It sounds like in November, they were confident enough to tell us that the process would be the same as past years (this is on the shaky assumption that invites in mid-Dec means business as usual). I believe the delay is more likely caused by the system error mentioned above, than a decision to change up the admissions process made somewhere between November 17th and mid-Dec.