Advice Needed

[adriano710]

How many hours is seen as sufficient when it comes to EC's? Obviously the more the better but what should you have at least for SHADOWING and CLINICAL VOLUNTEERING?

Thanks!

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[keels99]

I've always heard bare minimum of volunteering (clinical isn't pertinent) is 50 and 25 for shadowing. However it will obviously look better if you have more

 

[adriano710]

I've always heard bare minimum of volunteering (clinical isn't pertinent) is 50 and 25 for shadowing. However it will obviously look better if you have more

I thought it would be at least 100-200 for volunteering

 

[Judson]

How many hours is seen as sufficient when it comes to EC's? Obviously the more the better but what should you have at least for SHADOWING and CLINICAL VOLUNTEERING?

Thanks!

The easy answer is as many as possible over as long of a time as possible. Most will agree that volunteering and shadowing hours are necessary, but none will agree as to what amount over how long is sufficient.

If I had to take a stab at a bare minimum I would say ~100 hours per year for volunteering and ~25 hours shadowing in as many specialties as possible.

 

[keels99]

I am going off of what I was told by my advisor. I had 80 volunteer hours because I worked full time while going to school. Expecting someone to realistically volunteer that many hours with both work and school is ridiculous. I got accepted, so I'm assuming it wasn't that big of deal.

 

[AlteredScale]

I am going off of what I was told by my advisor. I had 80 volunteer hours because I worked full time while going to school. Expecting someone to realistically volunteer that many hours with both work and school is ridiculous. I got accepted, so I'm assuming it wasn't that big of deal.

This is such a relief to hear. Even though I wasn't full time, it became full time when I became a TA and started working in a lab and began my honors thesis while taking classes D: not fun and not recommended.

 

[AlteredScale]

How many hours is seen as sufficient when it comes to EC's? Obviously the more the better but what should you have at least for SHADOWING and CLINICAL VOLUNTEERING?

Thanks!

Shadowing I'd say...10-50 over a range of practices (I did surgical through neurosurgery, procedure based through gastroentero, office based through endocrinology, and more office based through a FM DO)
Clinical should be a longitudinal commitment. Usually over a year is about 100-200 hours. Some people who really commit have thousands but again, depends on your situation. If you are working then obviously you can commit a lot of time to volunteering.

Hope this helps!

 

[keels99]

This is such a relief to hear. Even though I wasn't full time, it became full time when I became a TA and started working in a lab and began my honors thesis while taking classes D: not fun and not recommended.

Yea I didn't have time to do much volunteering, but every volunteer event I did was significant (ex not just street clean up, but disaster relief.) I also had about 1000 hours of working as an ED scribe by the time I applied

 

[GreyF0X]

What did you guys do for leadership experience? This seems to come up a lot.

 

[FutureDrB]

What did you guys do for leadership experience? This seems to come up a lot.

I was President of a couple large student orgs. Was a teacher too.

I'm guessing anything where you could be considered an "authority" figure would count as leadership.

Maybe coach a little league team, be an officer of or start some student/community organization or charity cause. Or something more professional/employment that requires you be a manager or supervisor.

 

[GreyF0X]

I was President of a couple large student orgs. Was a teacher too.

I'm guessing anything where you could be considered an "authority" figure would count as leadership.

Maybe coach a little league team, be an officer of or start some student/community organization or charity cause. Or something more professional/employment that requires you be a manager or supervisor.

Never took part in any clubs because i thought they were a waste of time and i don't like sports to coach a team. I'm a non-traditional applicant, don't know if i could still be an officer of a club. Any ideas?

 

[FutureDrB]

Never took part in any clubs because i thought they were a waste of time and i don't like sports to coach a team. I'm a non-traditional applicant, don't know if i could still be an officer of a club. Any ideas?

I'm a non-trad too, 34. These are things I did while in graduate school from 27-30. If you're already out of school, obviously you're limited to community-based positions. I doubt you have to be that athletic to coach little league. Haha. But in all seriousness, I'm not a sports fan either, so I understand.

Do you have any special talents/skills? Maybe start or teach a class at a community center? Organize a recurring food/clothing drive?

Start a new thread about it and I'm sure others will have more suggestions.

 

[GreyF0X]

I'm a non-trad too, 34. These are things I did while in graduate school from 27-30. If you're already out of school, obviously you're limited to community-based positions. I doubt you have to be that athletic to coach little league. Haha. But in all seriousness, I'm not a sports fan either, so I understand.

Do you have any special talents/skills? Maybe start or teach a class at a community center? Organize a recurring food/clothing drive?

Start a new thread about it and I'm sure others will have more suggestions.

Thanks. Yeah, i might start one in the non-trad section.

 

[AlteredScale]

What did you guys do for leadership experience? This seems to come up a lot.

Outside of composing music for bands I acted as the representative for all incoming transfer students and did a lot of speaking in front of all new bio admits (I think the biggest talk I did was 700+). A part of a council for the biology division, I try to change things about how the division implements education and connects with the larger UCSD community. Leada student support team through a CCFA event and now am trying to create a IBD support group at UCSD. Finally, am trying to create a free medical clinic in a very rural town where my GF lives.

Nothing too major or great. It's hard to do something big if you're working a lot. As long as you do something you know?

 

[Doctor Dream]

How many hours is seen as sufficient when it comes to EC's? Obviously the more the better but what should you have at least for SHADOWING and CLINICAL VOLUNTEERING?

The more the better isn't necessarily true. There's a point when having more volunteer or shadowing hours really won't do you much good. It won't hurt, but you're not getting much benefit out of it. I think anything beyond about 75 hours shadowing is more than enough. With volunteering, say you've got like 800 hours volunteering at a hospital, and you add another 100 during the application cycle. Adcom's probably aren't going to care that your volunteer hours went from 800 to 900. They already see your commitment and experience with hospital volunteering.

Sorry, didn't really answer your original question, but just something to be aware of.

 

[tripl3s3v3n]

What did you guys do for leadership experience? This seems to come up a lot.

I was an E5 in the Navy with leadership roles that stretched from supervising people clean the bathroom to giving intelligence breifings to the Commanding Officer and Combat systems personnel.

Never took part in any clubs because i thought they were a waste of time and i don't like sports to coach a team. I'm a non-traditional applicant, don't know if i could still be an officer of a club. Any ideas?

I didn't either. What I included where the extracurriculars that I did with my family that I thought were meaningful to me. For example I included the 2 seasons of fantasy football that I played with my wife, I did win the Superbowl both years afterall.