School list/worth reapplying?

[dallen934]

cGPA: 3.75 sGPA: 3.61 MCAT: 516

Last round my main issues I think I had was applying to little, too top heavy, and having pretty abysmal clinical experiences (little late to the party to realize this now lol). I was pretty stupid and figured that majoring in chemical engineering would've given a larger bump to my app, and because my sGPA tanked because of a C+ in a biochem class I took over the summer. Also finding out engineering classes don't count towards sGPA until after I applied didn't help lol. I've been making efforts to bump up my clinical experiences, but given how things are it's been hard to project hours I'll be spending on each activity for the upcoming year. I have also been making what feels like strong improvements to my PS/activities writing, so there's that. I have one more appointment to discuss my app with an ADCOM thursday so I'm planning on submitting my app this weekend (hopefully). All bold-fonted information was not on my previous app.

Other general stats:

Clinical Volunteering:
Emergency room greater: 50
ICU PPE stocker: 50
Community health day volunteer: 20 +10
Shadowing: 20
Crisis Text hotline: +230 (not performed yet, but will likely begin soon)
Covid assessment of prevalence volunteer: +Unknown, possibly +100 (should know by end of this week)

Non-clinical:
Food Pantry: 250 +undecided
Platelet donation: +80 as of today (I talked to an adcom about this a few weeks prior, she said to def include it)
Red Cross volunteer: +undecided (at the moment, possibly 30+ hrs/month, could do more/less depending on job situation)

Research:
Cancer related migration studies within my college's department of engineering. Nature of study was independent, develop data for future grant proposals/approvals.
1000+ (hard to keep count)
Apprenticeship scholarship summer 2018
+ Honors research distinction (scholarship, granted honors, thesis published, oral defense, etc.)

Gap year job still pending, stuck in a limbo of interview offers -> hiring freezes, but good chance for clinical research position

LORs reportedly good based on talk w/ admissions member

This time around, I've been heavily basing schools of my stats (especially taking into account a GPA relatively low for my MCAT), and relying on MSAR data + LizzyM score + WARS. "Chance" score was based off of the prospectivedoctor chance predictor. My goal was to ensure that for all schools I was at least within the top ~70% of GPA scores, and above average on MCAT. OH resident btw.

I have considered waiting a year to apply, however I can't say with absolute certainty that I will have an opportunity to further my clinical experiences in the near future, so my app could very well not improve during that time. Any thoughts/opinions are greatly appreciated.
Also if the premed gods are with me, hopefully @Goro will see this lol.

	School Name	State	Chance
1​	Case Western	OH	Reach
2​	University of Michigan	MI	Reach
3​	University of Colorado	CO	Target
4​	OSU	OH	Target
5​	University of Cincinnati	OH	Target
6​	University of Massachusetts	MA	Target
7​	University of Pittsburgh	PA	Target
8​	University of Connecticut	CT	Target
9​	Western Michigan Homer Stryker	MI	Target
10​	Albert Einstein	NY	Target
11​	Dartmouth (+MS in engineering)	NH	Target
12​	Thomas Jefferson	PA	Target
13​	Brown University	RI	Target
14​	Carle Illinois	IL	Undershoot
15​	Temple University	PA	Undershoot
16​	Quinnipac University	CT	Undershoot
17​	University of Vermont	VT	Undershoot
18​	Pennsylvania State University	PA	Undershoot
19​	Central Michigan	MI	Far Undershoot
20​	Loyola University	IL	Far Undershoot
21​	University of Kentucky	KY	Far Undershoot
22​	Wright State	OH	Far Undershoot
23​	University of Toledo	OH	Far Undershoot
24​	Albany MC	NY	Far Undershoot
25​	College of Wisconsin	WI	Far Undershoot

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[Goro]

With your GPAs, those schools are NOT "far undershoot". They're right where you should be targeting, except your clinical ECs are lethally low.

 

[dallen934]

With your GPAs, those schools are NOT "far undershoot". They're right where you should be targeting, except your clinical ECs are lethally low.

Noted. Would you say that the type of ECs are bad or the overall numbers are just poor?

