3.7/3.6 516 MCAT

[RJL3]

Hi! Asian male California resident here. Decided to give this a try. I found out that I wanted to go into medicine after I already declared a History major (this was my sophomore year, and I am currently a junior ready to apply). Science is hard. I never took Biology or Physics in high school, so it was difficult keeping up with the rest of the kids at a top 20 university. Some stuff happened my freshman year that caused my grades to dip, but it's been an upwards trend. MCAT was first try, if that matters.

Education: Double major in History and Biochemistry

Extracurriculars: Wrestling coach 1 semester
3 years, President of on campus Wrestling Club
College government:Social Committee 1 year, Class Rep 1 year
Alternative Spring Break volunteering at a wolf sanctuary
Powerlifting top 3 placer in USAPL
One of the managing editors of the university's first history journal this semester
Background in instruments and performing, though that was mostly in high school.
College ministry
I do a lot of reading on medical matters on my off-time... does that mean anything?

Shadowing: 40 hours at a local hospital, ENT and anesthesiology, both clinical rounds and surgery.
Working at father's clinic (internal medicine) since high school

Clinical Volunteering: I've committed to working at an emergency room after my semester in May. Should be around ~100 hours total by the time I start applying in June.

Research: I've worked in a translational cancer therapeutics lab since spring freshman year ~ 2.5 years. It's the reason I got into science, and I really enjoy it. Spent both summers here.
1 paper, 5th author in peer reviewed journal. 1 paper 3rd author in review. Another paper that's about to be wrapped up and submitted before summer.
Presented three posters
Did a spring program where I went to several grand rounds, took a college course, and won judge's pick for my presentation
Presenting historical paper at an undergraduate conference in April.


Schools:
USC
UCLA
UCSD
UCSF
UC Irvine
Stanford
Oregon Health and Science University
UC Davis
University of Washington
University of Arizona
University of Hawaii
Boston U
Michigan State
Wayne State
Mt. Sinai
Weill Cornell
Drexel
Oklahoma



The formatting is a little sloppy. Hopefully someone looks through though!

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[GrapesofRath]

The lack of service with the less fortunate is a weakness. Go through MSAR and see how many schools have a mission to service: if you dont fit the mission they are looking for theyll find the next 3.65/35 applicant who does. Period.

What exactly did working at your dad's clinic entail? Because if the only clinical experience you have is this hospital stuff you are rushing in right now before you apply that's only 100 hours to begin with, that's another potential concern.

Delete OHSU, Hawaii, Michigan State, Oklahoma and U of Washington. You dont need Wayne State or Drexel either. Stanford is reaching pretty far.

 

[RJL3]

Right! Thanks for the response. Working at the clinic was a type of shadowing experience that took away a rosy-eyed view of medicine early on. He used to take on a lot of medi-Cal patients (low income), and I helped take care of insurance/billing.
My heart is definitely out there with the less fortunate (my congregation does a lot of community outreach events). However, I feel like contributing to biology is higher impact and more compatible with my interests at this point.
I am interested in going the research-physician route, but I was afraid that my stats weren't comparable to others who wanted to get into MD/PhD programs.

 

[7331poas]

Right! Thanks for the response. Working at the clinic was a type of shadowing experience that took away a rosy-eyed view of medicine early on. He used to take on a lot of medi-Cal patients (low income), and I helped take care of insurance/billing.
My heart is definitely out there with the less fortunate (my congregation does a lot of community outreach events). However, I feel like contributing to biology is higher impact and more compatible with my interests at this point.
I am interested in going the research-physician route, but I was afraid that my stats weren't comparable to others who wanted to get into MD/PhD programs.

Based on this it seems like you wont have a good result this cycle without more clinical experience. Contributing to biology can be done with a Biology PhD.

 

[RJL3]

Based on this it seems like you wont have a good result this cycle without more clinical experience. Contributing to biology can be done with a Biology PhD.

Right, I've thought about this a lot and have asked physicians their opinions. However, the research that I am interested in is translational science--leading drugs to clinical trials seems to be in the domain of MDs and MD/PhDs.