Sponsoring a Child

[mrtumus]

I sponsored a child for medical and dental coverage in Honduras. I live in the USA. I did it for 2 years and the child and I exchanged letters occasionally. I also have the option to meet her when I visit Hondourus. Anyways my question is can I mention this sponsorship in my medschool app? Is so how? I don't want to seem like I did this olny for medschool I have been committed and have been paying every month for her school and medical bills.

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[hydroxyurea]

Did this experience significantly impact you, encourage you to pursue medicine, and demonstrate/cultivate skills that will help you succeed in the delivery of health care?

Sounds like while it was a good gesture you just threw a few bucks around without a significant commitment of time/effort. If this is relevant than I should've been keeping track of every can I donated to the local food bank.

If this was relevant than pre-meds would be calling in all those "starving child in (third world country here) needs your help" commercials constantly.

 

[looncat]

No. My family and I sponsor a lot of children but I don't mention any of it because giving to charities is not an activity, you don't learn anything from it and it doesn't actually take much effort. Giving to those less fortunate is something you should do if you are part of the "more fortunate" crowd but it adds no merit to your qualifications for med school.

 

[Catalystik]

I sponsored a child for medical and dental coverage in Honduras. I live in the USA. I did it for 2 years and the child and I exchanged letters occasionally. I also have the option to meet her when I visit Hondourus. Anyways my question is can I mention this sponsorship in my medschool app?

Entering this experience in your AMCAS Work/Activities section will not reflect well on you. Neither will mentioning faith-based donations or giving blood at the bloodbank (in case those might be your next questions).

 

[NickNaylor]

Like... from one of those things that asks you to give in the mail?

 

[Goro]

I have to admit, this is novel, so go ahead and mention it.

I sponsored a child for medical and dental coverage in Honduras. I live in the USA. I did it for 2 years and the child and I exchanged letters occasionally. I also have the option to meet her when I visit Hondourus. Anyways my question is can I mention this sponsorship in my medschool app? Is so how? I don't want to seem like I did this olny for medschool I have been committed and have been paying every month for her school and medical bills.

 

[Make Or Break]

I have to admit, this is novel, so go ahead and mention it.

Are you being sarcastic, Goro?

 

[Goro]

No, I'm quite serious. I would hope that OP has more than this to go on, though.

Are you being sarcastic, Goro?

 

[ridethecliche]

Goro and Catalystik at odds. Interestingggg

 

[LizzyM]

Entering this experience in your AMCAS Work/Activities section will not reflect well on you. Neither will mentioning faith-based donations or giving blood at the bloodbank (in case those might be your next questions).

I agree for the most part but might disagree about blood donation if one has donated often (at least 4 times/yr) over several years and has also promoted blood donation on campus or in other settings. There is no substitute for human blood and rolling up one's sleeves as a blood donor is altruistic and can be life saving. I will say that it is very rare and I can recall seeing it only once over more than a decade on an AMCAS application.

 

[ridethecliche]

I agree for the most part but might disagree about blood donation if one has donated often (at least 4 times/yr) over several years and has also promoted blood donation on campus or in other settings. There is no substitute for human blood and rolling up one's sleeves as a blood donor is altruistic and can be life saving. I will say that it is very rare and I can recall seeing it only once over more than a decade on an AMCAS application.

Yeah, but then it's an activity, i.e. you're organizing an event and such. Just showing up and donating blood however...? Really?

 

[Aerus]

Goro and Catalystik at odds. Interestingggg

It shouldn't be a surprise that different adcoms will have different opinions on such a matter. If they all thought exactly the same way, the whole "apply broadly" creed on SDN wouldn't work as well.

 

[LizzyM]

Yeah, but then it's an activity, i.e. you're organizing an event and such. Just showing up and donating blood however...? Really?

If one donates at leaat 4 times a year, they might as well "like" the Red Cross or whatever on social media and tweet or whatever their donations and encourage other eligible donors to do the same. It doesn't have to take much time, maybe an hour or two every other month, but I think that's legit "experience". Organizing blood drives on campus: brownie points for that too!

I would agree, just donating a couple times is about as worthwhile on an application as donating $.

Will anyone put their ice bucket challenge on the application?

 

[Planes2Doc]

Yeah it gets weird when the respected ADCOMs are at odds with each other!

My rule of thumb is: If you have to ask in a forum, then it means that your sixth sense is going off, and telling you that something is questionable.

In that case, it might be safer to leave it off, but it's up to you. I'm guessing that the way you spin it will ultimately determine its impact on the medical school application.

