Can anyone provide advice for what I should be doing this school year?

[feedmebanhmi]

I am a 3rd year student majoring in Biology.
Here are my statistics and experiences:
GPA: 3.70
MCAT: N/A; I have not taken it yet.
Clinical Experience: Completed a CCE internship for 1.25 years (300 hours) which involved direct patient care (I did not continue as the commute was difficult); Served as a medical scribe for a physician for 1 year (100 hours, his program lasts 1 year per student).
Volunteer Experience: I have not done any in college, but I just started assisting a community service club which includes tutoring children, youth mentoring, and providing assistance at free clinics.
Work Experience: Lab assistant (2 years and ongoing, I need some form of salary due to my financial situations), Back-office medical assistant (1 year).
Research Experience: Working on two projects involving engineering and clinical applications with two poster presentations this upcoming school year (1 year and ongoing).

My questions are the following:
1. Should I continue furthering my clinical experience? Or, should I purely focus on my GPA and MCAT?
2. Should I take a gap year or apply to medical school at the end of this school year? What are the pro's and con's?
3. Should I start studying for the MCAT while taking my undergraduate studies?
4. What else should I do to make myself a competitive applicant for medical school?
5. Is it a bad idea to be involved in another research lab while continuing my current lab? I have another interest with another lab's project while being very interested in mine.
6. Is it necessary to have two LOR from science professors I had taken and 1 LOR from a non-science professor? I find it difficult to obtain LOR's from professors with lecture halls of 400 students. I currently have the prospecting LOR's: PI, 2 Dr's, 1 science professor who I took his class and currently working for, and the hospital I interned.

Thank you very much for reading and answering my questions. I greatly appreciate your input.

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[doit4themunki]

Weighing in here as 3 years on admissions committee / as a person who's looked at a LOT of apps. A lot of this is hard to answer since this descriptions of your extracurriculars are (understandably) short but given this info here's what I think.

1. numbers aren't everything but they ARE something. my opinion here is if it's one or the other, focus on the MCAT. it seems you have strong clinical experience. what you are lacking is volunteer work...you could kill two birds with one stone by trying to do some volunteer work in a hospital (for example at my undergrad institution you could do like 3 hours a week in the ED waiting room or patient transport or whatever). Anyway try and crush the MCAT, a good score might not necessarily guarantee you interviews but a bad score will guarantee you wont get many....

2. That's a really hard question to answer. It depends what you are thinking about. As far as how this will affect your application - if you take a year off and sit on your butt, that's going to hurt you. If you take a year off to work or do something cool, that's fine. As far as "life" choices....I dunno. If you take a year off you'll be one year older when you graduate? Honestly I don't think it matters....but if your'e going to take a year off make it worth while

3. This answer kind of hinges on what you decide on for #2. If you're going to apply during your senior year of college then you will have to study for the MCAT during classes basically. I did this during undergrad, it was hard but manageable. A lot of people do it, but try to take a light class load at this time. If you see yourself as someone who may struggle with the mcat, then take some time off from classes and dedicate yourself fully to studying for it. this kind of depends on you.

4. 1 - Crush the MCAT. 2 - Keep your GPA where it is 3 - Get involved in something unique. Everyone does research / volunteering / clinical stuff. Do something you enjoy that you can put on your app. Admissions committees see 1000's of applications that become indistinguishable from each other at some point...stand out!

5. No. I was working in like 3 labs at the same time. Just make sure you don't spread yourself too thin

6. Look at the school's websites you plan to apply to. Some will have specific recommendations like that. If you are really interested in a school that requires 2 science LORs then at that point you will have to find someone. There is not a way around it sometimes.

Hope that helps

 

[feedmebanhmi]

Thank you very much for the reply! It was really helpful, and I apologize for being vague.

Few questions:
1. Would working as an EMT be beneficial during my gap year? Due to my financial situation, I do not have enough funds to afford much of the application process.
2. What are ways to make myself "stand out" in my application? Do you have examples?

 

[feedmebanhmi]

Thank you very much for the reply! It was really helpful, and I apologize for being vague.

Few questions:
1. Would working as an EMT be beneficial during my gap year? Due to my financial situation, I do not have enough funds to afford much of the application process.
2. What are ways to make myself "stand out" in my application? Do you have examples?

Weighing in here as 3 years on admissions committee / as a person who's looked at a LOT of apps. A lot of this is hard to answer since this descriptions of your extracurriculars are (understandably) short but given this info here's what I think.

1. numbers aren't everything but they ARE something. my opinion here is if it's one or the other, focus on the MCAT. it seems you have strong clinical experience. what you are lacking is volunteer work...you could kill two birds with one stone by trying to do some volunteer work in a hospital (for example at my undergrad institution you could do like 3 hours a week in the ED waiting room or patient transport or whatever). Anyway try and crush the MCAT, a good score might not necessarily guarantee you interviews but a bad score will guarantee you wont get many....

2. That's a really hard question to answer. It depends what you are thinking about. As far as how this will affect your application - if you take a year off and sit on your butt, that's going to hurt you. If you take a year off to work or do something cool, that's fine. As far as "life" choices....I dunno. If you take a year off you'll be one year older when you graduate? Honestly I don't think it matters....but if your'e going to take a year off make it worth while

3. This answer kind of hinges on what you decide on for #2. If you're going to apply during your senior year of college then you will have to study for the MCAT during classes basically. I did this during undergrad, it was hard but manageable. A lot of people do it, but try to take a light class load at this time. If you see yourself as someone who may struggle with the mcat, then take some time off from classes and dedicate yourself fully to studying for it. this kind of depends on you.

4. 1 - Crush the MCAT. 2 - Keep your GPA where it is 3 - Get involved in something unique. Everyone does research / volunteering / clinical stuff. Do something you enjoy that you can put on your app. Admissions committees see 1000's of applications that become indistinguishable from each other at some point...stand out!

5. No. I was working in like 3 labs at the same time. Just make sure you don't spread yourself too thin

6. Look at the school's websites you plan to apply to. Some will have specific recommendations like that. If you are really interested in a school that requires 2 science LORs then at that point you will have to find someone. There is not a way around it sometimes.

Hope that helps