Advice needed re: teaching Princeton Review MCAT course

[Iron Horse]

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Has anyone taught orgo for PR? How difficult is it and how time consuming (prep, teaching, and office hours)? How is the pay?

I was offered the opportunity, but am hesitant to accept. Orgo was flushed from my memory banks as it is practically useless here on out. Besides, I may not be able to teach as they want to start June 8 and I have exams through early next week.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

 

[Burton]

Iron Horse,

I didn't teach orgo, but I taught Bio for TPR. Most of it will depend on how much you remember from college. If you did well or have a good memory for that sort of stuff, I imagine the prep time might not be too bad. I prepped for 3-4 hrs before every class. I tagged office hours right before class, so that wasn't bad.

The pay is good, but again it depends on how much you prep. Back when I taught a couple of years ago, it was just below $20/hr - not bad.

If you're doing it purely for the money, I would say it might not be worth it at this point.

Hope this helps some.

 

[NineSixteen]

Depends on if they offer the regular course or the hyperlearning course. Hyperlearning is what is taught here in Michigan, this is 9 classes each of physics and bio, 6 classes each of g-chem and orgo. Each class is 2.5 hours long, and the entire length of the course varies. Most have started already for the August exam, some are starting this month.

I teach Bio and Orgo, so for a single class, it's usually 1 class/week, sometimes 2. For the April test, I taught 3 Bio and 3 Orgo classes, and it was overwhelming considering I work full time in addition. This summer I only took 2 Orgo classes. Prep takes A LOT of time the first time you teach. I would spend practically an entire Saturday reading the material, organizing it on paper, coming up with good ways to teach, preparing passages. This was 3 years ago, though, and now I spend about 30 minutes before class to refresh my memory.

My advice is this: If you're starting med school in the Fall, start teaching this summer. This way you can get the monster prep done now, and make some good extra cash when you're in school with little time involvement. If you wait until you're in the middle of med school to start teaching, you may be in over your head. But, then again, it may require less prep after a year of Basic Sciences 🙂 A lot of the prep time I spent, however, was not mastering the material, it was figuring out how to teach it to a classroom full of stressed out pre-meds!

 

[Iron Horse]

Burton and 916,

Thank you for your input. I will follow up next week to discuss options with PR (they start this weekend and I don't finish until next week, but the director seemed to indicate that they could accommodate my schedule). I am finishing my first year and trying to decide if this is worth it. Probably not for orgo, perhaps for some other topics.

Thanks again for the advice.

Any other thoughts welcomed.

 

[vpdr]

So I had a quick question. How well would you have to score on those content tests to qualify to teach for Princeton Review?

 

[SomeDoc]

Has anyone taught orgo for PR? How difficult is it and how time consuming (prep, teaching, and office hours)? How is the pay?

I was offered the opportunity, but am hesitant to accept. Orgo was flushed from my memory banks as it is practically useless here on out. Besides, I may not be able to teach as they want to start June 8 and I have exams through early next week.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Prep time can definitely be significant- and that was when I had it fresh in my mind. I don't think it is worth the time given your schedule. The pay is good (17-20/hr), but you will only be teaching for a few hours a week (if you're teaching just one subject). You do get paid for prep time, but it is only half the rate or less of when you're lecturing. My advice is to focus on your schoolwork. It's not worth the extra hassle- that is unless you really want to do it.

 

[SomeDoc]

So I had a quick question. How well would you have to score on those content tests to qualify to teach for Princeton Review?

Scoring in the 90th percentile- either on an actual test section, or on the subject test in-house, will qualify you to teach.

 

[SomeDoc]

As a side note...

I'm wondering if any upperclassmen/upperclasswomen/grads know if teaching experience prior to the start of medical school would be relevant in the residency application portfolio. It will be going on the CV, but I was curious about whether it could go on ERAS as well.

 

[physics junkie]

As a side note...

I'm wondering if any upperclassmen/upperclasswomen/grads know if teaching experience prior to the start of medical school would be relevant in the residency application portfolio. It will be going on the CV, but I was curious about whether it could go on ERAS as well.

Did you notice that he asked the question 6 years ago? =)

 

[SomeDoc]

Holy smokes! The OP is probably in residency right about now.

At any rate, vpdr should be around for the answer to his q, and the info will be available in searchable archives for those interested.