Atlantic Bridge Program applicants: How to improve your application for 2010?!

[Fiddler]

Hi all-

Unfortunately, I received my rejection letter from Trinity College today (April 20th, 2009).

I really want to use my Trinity rejection in a positive way so that I can strengthen my application for the next application cycle.

Since Trinity doesn't require GAMSAT scores (and I don't have my March '09 results yet), I can thus conclude that my application package was deficient in one or more areas.
The question is: What I can do to address the deficiencies my original application had so that it will be stronger for the next cycle (2010)?

Are there any 'repeat' Atlantic Bridge Program applicants in this forum?
If so, how did you determine what components of your application required work (since we don't get feedback on our application)?

I would also greatly appreciate any other student's / prospective student's advice!

A little background on my situation:

Despite being an Irish citizen, since I haven't resided in the EU for the past 3 years, I am not eligible to apply as an EU citizen.
Therefore, I had to apply to Irish medical schools via the Atlantic Bridge Program!
I applied to the Irish GEP programs and Trinity's program.

I'm old(er)!: 34
I graduated from UCD with a 1.1 BSc (Biochem and Pharm) in 1996.
I moved to the USA and worked for 2 years in the biotech sector as a technician.
I then did my PhD in Biochem / Mol Physiol (graduated in 2003; GPA 3.92) in the USA.
I subsequently did the two obligatory post-doctoral fellowships in the USA (finished 2008).
Currently, I am faculty in a clinical department at a university in the USA (since 2008).


I think I have fairly decent clinical experience / shadowing:
For the past 3 years, I have volunteered my time with a transplant center and my research is primarily of a clinical nature.
I go out on transplant donor organ procurements all the time and sit in on a lot of the surgeries and post-transplant procedures.

Even though I haven't seen them, I would imagine my letters of reference are of somewhat decent quality:
2 of my LORs are from academic physicians I work with.

I tried to keep my 'research experience' section as succinct as possible so as not to bore anyone (1 page).

So......
Obviously, there must be certain aspects of the application that I can possibly improve upon:

1. I am thinking that I could have botched my essay ("Why I would be an asset to the Medical School").
2. Perhaps I haven't made a compelling case as to why I want to do medicine at this point in my life?
3. Maybe I haven't expanded enough on the section that asks for what you have been doing if you have been out of school for over a year?
4. Perhaps I need to improve upon my extracurricular activities/accomplishments?
5. My ABP application package was sent in very close to the deadline in Nov '08: perhaps this is an issue? (i.e. it should be sent in earlier)

Thanks for reading!
Any comments and/or input are most welcome!

[Aidan Kehoe]

Fiddler, the EU people can't really help you there, as far as I can see. Try asking this over at studentdoctor.net , where all the North Americans seem to hang out. Here is the sub-forum that focuses on the UK and Ireland, with lots of active commentary applying to RCSI.

[Fiddler]

Fiddler, the EU people can't really help you there, as far as I can see. Try asking this over at studentdoctor.net , where all the North Americans seem to hang out. Here is the sub-forum that focuses on the UK and Ireland, with lots of active commentary applying to RCSI.

Aidan-
Thank you for that information - I wasn't aware of that site and you're right - there are a lot of relevant threads there!