Do I tell them this?

[sweet2th]

I'm sure many of you are familiar with the National Youth Leadership Forums on medicine for high schoolers??? Well I did one in Chicago back in '98. A pretty big deal at the time...caused me to come home and tell my parents, "If I do anything but medicine, please smack me." In my description of the experience all I can really say is "A ten day experience of shadowing and conferences with student debates." Quite honestly, '98 was a long time ago and I don't remember a ton of details unless I pull out my journal from the trip. Would you include this?

Also- went to a meeting of the Commissioned Corp...a public health government service that happened to have their annual meeting in Philly last year. It was awesome being a masters in public health student at the time. I was the only one not in a uniform..needless to say I got to rotate through different meetings of scientists, environmentalist and nutritionists who wanted to recruit me like mad. Great day, but is this what they mean when they say "Conferences" on our application?? Would you include this??

My third and final question....in the experience description box...are you writing in more of a "bulleting" style or more of a narrative..."I did this, I did that" style. I am doing more of a bullet style to make it an easy read.
Thanks guys....this is taking me FOREVER!!!

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[AmoryBlaine]

I'm sure many of you are familiar with the National Youth Leadership Forums on medicine for high schoolers??? Well I did one in Chicago back in '98. A pretty big deal at the time...caused me to come home and tell my parents, "If I do anything but medicine, please smack me." In my description of the experience all I can really say is "A ten day experience of shadowing and conferences with student debates." Quite honestly, '98 was a long time ago and I don't remember a ton of details unless I pull out my journal from the trip. Would you include this?

Also- went to a meeting of the Commissioned Corp...a public health government service that happened to have their annual meeting in Philly last year. It was awesome being a masters in public health student at the time. I was the only one not in a uniform..needless to say I got to rotate through different meetings of scientists, environmentalist and nutritionists who wanted to recruit me like mad. Great day, but is this what they mean when they say "Conferences" on our application?? Would you include this??

My third and final question....in the experience description box...are you writing in more of a "bulleting" style or more of a narrative..."I did this, I did that" style. I am doing more of a bullet style to make it an easy read.
Thanks guys....this is taking me FOREVER!!!

In order: No (it's from HS), yes absolutely, does not matter at all.

Good luck

 

[beanbean]

Yes to both of your questions. Include both experiences, but elaborate a bit on the National Youth Leadership forum. 1998 wasn't that long ago and it shows consistent interst in medicine.

 

[sweet2th]

New question...I was a hospital volunteer in HS and won an award with a scholarship of $5K because of it. Still in HS but I think that would be worthy of a mention....no?

 

[WayChanger]

1) The activities portion of the AMCAS is meant for activities that you completed after high school. Unless you won the Intel Science Competition, or were published in prestigious journals in high school, or you completed thousands of hours of community service that continued into college, there should not be any reason to include high school activities on the AMCAS. In fact, the activities section of the AMCAS is called "Post-Secondary Experiences." This means AFTER high school. My personal opinion is that including this conference would make you look like you were desperate for activities to add. HOWEVER, you should talk about it in the personal statement if it inspired you to continue a pursuit of medicine in college, which might be a good path to take.

2) "Conferences" on the AMCAS means that you presented research at a conference. I really don't think your experience would qualify. I don't think it sounds like it's worth including in your activities.

3) Either format is fine...I did narrative format.

 

[Duchess742]

They don't want experiences from high school listed in work/activities. You can prob mention it in your PS as what got you interested in medicine initially. Definitely put the other thing as a "conference" b/c I think that's exactly the kind of thing that categorization was made for

I'm writing sort of a narrative description for each. The way I see it, there are good things about both...

narrative:
This gives med schools a chance to see you as more of a person, and you can talk about what you learned from each activity and how it made you feel. Also, you can explain any shady behavior in the activity (like if you took time off). I liked this method b/c I felt like I was able to sort of make my application more cohesive, like a story with a continuous theme.

bullets:
-quicker to read
-more impact
-gets your attention

basically, think about how you feel when you see diff mdapp's profiles. you enjoy the bulleted ones b/c they're quicker reads and you can easily see things organized. with the paragraph ones, you feel like you know the person better at the end, and you're able to form stronger opinions (good or bad)...at least that's how i feel.

