do moderators list their status as an EC on apps?

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Of all the lame extracurriculars out there, this would take the cake.
 
hermit said:
Of all the lame extracurriculars out there, this would take the cake.
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😆😆😆 Do you want to get banned from SDN for insulting our mods, dude? 😀
 
I didn't. And while it did pop up in my mind when asked at an interview about examples of mentoring/tutoring/helping out other students (I feel that I do spend a ton of time giving advice either on this forum or via PM), I just talked about something else.
 
I asked this same question, and some of us actually do. while you may think being a simple forum moderator is lame, you also have to consider that it's a volunteer position at a nonprofit organization, and some moderators also have other duties such as editing and journalism.
 
Doublecortin said:
😆😆😆 Do you want to get banned from SDN for insulting our mods, dude? 😀
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The mod who bans me for that comment is the reject who is listing this "job" as leadership.
 
armybound said:
...it's a volunteer position at a nonprofit organization...
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I LOVE IT!

Just like the janitor is really an environmental technician, right?
 
armybound said:
you do realize this is more than just a message board, right?
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As in, this is really a vehicle for tomorrow's physicians to leverage the insights of their peers in order to effect changes that will advance the practice of medicine?
 
hermit said:
As in, this is really a vehicle for tomorrow's physicians to leverage the insights of their peers in order to effect changes that will advance the practice of medicine?
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care to share your opinion? is it a worthless activity because it's web-based? are people not capable of volunteering online? are message boards not a good place to come for advice?

why are you on here?
 
hermit said:
As in, this is really a vehicle for tomorrow's physicians to leverage the insights of their peers in order to effect changes that will advance the practice of medicine?
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wow, 😱😱dude!! Do you have a death wish? You are really asking for to be banned 🙁
 
armybound said:
care to share your opinion? is it a worthless activity because it's web-based? are people not capable of volunteering online? are message boards not a good place to come for advice?
why are you on here?
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Look, if you think you are "volunteering at a non-profit" because you click a button when you see someone use the F-word on an internet message board, more power to you.
 
Doublecortin said:
wow, 😱😱dude!! Do you have a death wish? You are really asking for to be banned 🙁
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you can't get banned for expressing an opinion, even if the opinion is that moderators are stupid 😉

you can get in trouble for insulting/flaming/fighting though, so as long as he keeps it reasonably civil...
 
hermit said:
Look, if you think you are "volunteering at a non-profit" because you click a button when you see someone use the F-word on an internet message board, more power to you.
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refer to post #5. there's also a lot of behind the scenes stuff that goes beyond clicking when someone says the F-word. but it's easy to write people off when you don't know the extent of their duties 🙂

you also open the door to what you think is important enough to be listed as an experience. I volunteered at the hospital and they'd have me run pee to the lab and change bed linens. that stuff's not very important and sure wasn't very medical, so am I not allowed to list that as a volunteer experience? of course I can. in the same light, I'm a volunteer here, so even if you don't feel my duties are significant, it's still fair game.
 
I mod a forum that helps highschool kids to make post secondary choices, give advice, etc. Pretty much what some mods do for premeds here. But, I also have a bigger role in that organization, so I did not put moderating as a point, but I thing it be a good think to speak in a interview

Cheers
Piyush
 
I became a mod after I completed my app cycle. Given the amount of time I put in on a weekly basis, it would add up to a healthy EC. I probably wouldn't call it leadership, but it is volunteer work, and I do see it as giving back to a community that has helped me. What's wrong with mentioning that on an application?
 
Technically, it should count, but I wouldn't put it because there's so much bias against any web or technology based ECs.

Things like being a moderator on a web forum for medical students is valid service, but it will never be judged equally to a person who does it face to face in a school's "pre-med" club. Even though a moderator on this site may help thousands of premeds, it's discounted becaause it's not "real."

