ECs in Med school?

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So I see a lot of people in my class flocking to volunteer at this event or become liaison of that club. It seems a bit showy/excessive like in college and I don't even know if it matters much anymore

Do ECs matter for residency at all? Just being honest, I'm really not interested in being the president of a club here or a manager at the local clinic we have. There are some stuff I like doing (volunteering at clinics/health fairs from time to time or giving tour guides for admissions) but I want to primarily use my pre-clinical years to do well in classes and spend my free time doing fun things away from school. I will be getting involved quite a bit with research so hopefully that becomes something productive.

Sorry if this question has been asked before; haven't seen it discussed here in a while so I thought I'd ask. Thanks!

 

[Umyo]

No, ECs play a very very minimal role/ no role at all towards getting a residency.

STEP scores
Research
Letters
AOA

If there's something you like to do, do it. But doing it for the hopes that it'll help your residency match is a waste of time.


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[psychhopefull2016]

Not really an extracurricular but research helps! The other stuff matters much much less

 

[tatsuchi]

The only significant ECs that will be notable to programs is research, and maybe shadowing/volunteer work in the field that you desire. (Also tangentally related doing elective/away rotations in said field)

For anything else, do it because you can be passionate about doing it, and as a result, can tell a good story about it. Everything else is padding.

 

[zero0]

I really don't think research is important either unless you're shooting for top academic programs. Take a look at the PD survey:
http://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/NRMP-2016-Program-Director-Survey.pdf

Volunteering/extracurriculars are rated above research overall. The specialties that rank research above volunteering are your usual suspects, derm, neurosurg, etc.

Overall, the factors with the highest average ratings seem to be Step 1, letters, clerkship grades, professionalism, and no failed Steps or flags from the NRMP.

 

[Stagg737]

Pick 1 or 2 that interest you and that you enjoy doing. EC's in general aren't going to help or hurt your app that much. From what I've been told it just doesn't usually look great if you've got nothing other than board scores and class rank. Obviously if you've got research, AOA, other stuff it won't matter as much, it's just better to not have a minimalist CV.

 

[zaztong]

Would tutoring MS1's be considered an academic/community/volunteering EC?

 

[failedatlife]

Do you like the Cubs??? Because you are certainly heading down that road if you fall into that trap. Your ECs are like the regular season. Sure you can have won lots of games or published lots of papers but NO ONE CARES...NO ONE GIVES a crap about. Just like in baseball no one care about ANYTHING OTHER THAN THE WORLD SERIES. What is the world series of medicine...well it is your STEP 1...that half day test that hasn't correlates 0 craps with what I have seen 3rd year and it IS EVERYTHING. IT SAYS EVERYTHING about you, it is YOU. YOU are your step 1 score, it DEFINES YOUR LIMITATIONS and DEFINES ANY VALUE YOU WILL HAVE IN LIFE to that specialty. don't waste your time with publishing or heaven knows what ever else policy or volunteer stuff you like because NO ONE CARES...do it for yourself and the Lord because honestly those are the only two entities that will ever care. Beyond that you will go as far as your 3 digit number allows you to go. So if you want to be like the Cubs and win lots of regular season games (lots of honors in your classes and publishing) and SCREW UP the world series (aka STEP 1) NO ONE WILL BE THERE FOR YOU, they will outcast you because at that point you may be the hero medicine deserves but not the hero it needs right now and you will LOSE to the cowards (Clevelanders) who barely made it to the WS but crushed you on the ONLY THING THAT MATTERS.