 

[WayChanger]

Yes to both of your questions. Include both experiences, but elaborate a bit on the National Youth Leadership forum. 1998 wasn't that long ago and it shows consistent interst in medicine.

This isn't meant to be hostile, but I am puzzled as to why people on this board encourage the listing of high school activities on the AMCAS. It seems pretty clear to me that such things do not belong there. It is called the "Post-Secondary Experiences" section, and "Post-Secondary" means after high school. I would hope that applicants to medical school had better things that they accomplished in college/grad school to talk about.

 

[BradenDO]

1) The activities portion of the AMCAS is meant for activities that you completed after high school. Unless you won the Intel Science Competition, or were published in prestigious journals in high school, or you completed thousands of hours of community service that continued into college, there should not be any reason to include high school activities on the AMCAS. In fact, the activities section of the AMCAS is called "Post-Secondary Experiences." This means AFTER high school. My personal opinion is that including this conference would make you look like you were desperate for activities to add. HOWEVER, you should talk about it in the personal statement if it inspired you to continue a pursuit of medicine in college, which might be a good path to take.

2) "Conferences" on the AMCAS means that you presented research at a conference. I really don't think your experience would qualify. I don't think it sounds like it's worth including in your activities.

3) Either format is fine...I did narrative format.

I agree with not adding this on the EC section, but you could definately include it in your personal statement.

 

[sweet2th]

Deleted...but i'm still hanging onto the conference one for further thought. too bad i wasn't a go-getter in college. most of my college day things involved teaching spanish and tutoring. not exactly ground breaking like what people on this board are doing! i was actually trained for four days to be a hospice volunteer and never actually volunteered for whatever reason and when i moved, i never picked it up. TERRIBLE. instead i work twice a year at this agency that helps folks with AIDS but thats only twice a year for two projects so who cares about that! i hate this self measurement!

 

[sweet2th]

This isn't meant to be hostile, but I am puzzled as to why people on this board encourage the listing of high school activities on the AMCAS. It seems pretty clear to me that such things do not belong there. It is called the "Post-Secondary Experiences" section, and "Post-Secondary" means after high school. I would hope that applicants to medical school had better things that they accomplished in college/grad school to talk about.

Quite hostile- thanks for the kick in the arse

 

[Nebmuse]

It sounds like you weren't very impressed with NYLF. If you can talk about it in a positive light, I would use it in your personal statement. There is absolutely nothing wrong with talking about something that shows what you have done to develop your interest in medicine.

If you have room to put in the things you did in college, even if you did them only a few times, include them and talk candidly about them. If they haven't made an impact on you at all, I'd leave it out. (You don't want to be called on in an interview to talk about something like that.)

 

[WayChanger]

Quite hostile- thanks for the kick in the arse

Crap...aww, no, my message wasn't directed to you. I was really asking if others had some basis for encouraging high school activities to be put on the AMCAS, since some other posters seem pretty confident that they can be. I think it would be reasonable to do so if they were continued into college, but not really otherwise. In any case, you definitely should talk about those things in your personal statement.

 

[vkhalsa]

If you have room for the NYLF and it meant something to you then put it. People need to stop being so anal. The adcoms just don't want to see that your only good ECs were in HS and you haven't done anything since.

 

[DirtyIndian]

If you have room for the NYLF and it meant something to you then put it. People need to stop being so anal. The adcoms just don't want to see that your only good ECs were in HS and you haven't done anything since.