In a similar vein, a medical student who plays with a team in Halo or Counterstrike tournaments, or somebody who leads an endgame guild in Everquest or World of Warcraft will be judged poorer than somebody who writes that he plays Intramural Basketball. Even if the computer game people are practicing for hours a week with friends, helping motivate them, taking a leadership role, are well known and respected in their circles, and doing things that put them as "elite" in the video game community, it still gets invalidated versus a guy who plays on the courts a few hours a week with his buddies and practices "every once in a while."

Or how about somebody paid writing for a succesful blog that gets tons of hits a day? Not judged as impressively as writing for the school paper because you're going to get the fuddy duddy guys on adcomms who don't know what a blog is.
 
Hmmm. When I thought of it during my interview (at Mayo) I decided not to mention it because I figured that the interviewer could very easily figure out who I was from my posts in the thread for that (very small) school. While I don't feel I've said anything sketchy, I do value some attempt at keeping a modicum of anonymity. At the very least, I felt uncomfortable throwing my mod-dom out there to an interviewer, which most certainly would be inviting them to check out SDN if they hadn't already heard about it to better assess that "activity" that I was offering up.

Anyway, I digress. The point I intended to post here was that I don't feel personally that SDN is any less of a worthwhile volunteering activity than any other "real life" pre-med group or mentoring service. As to how it may appear to an interviewer or an adcom, I believe that really does depend on the individual. It could be seen as a 👍 or a 😕.
 
hermit said:
Look, if you think you are "volunteering at a non-profit" because you click a button when you see someone use the F-word on an internet message board, more power to you.
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Having been an extremely active moderator myself over at the political forums on pcperspective, I can say with authority that:

You have no idea what the **** you are talking about.
(A perk of not being a moderator on this site is that I'm able to express my opinion so colorfully. 👍)
 
Vihsadas said:
Having been an extremely active moderator myself over at the political forums on pcperspective, I can say with authority that:

You have no idea what the **** you are talking about.
(A perk of not being a moderator on this site is that I'm able to express my opinion so colorfully. 👍)
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I think I got a warning for using **** to insinuate a word that isn't allowed here. You should get one, too.
 
inaminute said:
I think I got a warning for using **** to insinuate a word that isn't allowed here. You should get one, too.
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Maybe I personally just don't like to use the word that starts with 'H', ends with 'K', and has its middle two letters that are the short hand for 'extracurricular'...
 
Vihsadas said:
Maybe I personally just don't like to use the word that starts with 'H', ends with 'K', and has its middle two letters that are the short hand for 'extracurricular'...
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naw, you're fulla shoot
 
inaminute said:
just curious...

do you put "SDN moderator" as a leadership position?
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note to mods: if you say yes to this, you will begin getting a gang of premed sending you their CV's asking to be part of the "team"
 
I don't have it on my residency apps, but I have brought it up in a few of my many residency interviews.

It has always been well-received. One interviewer was very interested in what I had to say about it.
 
Being a moderator for SDN is on my resume and was on my AMCAS app. Also at the time of application to medical school I was the editor-in-chief of the SDN front page.

Running a website that has around 100,000 registered users and millions of page views a month isn't an easy task. The staff at SDN are all unpaid volunteers who do this because we like it and think it is a worthwhile cause. Depending on the forum you moderate, the amount of involvement you have etc. the time committment can be enourmous as a volunteer with SDN. The fact of the matter is, the resource/community that is SDN would not be possible without the efforts of a few hundred volunteers, as such I think that warrants a mention on something like a resume/application.

I almost always spend 10+ hours a week on SDN, during busy weeks it is much higher and very rarely would it be lower than that. I know there are other moderators who are currently more active and I know administrators certanily spend more hours a week than that working for SDN. Also I am not including the amount of time I might regularly spend here simply reading a thread or posting. I am talking about the time it takes to handle reported posts, work on projects, discuss improvements to the site and other staff related issues.

So whether a volunteer puts SDN on their resume/app is up to them and may depend on their level of involvement. For me and several others (depakote, zipmedic etc.) SDN is something we do every day and if we were to leave it out, we wouldn't be able to give a full explanation for what we do each week without mentioning it.
 
hermit said:
Look, if you think you are "volunteering at a non-profit" because you click a button when you see someone use the F-word on an internet message board, more power to you.
Click to expand...

