My Medical School Admissions Coaching Program

Can it really be this easy to create a medical school application that makes you truly stand ABOVE the crowd of applicants … and make medical schools hang on every word of your application, then invite you to an early interview and offer you fast acceptance?

The answer is “YES” … and if you want to eliminate the worries about “Am I competitive enough?” or the doubts about your GPA or MCAT score, then this article may be one of the most important you will ever read!

Have you ever (think carefully as you answer) …

• Wondered whether your gpa is competitive enough to get in to med school? And what to do if your gpa is not high enough?
• Felt that your MCAT score is what is going to help you get in to med school, but then worried if the MCAT score by itself will be enough to make you truly stand out?
• Started to think that maybe you don’t have enough activities or research … the kind of activities that make medical schools STAND UP and pay attention?
• Felt frustrated because your pre-med advisor always seems to be too busy to really help you, or worse … she doesn’t even remember who you are, so you feel like you have to start over every time you meet?
• Thought that there were probably certain tricks to getting in to med school, that these tips would really help give you an advantage over other students, and that if you could just figure them out, they would really help you get in?
• Gotten fed up with people telling you, “You’re doing fine, just keep going …” when you ask specific questions about how medical school admissions works?
• Been really dissatisfied because it seems like no one will give you straightforward, step-by-step advice on what to do and when to do it? Does it ever feel like you are just being patronized?
• Secretly panicked, your mind begins to go wild, because if you don’t get into med school then all of the work you have done in college will be for nothing?
• Felt real fear because if you don’t get in to med school, then what? What’s going to be your back-up plan? What can you actually do with your degree, if not go to med school?

If you answered “YES” to any of these questions, I have news for you … and the news is “You are not alone.”

In fact, this list of questions was created from years of talking to and working with thousands of pre-meds about the problems they faced, the worries they had and what made them feel unsupported.

If you are like most college students, your life is on overdrive and you are constantly on the go. You find yourself running from one deadline to the next … and you feel like you never have enough time to complete anything as thoroughly and completely as you’d like. You think about medical school admissions — and the thought, “I have to get working on my application” — may be nagging you, something you know in the back of your mind you need to go working on, but you never seem to find the right time to do.

Trust me on this one. I know you may be wondering, “Am I doing everything I need to be doing … and have I done enough? Have I done enough of the right things? Are there other things I should be doing, but don’t even know I should be doing?”

Maybe you have spoken to an on-campus advisor or other mentor. When you asked them, “What should I do to make myself a better candidate?” the answer you get is nearly the same every time, “Don’t worry; you’re fine. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

This makes you feel like you have been dismissed. An empty, nagging feeling remains … is there something I should be doing that I don’t know about? Am I doing everything I should be doing to get into med school?

The truth is that med schools use a variety of criteria, many of them very subtle, to determine who should be offered an interview – and most importantly, an acceptance. But med schools won’t be e-mailing you a list of their criteria anytime soon. Sorry.

On-campus advisors simply do not have the perspective to determine what med schools are looking for – too many students for them to provide individual, customized advice to fit each student’s unique background and experiences.

How do you find out what medical schools are really attracted to? The easiest, best and most reliable way to do this is to send medical schools tens of thousands of applications from thousands of students and watch what they do. On-campus advisors do not have anywhere near the resources to do this kind of research, they same kind of research that is used in medicine to find out what actually works … it’s called “evidence-based” research.

Unless you have this kind of fact-based research result, it’s nearly impossible to figure out what to do. How do you fix something that you don’t know you’re supposed to fix?

The truth is, it’s not your fault! The entire admissions process is set up to work against you … UNLESS you know how to manage the process to your advantage.

Four Reasons Why Some Students Get In … And Others Don’t

1. Timing. Most students know that you need to apply early to get into medical school. And that almost always means, “I should turn my medical school application in early.” Did you know that your medical school application is not actually turned in until you complete at least two other steps in the admissions process? And that your application is not even looked at by admissions committees until after you have completed them?
2. Official Transcripts Trick. You may already know that medical school applications can be submitted starting June 1st, and you might even know that the online application is available for data entry as early as May 1st, but did you know that you can – and should – submit your “Official Transcript Request Form” to your Registrar in early May? And did you know that you must send a transcript to medical school from every college you attended, even from a college where you took summer school? What about a college class you took while in high school?
3. Avoid Letters of Recommendations Snafu. Here’s another tip: Many times a student will ask for letters of recommendation to be mailed to a med school, and then trust that this will be done, correctly and promptly, only to find out weeks or months later that their application is “on hold” because of a missing letter!
4. Medical School Admissions Index. Many med schools use an indexing system to help them evaluate and rank applicants quickly and efficiently. This index can contain as many as 11 different assessment points, but one rule of thumb to use is GPA times 10 + MCAT > 65. Knowing where you stand as an applicant can be a dramatic benefit to your chances of acceptance, IF you know about your status as a candidate early enough to make improvements.

