Admissions Blog

Waitlist Movement

By Admissions on Jun 23, 2011 Great news for some of you! Today, we restored a number of applicants who were originally removed from the waitlist, back to their position on the waitlist. This year we have experienced an unusually high amount of waitlist movement, particularly for this late in the game, and have therefore taken this course of action. We originally made the decision to remove applicants from the waitlist based on calculated statistics acquired from years of data as we did not want to give false hope to those whom it was statistically improbable would be offered a position. (We wanted to avoid stringing you along). If you received an email through the OAS asking if you would still like to be considered for our medical class this year, you were one of the lucky few. Congratulations!  Again, we cannot say where anyone is on the waitlist, and stand by what we said originally for all waitlisters – it is still a good idea to consider other options as we cannot say when/if an offer will arise, but will be in touch with you as soon as possible. Permalink | 15 Comments

When to Submit Your Application

By Admissions on Jun 20, 2011

A frequent question amongst prospective applicants is, “does it matter when I submit my application?” Like answers to many admissions questions, do not necessarily believe everything you read or hear from fellow applicants or from those who were admitted in a previous year. You obviously have to check very carefully that all the information you entered in your application is correct before you submit, but with the June 1 cut-off for non-academic activities, there is no reason to wait! The sooner you submit, the sooner you can ensure that your transcripts and any other required documentation has been received by our office. Besides the sooner you submit, the sooner we can begin to evaluate your application. If there is something we need to follow up with you, we can do so in a timely manner. You don’t want the frustration of your application being made ineligible because of a missing transcript for a three credit course you took as a visiting student four years ago, which you had forgotten about until we notice it on your home institution’s transcript. We know it’s human instinct, but for your peace of mind, please do not wait until the last few days or even weeks to submit. Submit early and you can relax for the rest of the summer.

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No site switching

By Admissions on Jun 15, 2011

It appears that some of you who have been admitted think that if you wish to switch sites, it’s just a matter of getting someone else to swap places with you. This is not the case at all. As it says in the offer letters, when you accept an offer to VFMP, IMP, NMP or SMP, you are committing to live and study at that location. If you do not wish to be at the site to which you were offered, for whatever reason, do not accept the offer in hopes that you can make a change once you are in the program – be happy you were admitted!

Another myth – there is concern out there that people might somehow be able to “swap sites” before we get to the next person on the wait list for a particular site. Again, not true, we follow a very strict protocol in making further offers from the wait list if someone has declined our offer. There are many applicants with extraneous issues and we cannot accommodate requests to be preferentially offered to a specific site.

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Non-academic activities

By Admissions on Jun 14, 2011

We have been receiving a lot of inquiries regarding the NAQ section of the new on-line application – people asking if they should include a particular activity or experience and if so, under which category should they enter it. We can’t advise you, we won’t tell you – It’s up to you to decide. Please don’t call or email us and ask if X should be under eg Leadership or Service Ethic, or if X should be included at all. Remember you won’t be penalized if you enter information in a “wrong” section – there is no such thing. So don’t worry, choose the activities, experiences and accomplishments which you consider important to your application for the MD Program and enter them where you think appropriate.

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Pre Interview academic criteria

By Admissions on Jun 09, 2011

The Evaluation Criteria section of the website has been updated regarding the pre-interview academic criteria. We can now confirm that the academic score will be derived from applicants’ overall average (or adjusted academic average if applicable). The academic and non-academic scores will still be weighed equally (50% each). We will not be looking at your MCAT or prerequisite average during this phase of the evaluation process.

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