I clicked submit last night: turns out I am an idiot
So I haven’t written much in the last week, primarily because I had been busy finishing my Ontario medical school applications. For those of you who don’t know, it is a pretty lengthy process, requiring an autobiographical sketch listing up to 48 items to describe yourself, a 1,000 word essay for the University of Toronto, and answering five short questions for McMaster University, among other things. It is done through OMSAS: the Ontario Medical School Application Service.
It’s amazing how much your feelings and emotions can change in such a short period of time. Life really is a roller coaster; not only throughout your entire life, but sometimes even within the period of a single day.
I woke up yesterday 11:00 a.m., determined to finish my application and submit it by the afternoon (Note: The application was due today 4:30 pm, so I was not a complete procrastinate for once!). I worked for about 6-7 hours straight, touching up my essays, revising, double-checking everything, etc.etc. After a huge surge of adrenaline, I was finally very happy with what I had produced in terms of my essay answers, as that is probably the hardest part of the application. Considering I hadn’t written things like this since Grade 12, it felt pretty good to get rid of the rustiness and actually let loose.
Success!
So I clicked submit at about 7pm, feeling super happy and relieved that I was not only able to put together an application I was very proud of, I did it with a whole day to spare! So to celebrate, my family took me out for a nice dinner. Yum steak.
Anyways, so I get home maybe two hours or so later, and start randomly reading some premed student forums online (keener much?). And I read this post by a student who was panicking about forgetting to fill out some prerequisite course information for the University of Ottawa. And then I started panicking too. Why? Because I had no idea what he/she was talking about!
Oh Crap…
So I called up my good friend Andrew, and asked him to take a look into his Ontario Medical School application account to see if this was true (I can’t do this anymore. Once you click submit, all of the application pages disappear). As it turns out, on the University of Ottawa school submissions page, there was this link you were supposed to click and fill our which courses you have taken that satisfy their prerequisite courses. I somehow completely overlooked this link! Unfortunately, once you submit your application, you cannot make any changes online.
Soon after that, I was reading the OMSAS FAQ page, to see if there was information on whether I could get this fixed. Instead, I stumbled upon another mistake I had made. You see, York University has a unique course credit system where in general, full year courses are considered 6.0 credits, and half year courses are considered 3.0 credits. However, some of my biology courses with lab components in 2nd year were worth 4.0 credits. On the OMSAS application system, a full course is assigned 2.0 credits and a half course is assigned 1.0 credits. Since 4.0 credit course was somewhere in between, I entered it in as 1.5 credits – since it was the closest thing. My brother, Jerome, had done this exact same thing last year, and his application was obviously fine.
However, the OMSAS FAQ page apparently added a new question and answer this year, saying that we were supposed to treat 4.0 credit courses like 3.0 credit courses, and just assign them 1.0 credits when we enter them into the application!
Great. An afternoon that started off being so wonderful and happy suddenly turned into an evening where I felt like a complete moron for not having been more meticulous in the application process. These mistakes were not a big deal, but I would feel very foolish if they somehow ended up hurting my chances in the end.
The OMSAS phone support does not run in the evening, so I wouldn’t be able to call them until the next day (this morning). So I had trouble sleeping obviously, since although I was pretty sure it can’t be that big of a deal, I couldn’t help but think about it. I had trouble falling asleep initially, and woke up several times in the middle of the night.
This morning – not so bad
So I wake up bright and early at 9:50am, happy that I was about to get a decent amount of sleep in spite of being a bit upset and anxious. I call up OMSAS, happy to see that I didn’t have to wait long to speak with someone, even though it is the last day for submitting applications (guess everyone is at class). Here’s what happened:
Course Credit Problem: As it turns out, OMSAS will automatically correct any course credit mistakes as they review my application before sending it out to the medical school admissions committees, so I am okay! I expected them to say this (since my brother had done the same thing last year), but confirmation is always nice.
Ottawa Prerequisite Courses Problem: Well, I was told I could mail in a letter to OMSAS stating that information I forgot to include. Unfortunately, they cannot add this information directly into my application. They will attach the letter with my application, and it is up to the University of Ottawa to read the letter if they please. Even if they somehow do not read the letter, a ten second glance at my transcript would make it obvious that I have all the prerequisites. I just hope I am not automatically disqualified for leaving that section blank, and they will decide to check my transcript/letter anyways when they notice this.
Now… I wait
Well now all I can do is wait and hope for the best. The funny (or tormenting) thing is that if I don’t receive an interview from the University of Ottawa, I will always wonder whether it was because my application was not good enough this year, or because I was automatically rejected!
I also applied to the University of Toronto, McMaster University, and Queen’s University, and my application should be fine for those schools, so for the most part, I have a shot for sure.
Hopefully I will move on in this process, and have some interesting stories to tell by the end of the year – and hopefully I will be able to post a happy success story next May!
As for right now… well I have an Evolution test tomorrow. Time to learn 1/3 of my course today!
Good luck to anyone who has applied this year!
Related Posts:
- … And then there were two
- First post and first impressions
- Having an Open Identity, Friendships
- So I think I know why my marks have dropped…
- Major Change Coming and Pre-Med School Update
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Comments
Hey Josh! I’m an IB kid who just recently stumbled upon your site while looking for help with scholarships essays. You’ve got some awesome pointers, and your success stories gave me the confidence to decide to try for those really big scholarships. I’ve only just started ploughing through the information now, reading about the million essays I’ll have to write. @_@ So thanks for the incredible insight and very helpful advice. =)
Wishing you lots of luck on getting accepted! Your blog name made me laugh by the way, “MedHopeful” haha.
Fellow torontonian,
- Natalie
Hi Natalie,
No problem, I’m really glad you are finding the articles helpful. Also glad you find the blog name funny =)
Good luck with the million essays!
Wow, that is quite a story. I hope everything works out for you, man. You already know that I am going through a similar scare (although not as big) with the Millennium Foundation. I still haven’t gotten a call back. From what I know, med. schools have an application fee (correct me if I am wrong) so it almost makes them liable to correct any problems that they might see.
I wish you good luck.
MedHopeful @ Premed101
What a relief that everything works out!
Yay for Josh.