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[vomitcom]

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[Faha]

Add your other instate schools- Virginia Commonwealth and Eastern Virginia. Also consider adding these schools:
Duke
Mount Sinai
Rochester

 

[candbgirl]

This is just my opinion but you have a great application but I’m not sure you should believe your school concerning your clinical experiences. Based on your description, there really is nothing clinical about what you did. The people you provided services to weren’t patients under a doctors care for treatment. How would you answer a question about how do you know you want to work with the sick , injured and dying for the next 30-40 years? I’m not saying the people you worked with aren’t sick but ...On the other hand, what you did was(is) amazing nonclinical work. Was any of your shadowing with a primary care doc?

 

[Walter Raleigh]

@Goro, @LizzyM: thoughts? OP has a lot of nonclinical volunteering with vulnerable populations, but they don't have any clinical experience other than 100 hours of shadowing. Does the case manager work count as clinical? Even a couple hundred hours in an ER or something would make OP very golden indeed.

 

[milgauss17]

FWIW I did just fine this cycle with next to no clinical volunteering and lots of non-clinical volunteering. I did have paid clinical experience

 

[LizzyM]

FWIW I did just fine this cycle with next to no clinical volunteering and lots of non-clinical volunteering. I did have paid clinical experience

BINGO! Clinical experience is the coin of the realm. Have you had time with patients, OP? you might be cut some slack if you've been rounding with your dad on Saturdays since you were old enough to walk and chew gum but if you wanted to identify one weakness in your application, that would be it.

 

[LizzyM]

Thanks for your insights, I really appreciate it. I've spent countless hours interacting with patients and talking to them ever since I was young. I have had a lot of time with patients, but none of it was formally arranged. I will be around patients every day for hours on end in my gap year volunteering (paid for by a public service fellowship), how can I let medical schools be aware of that? My gap year job is combining my two passions of service to those experiencing homelessness and health by working in the clinic at the shelter. I am currently trying to arrange for about 60-80 hours of volunteering by mid-June at a hospital near my school, if that helps.

Frankly, this might be one of those times when applying a little bit later than Day #1 might be in your best interest. When does this gap year volunteering thing begin? As long as it starts by Aug 1, I'd suggest applying after your first 5 days in that setting. You can then list the date in the past when you began and list your future hours as well and it will be clear what you are doing in your gap year. This might be the exception to the rule that you should shoot for applying on the day that AMCAS opens.

 

[LizzyM]

It starts the first week of July! Will I be at much of a disadvantage if I submit like July 10th?

Not at all! You should be golden, particularly at schools that have a strong emphasis on service to urban underserved (homeless).

 

[Walter Raleigh]

Well, OP could take one additional gap year and have that experience under their belt. It might be worthwhile if that 520 MCAT wouldn't expire.

 

[DoctorSnow]

Gaining that clinical experience should be your top priority. If you get that EC up to par, the world is your oyster 🙂

 

[Goro]

Hey, I'm new here and will be applying for matriculation to the 2020 class.

• Year in school: Senior at HYPSM
  
  
• Country/state of residence: VA
  
  
• Cumulative GPA: 3.85
  
  
• Science GPA: 3.83
  
  
• MCAT Scores: 520 (130/131/130/129)
  
  
• Research – include any abstracts/posters/publications and how you were credited (eg. First author, senior author, etc):

NIH Summer Internship Program Research, resulted in a poster presented at the end of the summer to NIH. Did work in organic chemistry research. Getting a ROL. No paper. ~400 hours

Organic Chemistry Research at my university: May be getting a second author, but not in time for my applications. Did about 800 hours of work in this lab throughout a summer and a school year. Getting a ROL.

• Volunteering (clinical) – include hours/sites

None explicitly.

• Physician shadowing – include hours/specialties

100 hours over a lot of specialities, but I did the most in a homeless shelter seeing an addiction specialist treat people recovering from addiction within the shelter aka I did most with a primary care doc.

• Non-clinical volunteering

Coaching low income youth in basketball/football ~40 hours

A director for a homeless shelter, was on the policy board and served in an extensive leadership position raising money, buying supplies and leading a weekly shift. My campus's premed advisors says med school will count this as clinical experience due to the extensive interactions with people experiencing homelessness and providing them with comfort and care. ~2000 hours over four years. This was a longitudinal commitment where I rose up the ranks of the organization to become one of a few directors and this experience influenced my decision to become a doctor.

• Extracurricular activities

Wrote a publication for a sports analysis collective at my school. Member of a drug and alcohol peer advising club. These were lower down on my priority list from the shelter and research.

• Employment history

Head swim team coach of my local swim team the summer after my freshman year, otherwise no employment experience in college

• Immediate family members in medicine? (y/n) YES
  
  
• Specialty of interest: Pediatrics, Addiction Medicine, Community Health --> working with individuals experiencing homelessness specifically
  
  
• Interest in rural health: MAYBE
  
  
• Gap Year Activity: Serving as a liaison/case manager for a family clinic within a large multiservices center/homeless shelter where I'll be able to do work outreaching to the homeless community and upgrading the immunization tracking/procedures of the clinic

School List:
Penn
UCSF
Harvard
Cornell
Columbia
WUSTL
JHU
UVA (in state)
Mayo
U of Minnesota
Case Western
Virginia Tech
Pitt
Yale
Vanderbilt
U Chicago
Northwestern
Stanford
Baylor
Boston University
Jefferson
Temple
Einstein

Delete U MN and Temple, add all Manhattan Titans, Hofstra, Duke, UCLA, UCSF, Miami, U VM, U MI, keck.