Advice for potentially reapplying (high stats, extensive research)

[ixkr]

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Hi there, long time lurker on the forum. The cycle is winding down to no acceptances for me so far, and I decided to prepare for a reapplication.

cGPA: 3.9, sGPA: 4.0, MCAT: 526, CASPER: 3rd quartile, PA resident, undergrad at an Ivy school, ORM/Asian (but also immigrant)

School list: In fear of yield protection, I have made the (now silly) decision of building a ridiculously top-heavy school list, consisting of (order reflects personal preference):

NYU, Columbia, Cornell, Mt Sinai, Penn, UPitts, WashU, Stanford, Harvard, UCSF, UCLA, Boston, Michigan, Emory, Duke, Northwestern, UChicago, UWashington, Yale, Vanderbilt

I received IIs from the bolded schools (n=4), of which rejections from 2, waitlist from 1, and 1 pending.

Research:

(1500hrs, MME1) – I worked at an oncology translational research lab (“Lab A”) part-time as a research assistant doing wet-lab assay work. I was able to get a 1 abstract (5th author) and 1 paper (5th author), both having clinical relevance. In addition, I have one more manuscript pending submission which resulted from a collaboration with another lab, where I will also be listed as a 4th or 5th author. Aside from bench stuff, later on in my career I also perform bioinformatics analysis (my undergrad concentration), and I am expecting to generate another publication from this study with hopefully a higher author position.

(100hrs) – I also worked for a different lab (“Lab B”) as part of independent study project, on some computational analysis. One co-first author conference paper came out of this.

(1500hrs, MME2) – I transitioned to working as a CRC (8 hour work day) at Lab A in the past year. This opportunity has a significant clinical component as I approach cancer patients remotely or in clinic daily to obtain consent to blood draws, however I classified it as research on AMCAS. I manage one big biobanking clinical study (hence high throughput of screening/patient interactions). I also manage IRB and other regulatory materials for the study. As I have seniority in the lab, I am also in charge of training new CRCs who join each year.

Clinical Volunteering: (150hrs, MME3) – I worked as a volunteer unit aide, thermal screener (during covid times), and infection control auditor at the university hospital. I talked about being a volunteer, and how, being an immigrant whose native language isn't English, this experience was an valuable exposure to clinical medicine and is formative in my decision to pursue medicine.

Shadowing: (50hrs) – I shadowed mostly oncology physicians affiliated with Lab A. However, this was mostly done during freshman summer, 3 years before this cycle.

Others: (75hrs) – I worked as a homework grader for a class in university for a semester.

Some personal hobbies.

LORs: 1 committee letter, 1 from PI of Lab A, 1 from the volunteer service program director, 2 science and 1 science professors from my undergrad institution.

What can be different next cycle:

• The projected 1500 hours of CRC work in my AMCAS this cycle will turn into realized hours, and hopefully that will become a more solid measure of my clinical experience. I will continue my CRC work and add another projected 1500 hours.
• I will continue my computational role and hopefully have the pending manuscript submitted, plus maybe one more pub.
• As I work more closely with physicians this year, I can ask the physicians on my study to write physician LORs. This will produce a maximum of 2 physician LORs from a T10 institution. I will ask also my PI to update my letter. I don’t see the point of updating professor letters as I am out of school.
• I can get some more shadowing done with the physicians on my study.
• Should I get more volunteering? I do already have quite some experience working with patients as a CRC. So maybe I should highlight it more in my app?

Regarding this year’s school list, I plan to apply to 30-40 schools, with about half and half top- and mid-tier schools. I just started thinking about this and have about 20 schools at the moment, but I would like to know what you think.

NYU, Columbia, Penn, WashU, Mt Sinai, Cornell, Emory, Mayo MN, UNC-Chapel, UVA, Maryland, Albert Einstein, Hackensack, Ohio State, USC Keck, Penn State, Rochester, Hofstra, Jefferson, Drexel, UMiami, Case Western

 

[Faha]

Your main weakness is your lack of clinical volunteering. Obtaining permission from cancer patients to draw blood is not clinical. Of your 150 hours of clinical volunteering it appears that thermal screening and infection control auditor did not involve contact with patients who were sick, injured or dying. Have you had any clinical experience where you are in contact with those patients ?

 

[ixkr]

Your main weakness is your lack of clinical volunteering. Obtaining permission from cancer patients to draw blood is not clinical. Of your 150 hours of clinical volunteering it appears that thermal screening and infection control auditor did not involve contact with patients who were sick, injured or dying. Have you had any clinical experience where you are in contact with those patients ?

Thank you for your reply. I do believe the clinical component in my research is significant that as I work in a clinical environment, working directly next to physicians. While the process of consent itself does not involve providing care to the patient, as part of my job I spent a lot of time discussing the study with them, made sure they are fully aware of the risks and benefits, and listened to and addressed their concerns. Often times, they are willing to share their experience of having advanced stage cancer with me (and many have indeed straight up tell me that they are dying so they refuse to be part of the study), and by conversing with them I have learned a lot about how to interact with them with respect and professionalism, and to comfort them within my ability.

As for the volunteering hours, I did spend about 100 hours directly involved in in-patient patient care, while the rest of the time was spent on infection control auditing/thermal screening.

 

[Faha]

You could still receive an acceptance with those 2 schools where you are on the waitlist or pending. If you need to reapply I suggest adding these schools:
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Rochester
Hofstra
Einstein
Tufts
Cincinnati
Ohio State
Case Western
Western Michigan
USF Morsani
Miami
U Virginia
Kaiser

 

[skimm]

.

