Economically disadvantaged, non-native speaker of English

[MIDOHopeful]

Hello all,

Thoughts on if my background will give me a (slight) advantage when applying this year to DO schools. I am not a URM, but my family and I came to the United States when I was a child. I grew up in poverty (back home) and for the first few years here, we lived well below the poverty line. As I mentioned, I am a non-native speaker of English.

Will AdCom's take this into consideration when making a decision on my application? Will my background be considered the same to a person applying who is URM?

Any thoughts/ opinions would be appreciated.

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[gmcguitar4]

Hello all,

Thoughts on if my background will give me a (slight) advantage when applying this year to DO schools. I am not a URM, but my family and I came to the United States when I was a child. I grew up in poverty (back home) and for the first few years here, we lived well below the poverty line. As I mentioned, I am a non-native speaker of English.

Will AdCom's take this into consideration when making a decision on my application? Will my background be considered the same to a person applying who is URM?

Any thoughts/ opinions would be appreciated.

If you aren't a URM, you won't be considered as a URM. Schools will admit URM's to increase racial diversity in a class. They don't care what language you speak or country your are from. What they do like is that you can speak another language though. Besides that, the only thing you can do with your story is put it into your personal statement. It won't give you some special advantage over other students. Having a strong PS plus being able to speak another language will make your app more attractive to adcoms.

 

[darklabel]

If you aren't a URM, you won't be considered as a URM. Schools will admit URM's to increase racial diversity in a class. They don't care what language you speak or country your are from. What they do like is that you can speak another language though. Besides that, the only thing you can do with your story is put it into your personal statement. It won't give you some special advantage over other students. Having a strong PS plus being able to speak another language will make your app more attractive to adcoms.

It will make a compelling PS (Assuming you can turn it into how you want to be a doctor). As for race it depends. As said before, some schools may not consider you an URM as others might. SDN logic is that Puerto Ricans (Mainland), Mexican-Americans, Native Americans and African American are the only real URMs, but it once again depends on the class markup, the number of applicants applying (and from where) as well as what the school is looking for. For instance, in some areas, there may be a need for more hispanics in general since there is a large Spanish speaking community without physicians (which happens quite often).

Anyways, it will definitely help, just remember that it won't turn an MCAT of 22 into a 30 in the Adcoms eyes. They still need to see that you can atleast succeed in medical school.

 

[gmcguitar4]

As for race it depends. As said before, some schools may not consider you an URM as others might. SDN logic is that Puerto Ricans (Mainland), Mexican-Americans, Native Americans and African American are the only real URMs,

It's usually according to school demographics pie charts. No matter what school you choose..those races you listed will be the least represented.

 

[darklabel]

It's usually according to school demographics pie charts. No matter what school you choose..those races you listed will be the least represented.

I agree, I wasn't disagreeing with SDN logic since that is universal; however, there are cases where you can have an "URM" advantage without being urm. There are a few West Coast schools (Not CA at all) that mostly accept instate students, but the applicant pool is small enough that the averages tend to be skewed lower.

Anyways I hate URM debate, especially in Pre-Osteo. With grade replacement I don't see the use in the "URM advantage".

 

[Goro]

We might...we all like rags to riches stories...this is what the USA is all about.


Will AdCom's take this into consideration when making a decision on my application?

Nope...children of immigrants are, if anything, over-represented in Medicine.

Will my background be considered the same to a person applying who is URM?