Advice for ReApp (School List, Research, etc)

[notsoeasy]

Hello! This cycle has been filled with a lot of anxiety and discouragement, but it's also filled me with anticipation as I definitely learned a lot from this last cycle and want to set my upcoming one for success! I think one of the main things that let me down last cycle was not applying to nearly enough schools (and probably having a bad balance).

Past School List: Hopkins, Penn State, UCF, Einstein (II), Georgetown, GW (II), Pitt, MD (IS), Perelman, Temple, Drexel, USC, Miami, Brown, Emory, Icahn, TJ, Virginia

Stats: MCAT (519, taken before applying last cycle), GPA (3.98, science and overall)

ECs:

1200+ Clinical: MA at 2 practices; I get to do a lot at my derm job (scribing, intake, procedural assistance, etc)

400+ Research: 250-300+ from working at a neurobio lab during undergrad (no publications or pubs, also mainly helped with data collection and analysis), 100+ from working with medical students on case studies/reports (new publication a month ago!) and am working on another paper currently

600+ Volunteer: Hospital volunteer (150+ but some was in HS so didn't include in the overall number, some was in the ER for a summer during college), noncrisis textliner helper (300+ in college), different other community organizations in college (100+), Advocacy foundation (50+, new role I started in my past gap year! - I had a huge passion for student advocacy when I was younger that was lost for a while during my studies but figured it was a great chance to bring back - I work with the media team in an organization that bridges patients and healthcare providers)

250+ Shadowing: Mainly from clinical urology (200+ in office throughout the years, 20+ now also in the OR), also did a shadowing program (40+ in the summer) at my hospital so got to see a variety of specialties!

Any suggestions of schools or types of schools I should be looking more into will be so helpful! Also, I know many top tier schools look for strong research, given by portfolio, I was wondering if that should be something I look into more? Given my current stats and activities, what reach schools seem best suited?

Any criticism and insight is greatly appreciated. I am sure I have weaknesses I may be overlooking and things I should look out for that I am unaware of, so please let me know your thoughts. And feel free to ask me anything 🙂

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[LindaAccepted]

Hello! This cycle has been filled with a lot of anxiety and discouragement, but it's also filled me with anticipation as I definitely learned a lot from this last cycle and want to set my upcoming one for success! I think one of the main things that let me down last cycle was not applying to nearly enough schools (and probably having a bad balance).

Past School List: Hopkins, Penn State, UCF, Einstein (II), Georgetown, GW (II), Pitt, MD (IS), Perelman, Temple, Drexel, USC, Miami, Brown, Emory, Icahn, TJ, Virginia

Stats: MCAT (519, taken before applying last cycle), GPA (3.98, science and overall)

ECs:

1200+ Clinical: MA at 2 practices; I get to do a lot at my derm job (scribing, intake, procedural assistance, etc)

400+ Research: 250-300+ from working at a neurobio lab during undergrad (no publications or pubs, also mainly helped with data collection and analysis), 100+ from working with medical students on case studies/reports (new publication a month ago!) and am working on another paper currently

600+ Volunteer: Hospital volunteer (150+ but some was in HS so didn't include in the overall number, some was in the ER for a summer during college), noncrisis textliner helper (300+ in college), different other community organizations in college (100+), Advocacy foundation (50+, new role I started in my past gap year! - I had a huge passion for student advocacy when I was younger that was lost for a while during my studies but figured it was a great chance to bring back - I work with the media team in an organization that bridges patients and healthcare providers)

250+ Shadowing: Mainly from clinical urology (200+ in office throughout the years, 20+ now also in the OR), also did a shadowing program (40+ in the summer) at my hospital so got to see a variety of specialties!

Any suggestions of schools or types of schools I should be looking more into will be so helpful! Also, I know many top tier schools look for strong research, given by portfolio, I was wondering if that should be something I look into more? Given my current stats and activities, what reach schools seem best suited?

Any criticism and insight is greatly appreciated. I am sure I have weaknesses I may be overlooking and things I should look out for that I am unaware of, so please let me know your thoughts. And feel free to ask me anything 🙂

A few thoughts:

Volunteer where you are interacting with the underserved in a non-clinical setting. Think soup kitchen, homeless shelter, addiction services, etc. Most of your volunteering is clinical volunteering. I really don't see that above.

If you really want to do research and attend a research oriented program, you should continue your research or perhaps find a different research opportunity .

In terms of recommending programs, what's important to you in a med school?

 

[notsoeasy]

A few thoughts:

Volunteer where you are interacting with the underserved in a non-clinical setting. Think soup kitchen, homeless shelter, addiction services, etc. Most of your volunteering is clinical volunteering. I really don't see that above.

If you really want to do research and attend a research oriented program, you should continue your research or perhaps find a different research opportunity .

In terms of recommending programs, what's important to you in a med school?

Thanks!!🙂 Yes, I'm planning on doing some volunteer work in hospice care this fall. My volunteering with the textline also wasn't clinical based and I would say my new advocacy volunteering is clinical in nature but more nonclinical tasks - focusing on healthcare in the realm of policy. Regardless, I definitely plan on looking around other volunteer opportunities in my free time as well

I learned a lot during research in labs during undergrad but also spent some days not having anything to do, so being honest, while I do like research-- I enjoy clinical experiences as a whole more; just wondering if getting more research experience would be beneficial, I'm not sure if my research is "enough"?

For med schools, I would love a school focused on community, servicing local populations, has strong connections, etc. But really, I also just want to cast a wide net this cycle and wanted to see any schools that would be a good fit that I may not have looked into! I felt many of my "target" schools last cycle ended up being low yield (GW, Temple, TJ, etc). I also wanted to choose my reach schools wisely. I know most top tiers care greatly about research, but was wondering what my research experiences match better with, so any thoughts would be super helpful!!

 

[Faha]

Where is your state of residence?