Rejected from Medical School? Here Are Some Next Steps.
You put your all into your undergraduate program, made time for extracurricular experience, and logged thousands of hours preparing for the MCAT. But it seems like it was all for nothing, because your chosen medical school isn’t going to offer you a place—maybe none of the schools you applied to are.
This is a devastating setback, but it doesn’t have to be the final blow for your dreams of becoming a doctor. Here are some tips for regrouping, reassessing, and moving forward.
Feel Your Feelings
Set aside a few days to give yourself space to process your emotions. Do whatever it is you need to do to constructively work through this blow to your self-confidence, whether it’s stepping away from screens for a few days to be in nature, hitting the gym extra hard, or even getting lost in a book or video game over the weekend. Putting your feelings into words can also help, whether you write in a journal or vent to a trusted friend.
Taking a complete mental break from thinking about medical school for a few days can help you blow off some steam, accept what’s happened, and prepare to try again.
Take a Hard Look at Your Application
You probably knew before you sent your application that there were flaws, but now that medical schools have confirmed that, it’s time to pinpoint exactly what the weakest aspects are. Do you fall down on the primary application components, such as GPA, MCAT scores, or clinical and extracurricular experiences? Maybe you stumbled on your secondary applications—for example, by submitting a generic personal statement essay.
The problem could also be more meta than that: maybe you applied very late in the cycle or need to re-evaluate the list of schools you applied to. Whatever it is, try not to give in to the temptation to beat yourself up during this process. If it helps to give you some emotional distance from what you’re looking at, imagine that you’re doing this evaluation for another friend. We’re often more compassionate with others than we are with ourselves.
Request Feedback
If you’re still stuck, try reaching out to the admissions committees at the schools you applied to for feedback. Medical school admissions teams are busy year-round, so you may not get many replies. But sending a polite, professional e-mail asking for insight into how you fell short could help you glean at least a few actionable ideas for improving your application next cycle.
You may also be able to reach out to an advisor or former professor at the college where you earned your undergraduate degree. Approach someone who has experience supporting pre-med students and ask them to be as honest as possible. Usually the answer is that your application is fixable with the right effort.
Improve Your Credentials
If you know (or are advised) that there are multiple issues with your application, it may be time to consider continuing your education with a post-baccalaureate program or special master’s degree. The Tiber Health Master of Science in Medical Sciences (MSMS) offers you the opportunity to improve your record by completing a curriculum that mirrors the first year of education at an LCME-accredited medical school.
You’ll also benefit from MCAT prep, faculty support, and a data-driven, dynamic classroom model that provides constant feedback about your performance. Plus, the MSMS’s predictive analytics model offers you a real-time prediction of how you’ll score on the U.S. Medical Licensing Exam Step 1—a motivational tool, and one you can use to show medical schools how far you’ve come when you apply again.Find a Tiber Health MSMS program near you today!
