Is it difficult/easy to make friends in med school as a nontraditional student?

[Elizabethx89]

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[EMDO2018]

you're 24, not 30. Usually there are a quite a few non trads in the class, the average age for matriculants nowadays is about 24. If you go DO, there will be even more non trads. I will be 26 when I start this August.

 

[Elizabethx89]

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[EMDO2018]

You mean a gap year? And what are linkages?

 

[Elizabethx89]

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[NuttyEngDude]

Sounds like you are in Georgia, take a look at this, has ages:

http://armstrong.edu/images/Medical Schools in Georgia.pdf

 

[Qester]

I personally will be 27 when I start this fall and am not too worried about it

 

[Elizabethx89]

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[EMDO2018]

I meant glide year. Is it referred to as a gap year for non-trads? It's the year that non-trads are pretty much forced to take off between the time they apply to med school and the time they begin since you apply for med school a year in advance. Traditional students can avoid the glide year by applying to med school during their junior years, but post-baccs have no such option.

Linkages are agreements some formal post-bacc programs have with med schools where students are guaranteed a spot if they complete the program with certain stats. For example, I considered going to the post-bacc program at Agnes Scott College. Agnes Scott has a linkage agreement with Mercer Medical School, so post-baccs who complete the program with a certain GPA and MCAT score (I think somewhere around a 3.5 and 28) can begin med school as soon as they finish rather than having to go through the application process and take a glide year off.

I didn't go to Agnes Scott because of the cost, but now that I'm realizing how much longer the process is going to be for me doing a DIY post-bacc, I semi-regret my decision.

I hope that made sense.

Ok.


I will most likely be in GA for med school next fall, beautiful state.

 

[Elizabethx89]

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[lunalight]

you're 24, not 30. Usually there are a quite a few non trads in the class, the average age for matriculants nowadays is about 24. If you go DO, there will be even more non trads. I will be 26 when I start this August.

Yep, once you hit the ripe old age of 30 making friends is out of the question.

My 1st year classmates are definitely more motivated than my old prereq classmates. I have a lot of respect for them because there is no way I could have done what they are doing when I was 22, hence why I'm doing it at 30! Making friends isn't harder, just different....work ethic and maturity are bigger factors than age IMO. One of the advantages of being non-trad is that I have (had? haha) a life outside of medicine, so I can take a break from the med school crowd and hang out with my "non-med" friends.

One thing that has been really un-fun about taking my prereqs is that it has been really difficult to make new friends since I'm older and at a different place in my life than everyone. It would likely be different had I taken my prereqs at my alma mater, which is a commuter school and much more nontraditional student friendly. The school I'm at, however, is a stereotypical party school where seemingly everyone is involved in Greek life.

I took my first genetics exam yesterday, and it wound up being a doozy of a test -- as in, I'd celebrate if I pulled a 75 on it and am semi-anticipating having to drop the course because of it. When I was an undergrad student, when we'd have a nightmare of a test like that, my friends in the class and I would often meet after the test to vent/discuss how we felt about it and hopefully reassure one another that we weren't the only one who struggled on the exam. Walking out of that exam, it dawned on me that there are around 130 students in that class, and I'm not acquaintances or friends with any of them. I have no clue how others felt about the exam since I had no one to talk to about it after, so I've been freaking out ever since wondering if everyone had a rough time or if I'm just an idiot.

I originally figured that it would get easier to make friends once in medical school since everyone would be more like-minded and mature, so I just had to tough it out and get through these semesters of prereqs. Then this past weekend, I attended a pre-med conference at a med school, and it occurred to me that, even at 24, I was already older than the MS1s and MS2s who we talked with at the conference. By the time I actually make it to med school, assuming I do, it's going to pretty much be the same scenario as now where I'm 5-6 years older than most everyone in my class.

Basically, I was wondering if any current nontraditional med students could comment on if being older makes it difficult to make friends in med school or whether they ever feel excluded because of their nontraditional status.

 

[Elizabethx89]

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[threesparrows]

Are there other postbaccs/nontrads at your school that you could befriend? Even if they aren't in your classes, it might make you feel less isolated overall to get to know others in your situation at your college. I think its especially important to not feel all alone when you are in the process of applying, since its a busy/confusing/demoralizing time, so get that support network in place now if you can. Maybe your premed advisor might know how many postbaccs there are? If there are a # of you, you could form a student organization.

 

[mspeedwagon]

In my humble opinion, it's mostly in your head. No one cares that you are "older," which at 24 you are not (I had a 50 year old in one of my classes. I'll agree that she was older). I don't know how different of a place in life you can be. Do you own a home, have kids, are you getting ready to cash out your 401K? I'm going to assume the answer to all three questions is no.

I'm 30 going on 31 and have find myself in exactly the same place as my classmates... I'm a lowly, soon to be, medical school applicant that hopes to be an MS1 soon.

Join a club at the school, walk up to people at the cafeteria and introduce yourself, go to a party. I'm pretty introverted by nature, but made sure to make an effort to have friends. You need to accept that making friends is a different ball game when you come back to a school (at any age). It'll never be as easy to make friends as it was in undergrad again in your life (granted, I can't speak for med school). At 30 and with the hairline of Jan Koum (i.e. it's clear I'm older), I've had no problem befriending the juniors and seniors in my classes (I make a deliberate effort to stay away from freshman). Many of them look to me for advice given that I'm ten years older than most, but otherwise I'm not treated differently.

If I had to mention one thing that has been weird, it is that all of a sudden I have a ton of 19 and 20 year old females adding me on facebook, which has been really strange and I'm afraid may give the wrong impression to my network. They are all pre-meds and in class with me, I swear!

PS - Feel free to come to the OldPreMeds Conference in DC. I promise you that you'll be one of the, if not the, youngest people there.

 

[AlbinoHawk DO]

Maybe you are the problem? I was 25 to 27 doing post-bac at a CC and met cool people of all ages and we got along just great.

 

[Elizabethx89]

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[QofQuimica]

I was one of the oldest people in my med school class and am the oldest person in my residency class. Finishing residency now at age 39. Age is not an issue unless you go out of your way to make it one. In fact, if you're single or in a relationship but with no kids like I was during med school and residency, you'll likely have more in common socially with many of your young classmates than you do with your nontrad classmates who are married with kids and mortgages. My best friends in both my med school and residency classes were trads who went straight to med school after college.