Information like this makes the difference between an application that jumps through all the hoops and gets into the hands of the Admissions Committee early in the application cycle, versus an application that sits in the “Incomplete” stack, ignored by admissions officers and all the while you are wondering, “What’s going on? Why am I not hearing back from any schools?”

My Story

My name is Don Osborne. I am the founder of INQUARTA, the leading medical school admissions advising program in the country. I have been coaching pre-meds since 1994 and have worked with over 3,500 students since then.

I have written three books on medical school admissions, as well as a book on MBA school admissions and one about how to get a great letter of recommendation. You can say I’ve been around.

I first became involved in medical school admissions as an instructor for The Princeton Review. I taught Verbal Reasoning for the MCAT. That was in 1991. In 1996, Princeton Review merged with Hyperlearning, and the owners asked me to be a part of the team that rewrote the Verbal Reasoning section of the course. I became an Instructor Trainer, training other teachers how to teach the MCAT. I also wrote the course “Verbal Accelerator” for Princeton Review. This course has been very impactful on MCAT students’ verbal scores.

How I Got Started

My MCAT students asked me if I would help them draft their personal statement to medical school. We would work together to create a great essay, and sometimes med schools would accept that student right away.

But other times, seemingly for no reason, med schools would ignore a great candidate, and accept a student who had a lower gpa and lower MCAT scores. I knew there was something going on, something that students weren’t being told about … which meant to me that the pre-med advisors didn’t know either, or they would be telling the students like crazy. After all, a university’s reputation for high med school acceptance is a very valuable thing.

I spent months studying the admissions process, looking at what could be the cause of this weird result -why would a student with lower grades and scores get in, when a student with a high gpa and top MCAT scores didn’t? What could be the cause of this? It’s something that just didn’t make any sense.

I had to figure out what was going wrong. I studied the entire medical school admissions process and reviewed the applications of hundreds of students. That’s when I discovered the most amazing thing!

The medical school admissions process is engineered against the applicant!

The entire med school application process is designed for the convenience of the people who manage it. As a result (and frankly, quite by accident), the admissions process has been designed to make it more difficult for you to get and sustain an advantage.

I found dozens of little errors that students were making in their application because they didn’t really understand the “inner world” of medical school admissions, how the application process actually worked, and how a medical school admissions office manages the flood of information they receive.

Unless you really study how medical school admissions committees respond to a student’s application, it’s difficult – nearly impossible – to uncover what elements create a significant advantage and why med schools pick one applicant over another, despite lower gpa or MCAT scores.

My Admissions Coaching Program

I re-engineered the entire admissions process to give students every single advantage possible in the admissions process, from the very early stages all the way to the last acceptance letter. This system turns the whole admissions process on its head, exploiting every step along the way so that you can be assured that you have done everything possible to make yourself the strongest, most compelling, most attractive applicant possible.

Over 3,500 clients during the last 14 years have used my system to eliminate the worries and nagging doubts that plague pre-meds. You will learn how to experience greater confidence, commitment and clarity about who you need to be and what you need to do to truly stand out to med schools. My program will make med schools really want to read your application, invite you to an interview and then offer you early admission!

My admissions advising program is specifically designed to help students figure out how to make themselves far stronger candidates than is possible otherwise.

You will receive the kind of direct, to the point coaching and mentoring that has worked for thousands of students. We are a group of committed experts who work hard to get you every possible admissions advantage. We know the in’s and out’s of every step of the medical school admissions process, and I have tested and experimented until I discovered exactly how to gain an advantage at each turn.

What It Is and What’s In It

This is not your typical medical school admissions ‘pre-med advising’ feel good series of platitudes. This is not an hourly advising program where you have to bring all the questions to the table. This is not an over-hyped essay editing service.

