Med School Updates: December's End

As the month is closing and I've realized that we haven't truly updated the world with med school application news, I submit to you this picture and apologize for the messiness of legend marks.

Here's the low down of our current application situation:

- Scott has been accepted to the Class of 2015 at Rocky Vista University (RVU) in Parker, CO (just south of Denver). Our first payment to RVU was due Dec 17, so of course we put in our deposit to attend medical school. The second payment is due in the middle of January. We really enjoyed RVU when we went to visit the campus in July. Scott knows that he would have a good experience there and thinks that the program would prepare him to be a good doctor. We're not sure if this is Scott's favorite program, as we are still learning about all his options. But we've decided that even if we make the second, and very large, deposit for school it's still okay to go to another school if we feel it will better prepare him. That being said, we are VERY happy to be going to medical school next year!

- In the beginning of December, Scott had an interview at Western University's campus in Oregon. I was lucky enough to follow him there to check out the town and new campus. Scott was impressed with the many options that come from Western's established program (since this will be a new campus for their existing program in Southern California). About a week ago, Scott received a call from Western informing him that Scott is on the Alternate List. The list is reviewed once a month as those accepted candidates drop off and alternates are chosen to take their place. We aren't really sure when we would hear back from Oregon. From our interview with them, we feel like the program would provide good opportunities for Scott, but he still needs to do some serious praying to decide, if he's accepted, if he prefers to attend this school.

- Just today we received a letter from the University of New England in Maine that Scott will not be requested to interview for this next year's class. While we are slightly disappointed to not visit the campus and be near extended family there and Scott's church mission area, we know that we'll be settling around the West Coast anyway after med school. And let's not forget, we're still ACCEPTED to a med school.

-We have not heard anything further about interviews for other schools but expect that we will start hearing more about second round interviews in January. Many of the interviews will be finished in February and March, and we would probably move from Sacramento to the campus in June to settle before med school things get going in the end of July.


Directly after Scott's interview was done in Oregon, we drove back six hours to Sacramento. Though it was a bit of a drive, we were glad to sit down and talk about what Scott's first impressions of the school were and how he thinks it would compare to RVU. While I would prefer living in the town of Parker, CO, we both could see the benefits of Western's program in Oregon and how many more opportunities Scott would have there to further his career exploration. After six hours of discussing the pros and cons from our perspectives, we came to the conclusion that we had no conclusion.

Both schools seem to have equal weight and we feel Scott would be successful at either school. It was quite a mystery to us what decision to make (at the time we had assumed from the three Oregon interviewer's responses that Scott would be accepted immediately). In Sunday School the next day, we had a miraculous lesson about Daniel in the Old Testament interpreting a dream for the King of Babylon.  I know that that would seem to have no connection whatsoever to our situation, but we felt we had a complete mystery on our hands and limited time to solve it. The lesson and scriptures helped us to realize the optimal steps to receiving personal revelation and moving forward with this major life decision.

Though I would say that we are still no where near understanding what we should do and which school we'll be attending come July, we know that we will be attending school (Yay! Can't say that enough!) and that the Lord will help us make that decision and reveal options. When one door closes, another opens... or maybe a window. Depends on who you hear it from.

As you can tell from our medical school application journey, that statement is Oh So TRUE!