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AMCAS

Most medical schools require that you use the American Medical College Application Service (AMCAS) to apply (see below for a list of non-AMCAS schools).  AMCAS is a massive bureaucracy that will (for a substantial fee) process your initial application and forward copies of it to the medical schools you choose.  I have several morsels of advice to offer regarding AMCAS:

• Start early.  The application process will take time for a number of reasons.  It takes a significant amount of time to fill out the AMCAS application and write your personal statement.  It takes time for AMCAS to process your application and forward it to the medical schools you choose.  It then takes even more time to fill out and return the secondary applications the schools will send you.  Since most medical schools do admissions on a rolling basis, it is to your advantage to start the process as early as possible.  This is especially true if you are still a student since the last thing you want is to be filling out secondary applications after school resumes in the fall.
  
   
• Really, start early.  The year I applied to medical schools, AMCAS did not print enough applications at first and for a while there were shortages at many colleges (including Harvard).  The AMCAS applications are usually available starting in late spring; get them as soon as possible (though I should note that AMCAS will not accept completed applications until June 1).
  
   
• Get your transcripts in as soon as possible.  Before AMCAS will process your application, they require that you send them an official transcript from every post-secondary institution you have attended.  After they have received all of your transcripts and your application, they will then use your transcripts to verify that all of the information on your application is correct.  This takes time (several weeks) so it is important that all of your transcripts are received by AMCAS as early as possible.
  
   
• Laser print your application.  AMCAS will send a photocopy of your application to every school, so you want to make sure it looks as neat as possible.  The main problem is that there is a limited amount of space on the AMCAS application and you must fit all of your information into the spaces allotted.  In particular, I found myself running into trouble with the extracurricular activities and employment sections, as well as the personal statement.  My typewriter's font was too big to fit everything where it belonged.  It really helped to use a computer and play around with the margins and fonts (AMCAS does insist that you use at least a ten point font).  I also found that for the extracurricular activities and employment sections it is possible to fit two lines of text onto each row (one atop the other) if you space things just right.  I photocopied each page of the application and printed onto the copies to make sure everything fit where it was supposed to go.  When I was finally ready to mail it off, I printed my application onto four blank pages and had Kinko's copy them onto the actual AMCAS forms (AMCAS will allow you to cut the application in half so that it will fit into a printer or copier; just tape it back together when you're done).  If you're interested, I have made templates of page 1 and page 3 of the AMCAS application that you can use.  These templates may be useless since they were for the 1996 AMCAS application (I have no idea if it has changed).  Also, the templates work fine with Microsoft Word for Windows 95, Version 7.0, printed on a Hewlett Packard LaserJet IIP.  They may look different with any other word processor or printer.
  
   
• Verify that everything has been received by AMCAS.  Before you even mail your application to AMCAS, call them and make sure that your transcripts and MCAT scores have been received.  If you sent a transcript and they haven't received it, send another.  You don't want to risk delaying the whole application process.  After you send your application, call AMCAS to make sure they have received it (and DEFINITELY keep a copy of it in case they lose it). Unfortunately, calling AMCAS is not as easy as it sounds.  Every medical applicant in the country will be trying to call AMCAS, so expect a lot of busy signals.  When you do get through, expect to spend a lot of time on hold.  When you finally speak to somebody, they will probably not be overly friendly or helpful.  There's nothing you can do, so just grit your teeth and learn to hate this evil pillar of bureaucracy.
  
   
• AMCAS is expensive.  This is a fact of life, but you should keep it in mind.  My advisor told me to apply to twenty medical schools, and sixteen of the twenty were AMCAS.  It cost me $400 just to have AMCAS process my application and send copies of it to these sixteen schools (this does NOT include the secondary application fees that I later had to pay to the schools directly).  Just keep in mind that it is going to cost quite a bit just to get the ball rolling....

Secondary Applications

Unfortunately, AMCAS is only the beginning.  After you have sent your application to AMCAS (along with all your transcripts and a substantial amount of money), AMCAS will process the application (which takes around four weeks) and then forward copies of the application to the schools you choose.  Every single one of those schools will then send you a secondary application.  In addition to completing the secondary application, you will be asked for more money.  It's sort of amusing actually.  Some schools have secondary applications that require you to write additional essays.  However, a significant number of secondary apps only ask for some simple information that you already wrote on your AMCAS application.  Obviously, what these schools really want is more money from you.  My List of Schools contains information on the secondary applications of most of the AMCAS schools to which I applied.


 

Non-AMCAS Schools

There are a number of schools which do not participate in AMCAS.  To apply to these schools, you need to contact the admissions offices directly and request an application.  One of the advantages of this system is that you tend to save money by paying only one application fee.  However, the non-AMCAS applications tend to be a bit lengthy and contain more essays than the secondary apps of most AMCAS schools.

Below is a list of non-AMCAS schools from 1996 (Note: I did not include osteopathic, podiatric, or veterinary schools, but these are also non-AMCAS):

• Baylor College of Medicine
• Brown University Program in Medicine
• Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons
• Harvard Medical School
• Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
• University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine
• New York University School of Medicine
• University of North Dakota School of Medicine
• University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry (joined AMCAS in 1997)
• Texas A&M University College of Medicine
• Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center School of Medicine
• University of Texas System
• Yale University School of Medicine

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bronson.terry@umassmed.edu