 

[Catalystik]

I agree for the most part but might disagree about blood donation if one has donated often (at least 4 times/yr) over several years and has also promoted blood donation on campus or in other settings.

I've never seen anyone come close to this, except for my husband who is a multi-gallon, award-winning donator, which maybe makes me harder to impress.

Promoting blood donation on campus? Or helping out in the blood-mobile? Definitely gets points in my book.

 

[Catalystik]

Yeah it gets weird when the respected ADCOMs are at odds with each other!

Clash of the Titans?

 

[mehc012]

I've never seen anyone come close to this, except for my husband who is a multi-gallon, award-winning donator, which maybe makes me harder to impress.

Promoting blood donation on campus? Or helping out in the blood-mobile? Definitely gets points in my book.

Seriously? They let you donate every 2mo, 4x/yr can't be that unusual!
I got a bit flaky about it when I went to college, because my school was in the boonies and didn't have a blood bank (also when the mobile came to town they didn't do the cool arm wraps, which I actually wrote an Econ paper on as a motivator for donation), but during HS and now since graduation I've tried to hit it up as much as possible. It always seems that everyone you run into there has been donating for 80 bajillion years, so I guess I'm just surprised that you don't see more. Perhaps people just don't think that it's application-worthy?

If one donates at least 4 times a year, they might as well "like" the Red Cross or whatever on social media and tweet or whatever their donations and encourage other eligible donors to do the same. It doesn't have to take much time, maybe an hour or two every other month, but I think that's legit "experience". Organizing blood drives on campus: brownie points for that too!

I would agree, just donating a couple times is about as worthwhile on an application as donating $.

Will anyone put their ice bucket challenge on the application?

If I do the ice bucket challenge 4x/year and tweet about it can I put it?!?

Organizing blood drives would totally be an activity, but simply donating, even with a certain level of frequency, doesn't seem so much like one to me.
Maybe med schools should endorse it, though...be kind of funny (in a useful way) if the blood shortage was even partially alleviated by a flood of premeds who heard that they could get application brownie points for a 1hr q2mo activity!

 

[aegistitan]

.

 

[L. Beethoven]

Personally, I wouldn't put down donations under the Work/Activities section, but there's obviously some differing viewpoints here.

I'd like to note that one of the USC secondary questions does ask about how you would allocate your charitable giving if you had immense wealth. I suppose that if you're already donating to a child sponsorship charity (hopefully for the right reasons), they'd like to know about that.

 

[Catalystik]

I can't tell if the ADCOMs are serious, but if they are

How does one help out in the blood mobile?

When the blood bank dispatches a camper or motor home containing a blood donation facility to a local organization that has organized a blood drive among its members, volunteers might (for example) check folks in, give them the questionaire that everyone is required to fill out, answer questions, research travel locations that might make a potential donor ineligible, offer fluids and treats when the donation is complete, and bring it to a nurse's attention if a participant is light-headed or otherwise symptomatic and not ready to depart the unit.

 

[mehc012]

When the blood bank dispatches a camper or motor home containing a blood donation facility to a local organization that has organized a blood drive among its members, volunteers might (for example) check folks in, give them the questionaire that everyone is required to fill out, answer questions, research travel locations that might make a potential donor ineligible, offer fluids and treats when the donation is complete, and bring it to a nurse's attention if a participant is light-headed or otherwise symptomatic and not ready to depart the unit.

Just don't go overboard...I know they mean well, but the volunteers always drive me nuts at the end, when they keep trying to force you to eat things and refuse to let you leave, or keep going on about how wonderful it is that you've donated as if you gave a kidney or something. If people are relieved when there is no volunteer that day (as I often am at blood banks), something is being done wrong.

 

[TheWeeIceMan]

Like... from one of those things that asks you to give in the mail?

*cue sappy music

"For the price of only a penny a day, you too can fill one of your 15 AMCAS activites." "And...you know....maybe help a child not to die...or something."

 

[Holmwood]

I sponsored a child for medical and dental coverage in Honduras. I live in the USA. I did it for 2 years and the child and I exchanged letters occasionally. I also have the option to meet her when I visit Hondourus. Anyways my question is can I mention this sponsorship in my medschool app? Is so how? I don't want to seem like I did this olny for medschool I have been committed and have been paying every month for her school and medical bills.

You can talk about the conversations you had with this child. If not in the primary application, then definitely for the secondary application.

There's SO MUCH essays about cultural awareness in secondary essays. This experience will tie into that perfect, but only if you weave it in right.