I loved my committee! I can give you a brief rundown of what I think made it great:
1)
My committee only serviced my dorm -- this meant that they had much greater availability to meet with individual students. My school had 10 premed committees, one assigned to each dorm, which I thought was a great system. Students live in dorms all 4 years at my school, but even for schools where this is not the case, committees could be assigned to groups of students by other factors.
2)
Students received individual attention -- I was assigned a pre-health advisor/committee member my sophomore year, and later was assigned a committee letter writer. Each of these individuals only worked directly with 2 or 3 other students, so they had a lot of time for me. This means you would have to recruit a high number of advisors, but this can be done by reaching out to health professionals in the area through your alumni database. Most of the alumni at our school were happy to get involved.
3)
All committee members were medical professionals -- whether they were med students, residents, or attending physicians, all of them had been through the application cycle themselves. The majority had served on admissions committees at some point as well. This meant that they were super familiar with the process and well equipped to advise us.
4)
Pre-med students were introduced to the committee early -- starting our sophomore year, we met the members of the committee (the people who would be involved in writing our letter) and had frequent general meetings, one-on-one check-ins, etc. This meant that we really got to know the committee members, who in turn became very familiar with us. This led to a much more personal committee letter.
5)
The letter-writing process was standardized and streamlined -- the year before their application cycle all pre-med students were access to a website through which they could have letters of rec submitted, upload their personal statement, and share their AMCAS info. They were made aware of the deadlines for each component of their application far in advance. This way, there was no confusion about what was necessary or when it was due, and the committee had all the necessary information from each applicant on time. In addition, the letter writing process itself was standardized -- your individual letter writer received access to all your uploaded materials and composed a rough draft. That draft was then passed on to the core committee (of about 5 people) for extensive review/editing. This ensured that everyone received a letter of similar quality, in case someone was assigned a letter writer who got lazy or had poor writing skills.
6)
Mandatory mock interviews were given -- at the beginning of the interview season, in early August, all current applicants were required to attend a mock interview that included a traditional interview, an MMI, and even a 'fishbowl' experience. Full interview attire was required. This enabled extensive feedback to be given on every aspect of the interview, from appropriateness of dress, to interactions with other interviewees.
Sorry for the confusion. Yes, as a pre-health advisor I'm looking at putting together a pre-health committee for our students for applying to the various health programs. A big piece of it would include committee letters. I'm just looking for experiences from the student side of what has made a good committee in their opinion.