Just because they moderate doesn't mean that they don't do other things as well. I work on a website that is similar to SDN, and I spend a great deal of time doing things like conflict resolution, and outreach to schools, because of the position I earned working there.
 
In response to what's the worst thing you've ever done? 🙂
 
I put my post count on my AMCAS, and my interviewers at Harvard were very interested to hear about it.
 
hermit said:
Of all the lame extracurriculars out there, this would take the cake.
Click to expand...

😆 Wow, well I have never really put much stock into people being a moderator on a board. But this is far from the usual message board. I think putting it down would make it fall under that catagory of people who have "I make websites freelance on the side" - you'd be surprised how many people have this listed under their ECs
 
Yes, on a superficial level, we do handle reported posts and monitor adherence to policy. That is one of our responsibilities. However, moderators do so much more than work with forum technicalities. Many of us started out as advisors, or members who took an active role in helping other members. When we can, we do our best to offer advice and to guide folks through various aspects of the medicine journey. We volunteer our precious time to help foster and maintain an enviroment of free academic and professional discourse. Many of us are professional school students, so our time is at a high premium. Yet, we feel it is important to give back to the SDN community. I know SDN was a tremendous help in my own application process and it continues to be as I continue onward in my journey. Because I benefited so much from the forums, I feel it is my obligation to give back to it in some way. That's one of the reasons why I continue to offer my support. The other is because I enjoy being of service and being a forum moderator is one way to offer it.
 
spicedmanna said:
Yes, on a superficial level, we do handle reported posts and monitor adherence to policy. That is one of our responsibilities. However, moderators do so much more than work with forum technicalities. Many of us started out as advisors, or members who took an active role in helping other members. When we can, we do our best to offer advice and to guide folks through various aspects of the medicine journey. We volunteer our precious time to help foster and maintain an enviroment of free academic and professional discourse. Many of us are professional school students, so our time is at a high premium. Yet, we feel it is important to give back to the SDN community. I know SDN was a tremendous help in my own application process and it continues to be as I continue onward in my journey. Because I benefited so much from the forums, I feel it is my obligation to give back to it in some way. That's one of the reasons why I continue to offer my support. The other is because I enjoy being of service and being a forum moderator is one way to offer it.
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:clap::clap::clap:

Spicedmanna is substantially more eloquent than I ever could be. 👍
 
Imagine the rapid increase of lost, mis-guided pre-med souls if SDN didn't exist. 🙁

It's definitely worthwhile!
 
DoctorPardi said:
Being a moderator for SDN is on my resume and was on my AMCAS app. Also at the time of application to medical school I was the editor-in-chief of the SDN front page.

Running a website that has around 100,000 registered users and millions of page views a month isn't an easy task. The staff at SDN are all unpaid volunteers who do this because we like it and think it is a worthwhile cause. Depending on the forum you moderate, the amount of involvement you have etc. the time committment can be enourmous as a volunteer with SDN. The fact of the matter is, the resource/community that is SDN would not be possible without the efforts of a few hundred volunteers, as such I think that warrants a mention on something like a resume/application.

I almost always spend 10+ hours a week on SDN, during busy weeks it is much higher and very rarely would it be lower than that. I know there are other moderators who are currently more active and I know administrators certanily spend more hours a week than that working for SDN. Also I am not including the amount of time I might regularly spend here simply reading a thread or posting. I am talking about the time it takes to handle reported posts, work on projects, discuss improvements to the site and other staff related issues.

