4 gap years! Yes, 4. Please help me with a school list.

[WanderlustMe]

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Hi everyone! After all these years, it's finally time to sign my soul away to medicine.

Institution: A certain prestigious, public school in CA.

GPA: ~3.5 (both)
Upward trend: bad 3 years for no good reason, but hauled ass senior year.

MCAT: 521
It expired, so I retook it. Worked ridiculously hard for a couple months and somehow got this beautiful score.

Volunteer/Leadership:

• 4 years of volunteer social work with the homeless/undocumented/low-income/asylum-seeking population. Based in a hospital.
• 1 year volunteering in the ER of a children's hospital
• 2 years volunteering as a school EMT
• 1 year board officer for a medical-related student club
• Been to 2 different Latin American countries very briefly for free clinic volunteering
• Tutored some 3rd graders for 0.5 year (volunteer)

Research:

• 4 years in research (2 in school, 2 after graduating)
• 5 basic science publications (1 first author, 1 second author, the rest are much lower)
• A senior thesis
• A poster presentation (mandatory with the senior thesis)

Work:

• 1.5 years working as an EMT
• 2 years working as a research assistant

"Wow" or uncommon activities:

• 2 years Peace Corps Volunteer in a certain underdeveloped Asian country (hands-down the most rewarding experience I've ever had in my life).
• A couple builds in Habitat for Humanity during my senior year, but not much commitment
• 1 year as a Museum specimen prep guy, working with flesh-eating beetles and dissecting cool animals.
• 1 semester raising awareness of war crimes to ~500 high school students.
• Cool life experience: backpacked through Asia for a summer.

My list so far:

Columbia
Duke
Harvard (for the lols?)
UCD
UCLA
UCI
UCSF
UCR
Case Western
Cornell (My postdoc recently got a professorship there)
Albert Einstein
Boston U

I'm not sure how "good" my EC's are, so I don't know where exactly I should be applying. Any help would be deeply appreciated!

 

[Faha]

I suggest adding a few more schools such as:
Mount Sinai
NYU
Brown
Dartmouth
Georgetown
Rochester

 

[WanderlustMe]

Thanks!

Do you think Hopkins is worth a shot?
I know it's hard, but I hear they love patient interaction in their admissions.

 

[Faha]

Your GPA is far below the 10th percentile for Hopkins (3.8).

 

[WanderlustMe]

Ah. I would like to have thought the other criteria made up for it, but I guess you're right,

 

[WanderlustMe]

Does anyone think my list may be getting too top-heavy?

 

[Chromium Surfer]

Ah. I would like to have thought the other criteria made up for it, but I guess you're right,

If you have the money I would apply to them! You never know! I bet people like you are the individuals who are below the 10th percentile! Faha always has great lists though so I would add the schools he reccomended. Maybe @Goro has more input.

 

[Goro]

Hi everyone! After all these years, it's finally time to sign my soul away to medicine.

Institution: A certain prestigious, public school in CA.

GPA: ~3.5 (both)
Upward trend: bad 3 years for no good reason, but hauled ass senior year.

MCAT: 521
It expired, so I retook it. Worked ridiculously hard for a couple months and somehow got this beautiful score.

Volunteer/Leadership:

• 4 years of volunteer social work with the homeless/undocumented/low-income/asylum-seeking population. Based in a hospital.
• 1 year volunteering in the ER of a children's hospital
• 2 years volunteering as a school EMT
• 1 year board officer for a medical-related student club
• Been to 2 different Latin American countries very briefly for free clinic volunteering
• Tutored some 3rd graders for 0.5 year (volunteer)

Research:

• 4 years in research (2 in school, 2 after graduating)
• 5 basic science publications (1 first author, 1 second author, the rest are much lower)
• A senior thesis
• A poster presentation (mandatory with the senior thesis)

Work:

• 1.5 years working as an EMT
• 2 years working as a research assistant

"Wow" or uncommon activities:

• 2 years Peace Corps Volunteer in a certain underdeveloped Asian country (hands-down the most rewarding experience I've ever had in my life).
• A couple builds in Habitat for Humanity during my senior year, but not much commitment
• 1 year as a Museum specimen prep guy, working with flesh-eating beetles and dissecting cool animals.
• 1 semester raising awareness of war crimes to ~500 high school students.
• Cool life experience: backpacked through Asia for a summer.

My list so far:

Columbia
Duke
Harvard (for the lols?)
UCD
UCLA
UCI
UCSF
UCR
Case Western
Cornell (My postdoc recently got a professorship there)
Albert Einstein
Boston U

I'm not sure how "good" my EC's are, so I don't know where exactly I should be applying. Any help would be deeply appreciated!

Jeeze, you have what I consider to be a perfect app. The only thing you're missing is being a veteran.

Being not merely golden, but platinum, you need to aim high.
I suggest:
Wash U
U Chicago
NYU
U Penn
Vanderbilt
Columbia
Sinai
Cornell
Northwestern
Case
Harvard
Yale
Stanford
JHU
BU
U VA
U MI
U AZ
U VM
U Cincy
Ohio State
U IA
UCF
UCLA
UCSD,
UCI,
UCR (IF you’re from the Inland Empire)
the new Cal U Med
Nova MD
Miami
Tulane
Albert Einstein
Emory
USC/Keck
Mayo
Rochester
Dartmouth
Duke
Pitt
Hofstra

Don't worry about your GPA. Somebody has to be in a school's 10th %ile...why not you?

 

[WanderlustMe]

I've never been called platinum before haha. Wow, I thought I was kinda good, but I never thought I was apply-to-all-the-top-schools good. But if you guys really think I can do it, I'll apply to them!

 

[Chromium Surfer]

I've never been called platinum before haha. Wow, I thought I was kinda good, but I never thought I was apply-to-all-the-top-schools good. But if you guys really think I can do it, I'll apply to them!

Good luck!! Let us know how things turned out. 🙂

 

[WanderlustMe]

Hi again! You guys have honestly helped me a bunch!

Still, applying to so many top schools has me worried, especially because I'll be up against people with perfect numbers and good EC's (probably better than mine?).
I'm wondering if it's worth it to apply to any less competitive schools (Drexel comes to mind), as I don't think there's any guarantee I'll get into one of these top schools. Let me know what you think!