I too am putting in NYLF. I have more than enough extraciriculars to cover my application and have mentioned NYLF in my personal statement but more importantly, NYLF gave me an eye-opening perspective into the world of medicine at a young age.

 

[sweet2th]

I too am putting in NYLF. I have more than enough extraciriculars to cover my application and have mentioned NYLF in my personal statement but more importantly, NYLF gave me an eye-opening perspective into the world of medicine at a young age.

interesting...yeah i've been out of school since '03 and will have a masters in '07 so i now have a good variety. my thinking was it gave it all a nice springing board..like, here is where it all began.

 

[emtji]

umm, can i chime in with: the NYLF is a money making adventure. period.

our school let us "teach" one of the sessions of physical diagnosis and anatomy. for 45 minutes of teaching, i got paid $50. pretty sweet. thank you. what did i teach? kinda pointless stuff that you can learn in an EMT course.

what is nylf? a 10 day summer camp for rich kids, typically jewish and indian kids from long island for the boston area program. and for what it's worth, don't contact the med students you met during those 45 minutes.

 

[BigRedPremed]

umm, can i chime in with: the NYLF is a money making adventure. period.

our school let us "teach" one of the sessions of physical diagnosis and anatomy. for 45 minutes of teaching, i got paid $50. pretty sweet. thank you. what did i teach? kinda pointless stuff that you can learn in an EMT course.

what is nylf? a 10 day summer camp for rich kids, typically jewish and indian kids from long island for the boston area program. and for what it's worth, don't contact the med students you met during those 45 minutes.

I agree with the above. Even if you got something out of NYLF, don't put it. The EC section is for activities you did after high school.

 

[crimsonkid85]

do NOT put anything you did in high school in the AMCAS activities section. it specifically asks for post-secondary activities. it only makes you look like you can't follow directions if you do. the only exception to this rule are references for papers you may have published in high school. everything else goes. (sad, but true). my premed committee members even told me not to put Intel awards, or the US presidential scholar award, both of which were pretty notable--during HIGH SCHOOL.

if you REALLY have a life experience that occurred before entering college that has shaped your vision to practice medicine, by all means describe it in your personal statement. however, keep it short. when i wrote my ps, the advice the premed committee gave me was, 'if it's in high school, keep it to less than 2 sentences.' you only have 5,300 characters, right?

 

[LIDO]

To answer your question about HS activities....

When I was in HS I was involved in a year long program my senior year. This involved taking all classes at a hospital and shadowing doctors three times a week for about 3 hours a day for the entire year. I was able to shadow with every single specialty in the hospital. I stood in on numerous surgery events at the table and had a book of amazing experiences.

I felt that this is more than just "a reason of pursuit". It was a dedication and life changing experience. My pre-med advisor, as many of these students, gave the big no of putting it my the apps. I decided to call a few schools. I called Columbia University Medical, Suny Downstate and NYCOM (I figured I would call an array and variety of medical schools from MD to DO). The replies were in this order : of course you should include such, yes most def., and you would be stupid to not include such.

So unless anybody on here can tell me why three medical schools, including Columbia, would encourage such.......go ahead. Call for yourself if you need that extra security and make sure.

 

[Dr. Josh]

New question...I was a hospital volunteer in HS and won an award with a scholarship of $5K because of it. Still in HS but I think that would be worthy of a mention....no?

see if you can include all these experiences in your PS as contributing to your path towards pursuing medicine.

 

[SurgeonUFO]

I did NYLF in Boston in 2003, and NYLF and various medical schools we visited basically that, at most, it would be a "gold star" of very little weight on the app. TBH, I wasn't very impressed with the program.

 

[MrBurns10]

I'm always a little curious as to why people search through the forum archives and then post a response to a thread that seemingly ended a while ago.

 

[emtji]

I'm always a little curious as to why people search through the forum archives and then post a response to a thread that seemingly ended a while ago.

because i wanted to hurt the nylf's profitability. i don't respect a program that caters to rich kids.