 

[deleted771945]

IMO you'll do great. More clinical volunteering, maybe with some underserved populations, couldn't hurt.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

I wish you luck. Maybe it isn't clear what your non clinical community service from your description to me. However with four interviews from the schools you indicated, I think it could be just fit. You are playing with a lot of strong candidates in your group, so it may be something minor, or you may have done your best which is not what the school is looking for. Here's hoping one acceptance comes to you, but if not I would keep working on interviewing and getting a better sense of fit with the schools on your list, which you should expend a bit more next time if necessary.

 

[ixkr]

You could still receive an acceptance with those 2 schools where you are on the waitlist or pending. If you need to reapply I suggest adding these schools:
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Rochester
Hofstra
Einstein
Tufts
Cincinnati
Ohio State
Case Western
Western Michigan
USF Morsani
Miami
U Virginia
Kaiser

Thank you for your kind words and for these suggestions. Yes, I will definitely apply to more in-state and east coast mid-tier schools next cycle. From what I can gather from our school's information, I believe tufts is low yields for students from my school, but the other ones look great!

 

[ixkr]

I wish you luck. Maybe it isn't clear what your non clinical community service from your description to me. However with four interviews from the schools you indicated, I think it could be just fit. You are playing with a lot of strong candidates in your group, so it may be something minor, or you may have done your best which is not what the school is looking for. Here's hoping one acceptance comes to you, but if not I would keep working on interviewing and getting a better sense of fit with the schools on your list, which you should expend a bit more next time if necessary.

Thank you for your kind words. I did have some self-coordinated and undocumented service activity (couple 100s hours, but highly fragmented across many years since at least junior year in high school) serving as a virtual mentor for high school students competing in my home country's biology Olympiad. This exam is an important EC for these kids to get ahead in their college admission process. I helped them prepare for this competitive exam by helping them with practice questions (access to private tutoring and competition prep varies hugely across my home country) and with accessing resources (literature search, some simple coding & bioinformatics analysis knowledge, interpret scientific articles, etc.). But again, this is self-coordinated and undocumented (even if there is any record, it will be in a foreign language) so I did not include it in AMCAS in fear of being seen as padding my application. Now thinking back, it might actually be an interesting addition in a field where I used to put 0. Would you think it is something worthwhile to include if I need to reapply? Thank you again!

 

[ixkr]

Don't forget to overlook your interviewing skills. 4 II from that school list is very impressive, so it's not as if your application is necessarily lacking (you also still have a very good chance of going to medical school this fall having not gotten the R from 2 schools yet; remember, most matriculants receive only one A). I am similar to you in stats/research, and I received no love from "safety" schools apart from my alma mater (Ohio State), so your original inclination to create a top-heavy list wasn't all that ill-informed. Still, keeping in mind that this process is essentially a crapshoot, the more schools the better regardless of what people say about OOS/IS friendliness blah blah etc. etc. (2 of my 6 As were schools I added last minute as a "why not" and did not expect to hear anything from). I think your new list looks good so far.

Nice to get some inputs from a fellow applicant and this is solid advice! I honestly thought the (traditional) interviews went well as I was able to answer the interviewer's questions without major hiccup, but again, as someone who doesn't speak English natively, there surely could be things that I missed in the interview that I didn't pick up. The MMIs I think I definitely have rooms to improve upon as I was relatively unfamiliar with the format and might not have exactly hit the points they were aiming for. I would have to practice more with my advisor/friends. Thank you and I wish you all the best in your future studies.

 

[chilly_md]

Thank you for your kind words. I did have some self-coordinated and undocumented service activity (couple 100s hours, but highly fragmented across many years since at least junior year in high school) serving as a virtual mentor for high school students competing in my home country's biology Olympiad. This exam is an important EC for these kids to get ahead in their college admission process. I helped them prepare for this competitive exam by helping them with practice questions (access to private tutoring and competition prep varies hugely across my home country) and with accessing resources (literature search, some simple coding & bioinformatics analysis knowledge, interpret scientific articles, etc.). But again, this is self-coordinated and undocumented (even if there is any record, it will be in a foreign language) so I did not include it in AMCAS in fear of being seen as padding my application. Now thinking back, it might actually be an interesting addition in a field where I used to put 0. Would you think it is something worthwhile to include if I need to reapply? Thank you again!

Get more clinical and non-clinical experience. You can list this biology olympiad tutoring activity, but it can't be your only one. It is very common for premed students to tutor younger kids in science subjects and does not really get you out of your comfort zone.

 

[voxveritatisetlucis]

Take off drexel, Penn state, hackensack, Jefferson. Substitute for schools with higher median MCATs . Though resource protection was less of a factor due to the pandemic I doubt that these schools believe that you would end up there and may be less likely to interview you. I would add iowa (known to give merit scholarships to higher scorers), pitt, Icahn instead

 

[Goro]

As mentioned, get in more service to others less fortunate than yourself.

Consider UTx.SW, U MA, U WI, U VM, BU, MIAMI, OH STATE, U CINCI, EMORY, EINSTEIN, UCSF, UCLA, U MI, U VA

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Thank you for your descriptions. Science Olympiad is a great activity but it's not really community service similar to what you would be doing in clinic caring for others not like yourself. As noted you need to do some service and clinical exposure in the US in a way that gives you an opportunity to serve others in environments outside your comfort zone.

You did likely emigrate from a country so make sure the schools on your list have a community that would support you and vice versa.

 

[erdoc111]

Try to find a volunteer activity, where you give service to people less fortunate, an activity that is new to you so that you can discover new things about the world and yourself. Maybe hospice, homeless shelter, anything that you may be interested in. Perhaps since you have spoken to patients about their cancer diagnosis in your research then hospice would be the next natural step to really digging in and seeing what a cancer diagnosis could mean. Or simply choose some new area that interests you! Hopefully, you will get in off a waitlist and I wish you all the very best.