In my program you will learn how to approach each of these aspects of your application to get the best possible strategic advantage:

• Personal statement – My editor will personally walk you through every step of the creation of your personal statement. The result will be your original work, fully exploring and describing your strengths … Your original answer to “Why do you want to be a doctor?” will show why you are a highly motivated candidate for medical school. You will feel much more confident because you have explored your reasons for going to medical school.
• Letters of Recommendation – You may already have recommenders picked out, but how do you manage the confidentiality requirements that medical schools require? Did you know that different med schools want different kinds of recommenders? Not all med schools operate the same way. You want to make sure you have the time you need to get your letters so you can avoid the last-minute race, competing with dozens of other students all vying for a good letter of rec. How willing is a professor to write you a letter of recommendation when he or she is grading finals, and preparing to leave for the summer?
• School Selection – What med schools should you apply to? Which ones are the “right fit” for your specific circumstances? Every year students apply to schools that are a terrible fit, wasting money that could be better spent elsewhere (secondary application fees and travel costs for the interview). I often save students hundreds, even thousands, of dollars in application fees, by pointing them in the right direction.
• Resume – The individual description for every one of your experiences is an added opportunity to help you stand out as an applicant. What you say here will make a subtle and important difference to help you shine against other applicants, applicants who may have similar experiences as you, but who do not know how to show them in the most favorable light
• Experiences you should have – There are specific experiences that med schools consistently prefer. These are experiences you want to confirm you have, or obtain, before you apply.
• How you stack up against other applicants – You need to know yourself, especially what makes you different as an applicant compared to all the others. If you don’t know what makes you different, you are hard-pressed to answer tough-minded essay and interview questions. But, if you do know what makes you different, you can depend on this throughout the application. You will sound more original and more focused than many, many other candidates.
• How medical schools will interpret your GPA and MCAT score – and what you can do about it. Does it really make a difference which college you attend or which major you declare? The answer will surprise you … it’s not “Yes” and it’s not “No.”
• How to have the most persuasive interview – one of the most important 30-minute conversations of your life. In my program, you will be more prepared for the interview than any 30-minute mock interview will get you, because I won’t be doing a mock interview with you – I will be evaluating your interview skills and coaching you to maximize your credibility, your connection to your interviewer and your authenticity as an applicant.
• Secondary Essays – Finding your authentic voice can be a tough challenge when you are writing your personal statement. When it comes times for the secondaries, you will be writing over 75 pages of essay content. My editor will help you stay focused and consistent all the way through your applications. Admissions officers will read your application and find a focused, dedicated, committed candidate, not a scattered candidate with the most superficial motivation to medicine … to “help people.” Something that’s just not enough.
• Follow up and follow through – You will continue to press your advantage with the right kind of follow up. Know what to send and when to send it after you have completed your interview; show med schools that you are committed to medicine.

Who Needs this Program, and Who Doesn’t?

You don’t need this program if one of your relatives is on the admissions committee of your favorite medical school. You don’t need this program if you are absolutely clear about what you need to do and when you need to do it. And you don’t need this program if you have advising and coaching resources with a 14-year track record and who are dedicated to your success.

But if you’re like most students, with limited access to information, and with advisors who are so busy they can only offer the most superficial support, then this is the program for you. Personalized and personal, your editor and I will get to know you very well.

What makes this program different?

My evidence-based approach to advising makes my program different. Personal touch is what makes my program different.

In my program, you will discover your authentic and original motivation to medicine, and you will learn how to convey that motive powerfully and persuasively – in your primary application, through your recommenders, in your secondary essays and – most important – in the interview.

Imagine the feeling of confidence you will have as you reach out to shake the hand of your medical school interviewer, knowing that you have powerful and impressive reasons why you want to attend medical school, the kinds of reasons that will make your interviewer stop, listen carefully, look you in the eye and think, “I want this student in my medical school.”

Guarantee

I am so confident in my program, that If you are not accepted to medical school the first time, I will work with you again a second year for free. I have helped over 3,000 students apply to and get accepted to medical schools and I am committed to your success, too.

Enroll Now!

The fee for my program is $3,995. Follow this link to enroll in my Medical School Admissions Coaching Program or call me at 949-417-1295 x. 211. Let’s talk about your unique circumstance and how my program can help.   You can also sign up for a payment plan option: $1600 your  first payment, then $499 a month for five months, which includes a $100 payment plan fee.   For this option, please use Medical School Admissions Coaching with Payment Option. Discounts are available.

