Med school applicant trends and data

Recently, I was at a meeting for Boston-area health professions advisors, and a couple folks from the AAMC (Association of American Medical Colleges) were discussing med school applicant data. I don't think any of this should necessarily inform an individual student's decision-making around medicine but it is interesting nonetheless.

What pleasantly surprised me is the data on re-applicants (meaning students who apply but are not admitted the first time). Of those applicants who applied only once, 48% were admitted (this is the national average; Harvard's was 93% last year). Of those who applied twice (meaning those who were denied the first time through), 39% were admitted. To me, these are encouraging numbers (when noting the marginal difference in rates between first- and second-time applicants). Total re-applicants are a fairly small group but it seems that many of these students succeed in the end.

Having said this, when making decisions around whether to apply now, apply later, or reapply, it's really important to talk through these individual circumstances. The important point to make about re-applicants' success is that it is not due merely to having submitted an additonal application; rather, it's because these students significantly improved the weaknesses in their original application. I often (as I know Lee Ann does as well) encourage premeds to plan to apply to medical school just once, to take this approach. This means addressing the significant weaknesses before applying, not using the application process as a gauge of competitiveness. Applying to "see how it goes" is usually not the best strategy.

There are practical reasons for this--time, money, psychological burden, etc.--but I do think that upon applying again, re-applicants are scrutinized in a different way. They are expected to have significantly updated their applications. This is all to say, plan to apply once. But for re-applicants who are ultimately qualified and for whom medicine is good career, a healthy number succeed in the end.

But on to other things...

Right now, we're experiencing a peak in applications. The total number will be around 42,000 in 2008. Historically, this comes after a dip in 1988, a peak in 1996, and another dip in 2002 (dot com bubble?). And by 2015, the AAMC projects that the number of applications from women will exceed those of men.

For more information on Harvard data for medical school, OCS publishes a data report which is available for viewing in the 1st floor library. And if you have photos or pictures that would be good for this blog, please send them my way! Not enough mixed media on this thing.