 

[Psai]

Do you like the Cubs??? Because you are certainly heading down that road if you fall into that trap. Your ECs are like the regular season. Sure you can have won lots of games or published lots of papers but NO ONE CARES...NO ONE GIVES a crap about. Just like in baseball no one care about ANYTHING OTHER THAN THE WORLD SERIES. What is the world series of medicine...well it is your STEP 1...that half day test that hasn't correlates 0 craps with what I have seen 3rd year and it IS EVERYTHING. IT SAYS EVERYTHING about you, it is YOU. YOU are your step 1 score, it DEFINES YOUR LIMITATIONS and DEFINES ANY VALUE YOU WILL HAVE IN LIFE to that specialty. don't waste your time with publishing or heaven knows what ever else policy or volunteer stuff you like because NO ONE CARES...do it for yourself and the Lord because honestly those are the only two entities that will ever care. Beyond that you will go as far as your 3 digit number allows you to go. So if you want to be like the Cubs and win lots of regular season games (lots of honors in your classes and publishing) and SCREW UP the world series (aka STEP 1) NO ONE WILL BE THERE FOR YOU, they will outcast you because at that point you may be the hero medicine deserves but not the hero it needs right now and you will LOSE to the cowards (Clevelanders) who barely made it to the WS but crushed you on the ONLY THING THAT MATTERS.

Stop

 

[ZPakEffect]

Stop

No, this guy is hilarious.

 

[atomi]

This stuff fizzles out by the end of second year when people are studying for boards and getting ready to move on to the adult world where they have to be present 50+ hours/week and are getting married and starting families on their own time.

There are a decent number of 22 and 23 year olds coming into med school that have only known high school and college, and thus we have all the clubs and ECs that some M1s get involved with. The reality is that adults don't do these things (because they work and have families) and the first two years of med school just provide an opportunity to extend out after-class activities for just a little while longer (perhaps unhealthily so) that would have naturally died off immediately after college graduation when people started working.

Residencies do not care about any of these things because they are hiring people that they can train to do work. They are not trying to select a diverse campus community from a pool of high schoolers.

 

[.hematoma.]

I think that ECs can matter if they show your underlying passion for the field you want to pursue. I'm into global health, so my main EC is a nonprofit I started + a lot of global health research... yeah I'm doing both these things for myself but I think that they will definitely make me an attractive applicant, IF everything else is in order (step, LORs, etc). If anything, it'll be a good conversation starter during interviews.

 

[NWwildcat2013]

.

 

[mmm_cats]

Do you like the Cubs??? Because you are certainly heading down that road if you fall into that trap. Your ECs are like the regular season. Sure you can have won lots of games or published lots of papers but NO ONE CARES...NO ONE GIVES a crap about. Just like in baseball no one care about ANYTHING OTHER THAN THE WORLD SERIES. What is the world series of medicine...well it is your STEP 1...that half day test that hasn't correlates 0 craps with what I have seen 3rd year and it IS EVERYTHING. IT SAYS EVERYTHING about you, it is YOU. YOU are your step 1 score, it DEFINES YOUR LIMITATIONS and DEFINES ANY VALUE YOU WILL HAVE IN LIFE to that specialty. don't waste your time with publishing or heaven knows what ever else policy or volunteer stuff you like because NO ONE CARES...do it for yourself and the Lord because honestly those are the only two entities that will ever care. Beyond that you will go as far as your 3 digit number allows you to go. So if you want to be like the Cubs and win lots of regular season games (lots of honors in your classes and publishing) and SCREW UP the world series (aka STEP 1) NO ONE WILL BE THERE FOR YOU, they will outcast you because at that point you may be the hero medicine deserves but not the hero it needs right now and you will LOSE to the cowards (Clevelanders) who barely made it to the WS but crushed you on the ONLY THING THAT MATTERS.

Don't even waste youre time on grammar because you need to EAT SLEEP BREATH STEP

 

[LilKangaroo]

I was once told the only EC's that matter are national positions. So I did that. Several interviewers have been "impressed" with my EC's. I think it helped me get some interviews.

 

[FootballFoot]

I was once told the only EC's that matter are national positions. So I did that. Several interviewers have been "impressed" with my EC's. I think it helped me get some interviews.

How do you get into those kinds of positions?

 

[LilKangaroo]

How do you get into those kinds of positions?

Often it's as easy as signing up to be on a committee for an organization that you are interested in. The more work you do for the organization the more likely you are to get better positions.