I don’t understand why anyone would pick anything for an official email addy besides their actual name. 
On one hand, it’s stupid to judge people by their email handles, and I can’t IMAGINE that a school would decide to reject or accept you based on your email handle, but it’s just not very professional IMO to call yourself by a pseudonym in any official correspondence. You certainly wouldn’t sign your name that way, right? For anything official, I use my university email where the handle is my first initial followed by my last name @ university.edu. Those of you who are not affiliated with a university can do the same thing through yahoo or gmail: make an official named account, and use it for official emails including all of your med application correspondence.
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Those of you who are not affiliated with a university can do the same thing through yahoo or gmail: make an official named account, and use it for official emails including all of your med application correspondence.
Exactly!!
I have about 4 yahoo accounts for the various names I use.
One of them is kimie and I would certainly NOT use this one for ANYTHING professional, especially not med school coorespondence.
Hey there–
You’ve already gotten lots of great advice here from other people–but I just have one comment. You don’t have to be able to talk about football in your interview! I don’t know why an interviewer would bring that up, unless it was to break the ice. Yeah, you should be well-versed in important domestic and geo-political matters (at a cocktail party conversation level, maybe a little more, but not too much more, or you’ll just get yourself into trouble 
) Maybe in corporate America some managers want to see how sportsy you are, but this is really, really not an issue for medical school. I bet the interviewers were just trying to be chatty (insofar as mentioning football, at least).
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does your e-mail address really make a big impact?
This is an interesting question! I think it makes a subtle, but huge impact, at least if the address is anything unusual. Even just having a hotmail address or a yahoo address seems a little tacky to me when I see people using it professionally, at least if the person is employed by a major institution that is obviously going to provide an email account for them. For students and applicants it’s totally fine, I think. The name should be straightforward though.
Even in the personal realm, the wrong email address can be a turnoff. A friend of mine recently turned a guy down for futher dates because he had an ever-so-slightly-sleazy sounding email address.
Yeah, I think you should have a proper and professional sounding email address for all official affairs.
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does your e-mail address really make a big impact?
Even in the personal realm, the wrong email address can be a turnoff. A friend of mine recently turned a guy down for futher dates because he had an ever-so-slightly-sleazy sounding email address.
Yeah, I think you should have a proper and professional sounding email address for all official affairs.
I just went thru a stack of resumes and turned down 2 because of this very reason. MsJuicy@…com & luscious@…com. These are on resumes for an admin asst. position.So yes, I say email address does matter.
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Even just having a hotmail address or a yahoo address seems a little tacky to me when I see people using it professionally, at least if the person is employed by a major institution that is obviously going to provide an email account for them.
Some major institutions won’t allow you to use your job address for anything not related to that job. So for some, it’s not amatter of being tacky, as much as keeping ones personal life seperate from thier professional one.
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Some major institutions won’t allow you to use your job address for anything not related to that job. So for some, it’s not amatter of being tacky, as much as keeping ones personal life seperate from thier professional one.
Yeah, I see what you mean–I was just talking about when people are representing some institution, in a manner that IS related to their job, and still give out a hotmail address. It’s not a big deal though.
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does your e-mail address really make a big impact?
In February a local admissions dean came to speak at my post-bacc school. He made a point to tell us to open a new account if our email address could be construed as “questionable”. He offered up the (probably fake) example of someone being “cowtipper@yahoo.com”, saying that if he were conducting the interview, he would ask about the origin to see how much he liked the answer. He did not have a problem with someone’s email being through yahoo or msn, etc.
I always think of certain situations, such as job and school applications, on a very professional level and use an account that is my name (my university one tends to fill up with spam!!).
For example, my hubby has a website, so my official email is "firstname@lastname.com"
I get many comments on it, even my PI thought it was neat! 
I would never use my name as an email 
But use a neutral thing like whuds It’s like “whuds up” LOL
That’s what I’m saying too. I mean, when I write a business correspondence letter, I don’t sign it “QofQuimica.” I sign it with my real name. This is the clearly obvious thing to do to all of us, right? So I wouldn’t use my QofQuimica email addy either, and for the same reason.
For the person who said they wouldn’t use their name, why not? Do you worry about the med schools finding out your true identity or something?
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That’s what I’m saying too. I mean, when I write a business correspondence letter, I don’t sign it “QofQuimica.” I sign it with my real name. This is the clearly obvious thing to do to all of us, right? So I wouldn’t use my QofQuimica email addy either, and for the same reason.
For the person who said they wouldn’t use their name, why not?
For security reasons I do not like my name used (Identity theft just this past year! still problems) I also think it’s hard to get an email with your real name, I have yahoo and like it but I’m abroad too.
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does your e-mail address really make a big impact?
As “silly” as it may seem, your e-mail can greatly influence the AdCom - just as you do not get a 2nd chance to make first impression. If you have broccoli b/t your front teeth, it does not matter - you just blew your first impression at the interview. Does that mean you neve brush your teeth? Hell no, but you still cannot undo that impression. Same deal with an off-color, humorous, snide or colloquial e-mail addy.
Above all else, at all times, you must remember that this is a predominently stodgy, conservative profession. Yes, it is changing, but AdComs & the governing bodies are predominently manned by the ‘old guard’ & they are not likely to find such stuff whimsical.
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Above all else, at all times, you must remember that this is a predominently stodgy, conservative profession. Yes, it is changing, but AdComs & the governing bodies are predominently manned by the ‘old guard’ & they are not likely to find such stuff whimsical.
I agree, although even if medicine wasn’t stodgy, I’d still think it would always be best to have an email address that makes a neutral impression.
Actually this reminds me–I used to work as an editorial assistant in a book publishing company, and authors would often send in their manuscripts unsolicited. Well, unsolicited work isn’t supposed to get looked at, but sometimes it does just because we were always hoping to find something good. But for sure it NEVER got read if it came with a bizarre-looking cover letter. Like a letter decorated with graphics, or with a specialized font meant to tell us how romantic or futuristic or whatever the book was. Not that some creativity isn’t ok, just that the vast majority of stuff like that tends to look amateurish and gimicky. It’s the same reason why no one should put their resume on pink paper.
Since people use email for so much–both professional and non–having a scandelous sounding address can wreak havoc everywhere! Not just on medical school applications…
(Why am I going on and on about this subject? Must stop!)