Sincerely and with respect,

Don Osborne, President

PS. My promise – and my personal commitment to you – is to give you not just one or two ways to gain an incremental advantage, but an entire re-engineering of the admissions process. My method has worked for thousands of other students and I believe my system will also work for you.

Testimonials

Thank you so much for your help and support this year! It has been a memorable and productive one! I had never imagined that it would turn out so well and I am very thankful. I will definitely recommend INQUARTA, especially to people like me, without a pre-med advisor. The support of the team is priceless! I was accepted to UC Irvine, Northwestern, Georgetown, MCP-HU, Medical College of Wisconsin, and Albert Einstein College of Medicine! — Salina Lee

Applying to medical school these days is tedious and overwhelming. The enormous amount of highly qualified students battling for a finite amount of spots makes even the slightest edge important to your success. In January of last year, I felt pretty confident that I knew the ropes of applying to medical school. I was more worried about my MCAT and GPA which were not as competitive as I had hoped for. I shudder to think where I would be now without the guidance, insight and prodding from INQUARTA. From their instruction I not only learned how important timing is, but how to prepare months in advance to actually meet the deadlines. INQUARTA picked my brain and gave me the confidence to include things in my application I would have never thought of. Their techniques helped me create a unique and compelling application—A far cry from what I would have produced on my own. I think admissions committees were impressed—I received interviews at Tulane, New York Med and St. Louis . . . All before September. -William D. Krauss (UCSD)

Thank you for all your help in the medical school application process. I am sure that without your assistance I could not have made it this far. I had average grades and a 34 on the MCAT. Out of 36 schools which I applied to, I interviewed at four schools so far, two of which are top schools. I am still waiting to hear about acceptances. Basically, how I performed on the MCAT and the interview was up to me. What you did was place me on a strict timeline allowing me to interview early and take advantage of the rolling admissions process which many schools have. I stuck to your formula of a one-day turn around time for secondaries and it paid off. I have many other friends who have a much better academic profile than I, but they lagged for so long on getting the primaries and secondaries out on time, they missed the boat and were rejected from all the schools they applied to. You also helped me get the essay and interview format down. I highly recommend your service. Thank you! — Ana Powell

I have been getting interviews from places that I did not think I would. I can not believe that with an MCAT score of 25 I have already been accepted to two places. INQUARTA helped me a lot through this hectic process and the one most helpful aspect was the essay. I feel like the editor worked day and night to perfect my essay and I believe that I have gotten more than my money’s worth. The school selection was also helpful and the mock interviews over-prepared me. This is why all my interviews seemed like a breeze. Most importantly, INQUARTA gave me peace of mind and the notion that I am doing my best to get into a medical school. Even if I had an MCAT score of 40, I would still have used INQUARTA’s services. I am also glad I used INQUARTA because if I didn’t, and I didn’t get any acceptances, I would have regretted not enrolling. A little investment goes a long way with INQUARTA. I have a future ahead of me. — Armine

I must admit I was one of many pre-meds chanting yet another variation of the bandwagon slogan: “I want to become a doctor because I want to help people.” Generic or not, my desire to help others formed the very core of my reasons for pursuing a career in medicine, and I struggled to express my true feelings with a refreshing voice. INQUARTA offered a very effective approach that enabled me to guide listeners and readers with my life stories. In all successful interviews, I never had to explicitly explain why I wanted to become a doctor; I only had to tell them different stories about my life. INQUARTA undoubtedly helped me to find a truly unique voice that was engaging, relevant and most importantly, my own. I highly recommend INQUARTA as it helped to transform my average repertoire of numbers and experiences into a highly competitive and memorable package. Thanks again! — Johnathan H.

First off I would like to thank you. I am not sure if you remember, but about two weeks ago I had called you with a question. The Pediatric Cardiologist I research under was so impressed by my work ethic and passion he wanted to call up med schools personally, so he told me to pick 3. You told me to go with VCU, Vermont, and USC. I would have gone with completely different schools. But you were right! You are a GENIUS! I have recommended all the undergrads I have met here at UCLA to enroll with INQUARTA! Within one day of his email, the VCU med dean replied and told him she is releasing my file for an interview based on his praise. So now, I have an interview December 15th. Thank you so much for that. — Sanjay

P.S. In addition to those 3 med schools, I also talked him into emailing Brown (my dream school). The dean responded and said she would personally review my file! I’m very excited!