 

[DrStephennmnm]

Am I the only one who saw that OP is including donating blood on his app?

 

[Goro]

Noted. Would you say that the type of ECs are bad or the overall numbers are just poor?

Numbers are too low.

 

[Goro]

Am I the only one who saw that OP is including donating blood on his app?

Platelet donation is more heavy duty.

 

[danielblank313]

If Crisis Text Hotline is the same thing I did, i.e., text conversations through your computer I wouldn't classify this as clinical experience. It's definitely a really good experience and I highly recommend going through with it, but if what you're lacking is clinical experience it's up to you to weigh whether or not it's worth it if you can find true clinical experiences.

 

[summerdays]

Agreed that your clinical hours are low. Instead of getting a job in clinical research, you could consider getting a job as a medical scribe and maybe do research on the side if that's what you're passionate about.

 

[Damson]

I have to applaud you on the crisis hotline one. Thank you so much for being there for people who need you

 

[dallen934]

Agreed that your clinical hours are low. Instead of getting a job in clinical research, you could consider getting a job as a medical scribe and maybe do research on the side if that's what you're passionate about.

I've actually been looking into that currently, it looks like they might be hiring for telehealth positions. It'll be my goal to nail down a job that is more positioned in a clinical setting.

I guess my concern for now, and if anyone else wants to chime in also, is it worth appllying this year if I am not able to find a clinical setting job before my primary is sent out? I am very aware that my ECs are close to unacceptable, but I am wondering how sympathetic ADCOMs will be to this issue.

Cause don't get me wrong, if there wasn't a pandemic I'd be signing up for shadowing, volunteering, and clinical positions as much as I could, but it seems that all those options are limited, and I'm guessing that is a problem for more than just myself.

 

[dallen934]

If Crisis Text Hotline is the same thing I did, i.e., text conversations through your computer I wouldn't classify this as clinical experience. It's definitely a really good experience and I highly recommend going through with it, but if what you're lacking is clinical experience it's up to you to weigh whether or not it's worth it if you can find true clinical experiences.

Fair point, I'll be sure to switch it to non-clinical. If you don't mind me asking, how was your experience going in? I definitely want to do it and I feel like I could do a good job, but I am somewhat nervous going in.

 

[summerdays]

I've actually been looking into that currently, it looks like they might be hiring for telehealth positions. It'll be my goal to nail down a job that is more positioned in a clinical setting.

I guess my concern for now, and if anyone else wants to chime in also, is it worth appllying this year if I am not able to find a clinical setting job before my primary is sent out? I am very aware that my ECs are close to unacceptable, but I am wondering how sympathetic ADCOMs will be to this issue.

Cause don't get me wrong, if there wasn't a pandemic I'd be signing up for shadowing, volunteering, and clinical positions as much as I could, but it seems that all those options are limited, and I'm guessing that is a problem for more than just myself.

I think you have two options here.

1. Try applying this year but apply to a LOT of schools including ones that are under the category of "far undershoot," as you put it. You can hope you'll get some sympathy due to COVID but the reality is that there are still other re-applicants coming in with thousands and thousands of clinical hours (and really great stories about patient care for their interviews).

2. Take this next cycle off and really increase your clinical hours. Get a scribing job if/where/when you can, volunteer in the hospitals, do some volunteering outside of your job.

If I were you, I'd personally go for the 2nd option. Your GPA & MCAT are high enough that I wouldn't waste them on rushing into another cycle when you know you have low clinical hours. Go into next year's cycle guns blazing with the full package instead.

 

[danielblank313]

Fair point, I'll be sure to switch it to non-clinical. If you don't mind me asking, how was your experience going in? I definitely want to do it and I feel like I could do a good job, but I am somewhat nervous going in.

I really enjoyed my time there, I still take a shift every now and then. For me, I was most nervous about making things worse. Definitely a lot of vulnerable people you're talking to. But you realize it's much harder to make things worse than it is to make them better. For what it's worth, this experience was spoken very highly of in my interviews and from all the conversations you have with so many different people from all walks of life, it'll make answering some tough interview questions or secondary questions a lot easier and more meaningful.