So whether a volunteer puts SDN on their resume/app is up to them and may depend on their level of involvement. For me and several others (depakote, zipmedic etc.) SDN is something we do every day and if we were to leave it out, we wouldn't be able to give a full explanation for what we do each week without mentioning it.
Click to expand...

spicedmanna said:
Yes, on a superficial level, we do handle reported posts and monitor adherence to policy. That is one of our responsibilities. However, moderators do so much more than work with forum technicalities. Many of us started out as advisors, or members who took an active role in helping other members. When we can, we do our best to offer advice and to guide folks through various aspects of the medicine journey. We volunteer our precious time to help foster and maintain an enviroment of free academic and professional discourse. Many of us are professional school students, so our time is at a high premium. Yet, we feel it is important to give back to the SDN community. I know SDN was a tremendous help in my own application process and it continues to be as I continue onward in my journey. Because I benefited so much from the forums, I feel it is my obligation to give back to it in some way. That's one of the reasons why I continue to offer my support. The other is because I enjoy being of service and being a forum moderator is one way to offer it.
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Exactly.
 
Here's the answer to the OP's question that you really want. If I list as an extracurricular that I am a moderator on Site X (SDN, YouTube, MySpace) does it make me a more attractive candidate for medical school admissions?

In a nutshell, it is an extracurricular activity but we look at all volunteer work in terms of how it molded you as an individual, how it showed your interest in helping your fellow humans and how it allowed you to know more about the scope of the practice of medicine.

From experience, you are likely to benefit more by "reading" SDN than moderating the site (mostly housekeeping duties). The best experience is participating in the discussions and sharing your background (which is what most users do anyway). There is very little "status" associated with moderating this site. The richness of this site comes from the users and definitely not from the moderators.

Bottom line: Do extracurriculars that interest you and show your interest in your fellow humans/the practice of medicine. Don't participate in an extracurriular because you believe it will "look good" for an admissions committee.
 
njbmd said:
Here's the answer to the OP's question that you really want. If I list as an extracurricular that I am a moderator on Site X (SDN, YouTube, MySpace) does it make me a more attractive candidate for medical school admissions?

In a nutshell, it is an extracurricular activity but we look at all volunteer work in terms of how it molded you as an individual, how it showed your interest in helping your fellow humans and how it allowed you to know more about the scope of the practice of medicine.

From experience, you are likely to benefit more by "reading" SDN than moderating the site (mostly housekeeping duties). The best experience is participating in the discussions and sharing your background (which is what most users do anyway). There is very little "status" associated with moderating this site. The richness of this site comes from the users and definitely not from the moderators.

Bottom line: Do extracurriculars that interest you and show your interest in your fellow humans/the practice of medicine. Don't participate in an extracurriular because you believe it will "look good" for an admissions committee.
Click to expand...

Hit the nail on the head. I did not put my status as an assistant moderator on SDN on my AMCAS application.
 
DoctorPardi said:
Running a website that has around 100,000 registered users and millions of page views a month isn't an easy task.
Click to expand...

Take that idea further. Imagine if this site was for-profit, was sponsored by Kaplan, TPR, medical schools, pharmaceutical companies, Google Adsense, etc. etc.

There would be huge potential income and the "heads" of this site could say "I help run a web-based organization providing resources to students interested in various health fields and which generates X amount of dollars in monthly revenue."

No adcom, or reasonable person, would then discount the significance of this activity. So, just the fact that it's nonprofit doesn't make it any less significant. If I was a mod (god forbid!), I would not put it, simply because it's not the kind of thing most people understand - say "I help moderate a forum with millions of pageviews daily" to random folk and you will receive blank stares. But this doesn't detract from the importance of the activity itself.

Actually, it reminds me of this peer-reviewed published paper on the normal flora on horse penises (if I recall correctly); I bet some poor undergraduate volunteer's job was to collect "samples". It was significant work, it merely does not translate well to the general populace (e.g. "yah I volunteer to touch horsies in their special places...")

As a side note, I'm guessing hermit has never moderated a popular forum before. It's really a labor of (extremely masochistic) love.
 
estairella said:
Actually, it reminds me of this peer-reviewed published paper on the normal flora on horse penises (if I recall correctly); I bet some poor undergraduate volunteer's job was to collect "samples". It was significant work, it merely does not translate well to the general populace (e.g. "yah I volunteer to touch horsies in their special places...").
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You read my publication?
 
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