Four Things You Should Be Doing to Help Your Application

Whew! The last few months sure flew by, didn't they? Gobs of secondary essays now complete, applications submitted, and now... you wait.

It's anticlimactic.

The Great Waiting Period

You hear pretty much nothing from your schools and just have to wait to see whether they invite you for an interview. Human beings hate information voids, so we invent things to do to make ourselves feel better. It’s way too early to determine whether you’ll get in, so don’t give into those voices in your head!

Things You Should NOT Be Doing

(paraphrased from emails from former students):

"I haven't heard anything from many of my schools. I should call all of my schools to make sure they received my application."

"My numbers must be too low. I should start studying to retake my MCAT."

"My letters of recommendation must be terrible. I should start asking for more letters to send along to schools to help my application."

No, no, no. Your schools have received your applications, re-taking the MCAT on short notice is a terrible plan, and you've already asked for the best set of letters you can.  

Stop making yourself crazy! Action can be a good thing, but only if you do the things that actually matter for helping your application.  

The Four Things You SHOULD Be Doing

(Over the next six months):

1) Preparing for interviews, even if you haven't received any yet.

You should read about medical ethics, peruse the Economist to stay up on current events, and get out of your comfort zone. We also recommend checking out a video we made on the most common interview questions - it’s definitely worth a watch.
 

2) Writing update letters to your med schools.

We suggest sending updates in October, January, and April. In the meantime, here's a ton of resources to help you navigate those:

• Update Letter FAQ
• Every Question You Have About Update Letters
• How to Write an Update Letter That Actually Works

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3) Continue making yourself the best applicant you can be.

Since you’ll be providing regular updates to your medical schools, you need to have ongoing accomplishments to discuss. A promotion at work, new grades in your classes, a paper being published... keep working hard to stand out.

4) Living life to the fullest.

This is probably the last free year of your life. Once you get into medical school, you will long for these relatively un-busy days. Take advantage of them. Take a trip somewhere. Go to the beach. You truly owe it to yourself. 

Hopefully this will help you stay sane as you wait for good news during this long, long, long process.

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