Have your ERAS application ready by September 15th. Have your ERAS application ready by September 15th. Have your ERAS application ready by September 15th.
You have probably heard me say those words a lot in the past few months.
But for some astute students out there, there may be a different quote that comes to mind:
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBZk6JZwJCU]
I have gotten questions from a number of students about the fact that the ERAS page says the following:
Have I been lying this whole time? Accidentally misinforming my loyal readers? Purposely deceiving unsuspecting students? Thankfully, no to all of those options. But first, it is time for a brief history lesson.
For the past handful of years, ERAS has started transmitting applications electronically on September 15th at 9am EST. And for the past handful of years, the ERAS site crashes at approximately 9:02am EST. (Actually, in 2015 it crashed BEFORE 9am. Which was super great….) The past year or two, there had been rumors and inklings that the AAMC was going to find a way to decrease the glut of applications on day 1 and thereby reduce the stress on the servers on that first day, but it was not ready for prime time. Until now…
So, starting this year, if your application is ready, you can certify it and click to send it to your preferred residency programs starting on September 6th. ERAS will not release them until September 15th, but it will have them queued up and ready to go that morning. This way, you don’t have to be as stressed out trying to get in early that morning along with 35,000 of your closest friends. Plus, you won’t have to worry about seeing this:
