After you're invited, the interview is what matters most. It seems unfair, but because the dermatology department is so small, you will work with most of the people that you see during the interview. For that reason, people want to see that you can work well with everyone and most importantly, that they'd want to work with you. << who is this coming from? someone on inside of process? I can't imagine them ranking applicants based solely on these very surface level 10 min conversations, anyone can pretend for 10 mins. << you're talking about people who would grant external applicants interviews based on their resume compared to away rotators who they've known for 4 weeks, so yeah i can completely see these people making decisions based on 10 minutes of talking to them.
It really depends on you and whether your scores and apps are comparable to the non-courtesy interview candidates.<<this suggests that interiews arent the end all be all in ranking then? because presumably even if you have a couresy interview, you still have an interview, and would be on the same playing field as everyone else --- NO, true courtesy interviews do not have an equal chance. Courtesy interviews are for when a program hates a rotator or home student, but rather than outright reject them, they interview them anyways, with no intention to rank or with the intention of putting them dead last. It is just a way to avoid drama and hurt feelings, rather than cause drama. The definition of a true courtesy interview is an interview granted to assuage feelings without actually giving the interviewee serious consideration. Anything else is a real interview and not a courtesy interview. <- What about if a mentor reached out to a program and you received an interview? It's not a technical courtesy invite, but you don't know if you would have gotten it otherwise
how the heck would someone even know if they were a courtesy invite?
OP poster here about courtesy interviews. I guess I was using that term loosely to include away rotators since some aways interview all candidates...but can't answer that question << there's almost no way to know if you're a courtesy interview unless you know you didn't perform well on the away rotation. its exactly what you said, most likely behind-the-scenes you'll be taken off the list but they can say they interview all away rotators. the moral of the story, as in every interview, is everyone lies all the time. Agree with what wa ssaid above that unfortunately you'll never know if you were a courtesy interview or not, so not matter what don't sweat it.
<- good example is UTH. They interview all rotators in the rotation, but in their current class only 1 of the residents was a rotator (the rest were external). They sometimes have up to 10 rotators in a month, so if you do the math, they should have > half of their residents from rotators, but this is not the case << im going to play a lot of devils advocate here. it is possible - NOT PROBABLE, but POSSIBLE - that the away rotators ranked them a bit lower on their own list and matched higher, so the rotators list and UTH list did not match up, and the effect is what you're seeing. but yes i agree it was most likely courtesy interviews so UTH could say that they interview all rotators, and appear attractive to new applicants selecting away rotations. for every story about a program burning an applicant, there is a story about an applicant burning a program. i think it's the derm law of ranking or whatever other clever name it should be called. --> True!
->does UTH stand for Utah? -> hoping it stands for UT Houston, but not sure > yes UT Houston is UTH. abbreviating Utah by one letter would be not kewl
< Do you think courtesy interview applicants have an equal chance as everyone else?