.

[winterjacket77]

.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Scrap the Canadian list. I presume your intention is to practice in the US, not in Canada, and you get no breaks being a US citizen.

I don't get your community service experiences. I can give you slack if you have to work while attending university, but attending a well-endowed school also gives you access to numerous town-gown relationship opportunities, not all related to science or healthcare (preferably). Mentoring and tutoring represent academic competency more than service orientation, so you need something to address this.

I'm also a bit surprised. What is your relationship with your prehealth advising team? How about prehealth clubs? MAPS/SNMA networking? Any pipeline or academic enrichment programs?

Presuming race/ethnicity is redacted when reviewing your application, your mission fit is going to determine your success. Definitely keep your in-states and regional schools in mind, but make sure you have done your homework networking with students like yourself at the schools on your list well before submitting your application. They could help you with your lack of shadowing.

 

[Faha]

Projected hours have minimal value to your application. Your lack of clinical and nonclinical volunteering and shadowing will limit your chances for interviews, especially at top tier schools where you will be competing with applicants who have many hundreds or thousands of hours each for clinical and non clinical activities. You should accumulate 50 hours of in person physician shadowing before you submit your application. Also 150+ hours of clinical volunteering and 150+ hours of non clinical volunteering (food bank, homeless shelter). Many schools screen at 150 hours so you could be screened out otherwise. If you have those hours when you submit your application I suggest these schools:
Your 3 New Jersey state public schools
Hackensack
Hofstra
Einstein (free tuition)
Mount Sinai
Columbia
Cornell
NYU (free tuition)
New York Medical College
Dartmouth
Brown
Tufts
Harvard
Yale
Jefferson
Drexel
Temple
Pittsburgh
George Washington
Johns Hopkins (free tuition)
Duke
Emory
Vanderbilt
Miami
Washington University (in St. Louis)
TCU
Northwestern
Cincinnati
Case Western
Howard
Meharry
Morehouse

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Got it, I will make it a priority to also do more service oriented volunteering. I have a good relationship with the pre health advising team, and am a member of some pre health clubs, I just didn't pursue leadership positions in them. I had never heard of MAPS/SNMA until you just mentioned it, and I wish I had.

As far as mission fit, my application is definitely more inclined towards research-focused schools. Thank you for your advice!

Pumping the breaks a little... you say you attend an Ivy+ school. There are no affinity clubs for prehealth/premed minority students? Your prehealth advising office didn't mention this? You don't have to be a leader-in-title for any prehealth clubs, but AMSA and SNMA have a dedicated mission to help aspiring doctors.

It's never too late to connect with SNMA. Find them on social media. You can also see if there are any appropriate mentoring organizations out there (15 White Coats I think is soliciting scholarship applications, see the Underrepresented forum).

On the research-focused side of things, have you ever heard of ABRCMS? SACNAS? I'm just a bit surprised that no such affinity groups exist as a supportive peer group for you. (Or maybe I shouldn't be surprised.)

That said, I concur with Faha's list and advice. Leverage the help you have at your university and the other external mentoring organizations to make sure your application is optimal.

 

[LizzyM]

If tuition is a big factor, consider tuition for OOS students. I seem to recall that Colorado really soaks OOS students. Just cross those schools off your list... there is nothing more painful than having only one offer and have the net tuition be off the charts.

 

[Goro]

OP, you're going to need to bulk up the clinical exposure and nonclinical volunteering.

Faha's list is good.
Add UCSF and UCLA

 

[jvquarterback]

You can get a pass on the non clinical volunteering if you’re actually caring for family members like a younger sibling. working for their support or providing child care would potentially work for you. Get started ASAP if that doesn’t apply to you. Get started anyway.

Don’t sweat the clinical volunteering if you have paid clinical. Especially if the above applies to you.

Add Penn and Chicago to the list if tuition is a main factor.

 

[LeaveNoTrace]

You can get a pass on the non clinical volunteering if you’re actually caring for family members like a younger sibling.

That really depends. @Goro would disagree. The OP is a Black woman who had to work two jobs due to financial difficulties. If she qualifies for FAP she should use it. At one point much was forgiven for URM applicants, especially high-stat ones like the OP. However, diversity or no, she needs to check the boxes. That means 150+ hours EACH of COMPLETED clinical and nonclinical volunteering. Without those boxes checked the OP is on thin ice; if they had another year or just 200 hours each of these done they would be at the very least top-20 pack fodder and quite possibly have broken out of the pack fodder ranks and moved towards the front.

TL;DR you've got a great car (overall application) with bald junkyard tires (volunteering and clinical exposure); you're at a significant handicap with those bald junk tires.

 

[LeaveNoTrace]

all T20s

you can get the required clinical/nonclinical hrs within like 1-2 months of volunteering. should be simple

Eh - I'd tell even a Black Navy SEAL with a 4.0 and 527 to have their state schools and a couple midtiers on their list. Granted, they're probably being offered scholarships left and right, but an all-top-20 list is wild even for the best of the best.

 

[LeaveNoTrace]

ofc totally agree. just all the T20s as a starting point. the OP is a great candidate as long as the min reqs/check boxes are met and no red flags.

nice work OP and congrats on the high mcat

I'm a bit less sanguine about the OP as they are now - they're pack fodder for top 20 schools. The low clinical exposure might - might - be forgiven, and their URM status and socioeconomic hardship might get them treated like a 3.9/523 ORM from the suburbs. In other words: top-20 pack fodder. A good place to be. With the boxes checked Harvard's giving them a shot, not rolling out the red carpet.