ECs in Med School?

[bluenebula83]

being a premed, it's an unstated rule that you should be doing some sort of extracurriculars outside of class (volunteer, work, sports, clubs, etc.) in order to get into a decent med school. is this also the same during medical school as your trying to get into a good/decent residency? i've read about events at some schools where the med students volunteer building a house. i'm thinking, would we have time to be doing all that and still have the time/sanity left to do well on our classes? is it true that as long as (1) your grades are good and (2) you have great USMLE scores, your bound to get into one of your top-choice residency programs?! i'm just asking this so that i'll know wat to focus on once M1 begins. thanks!

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[Adcadet]

being a premed, it's an unstated rule that you should be doing some sort of extracurriculars outside of class (volunteer, work, sports, clubs, etc.) in order to get into a decent med school. is this also the same during medical school as your trying to get into a good/decent residency? i've read about events at some schools where the med students volunteer building a house. i'm thinking, would we have time to be doing all that and still have the time/sanity left to do well on our classes? is it true that as long as (1) your grades are good and (2) you have great USMLE scores, your bound to get into one of your top-choice residency programs?! i'm just asking this so that i'll know wat to focus on once M1 begins. thanks!

From what I can tell being an MS3, most people don't have "ECs" per se. Many have done research, some have volunteered a little (clinic for the underserved), some have run student interest groups. Iserson's Getting into a Residency doesn't have specifically mention ECs in the section on "Putting your effort where it counts," but grades, USMLE, research etc sure are.

But, in talking with a faculty member last week, residencies are frequently looking for something special about you, like that you decided that you want to go into endocrinology because you saw how much DM affected your little brother or that you really want to work with the homeless. And if you get this sort of thing from an EC, then great.

 

[Law2Doc]

being a premed, it's an unstated rule that you should be doing some sort of extracurriculars outside of class (volunteer, work, sports, clubs, etc.) in order to get into a decent med school. is this also the same during medical school as your trying to get into a good/decent residency? i've read about events at some schools where the med students volunteer building a house. i'm thinking, would we have time to be doing all that and still have the time/sanity left to do well on our classes? is it true that as long as (1) your grades are good and (2) you have great USMLE scores, your bound to get into one of your top-choice residency programs?! i'm just asking this so that i'll know wat to focus on once M1 begins. thanks!

Those going into the more competitive residencies generally do some amount of research at some point in med school. It also doesn't hurt to keep accumulating clinician relationships for when you need LORs. The other zillion ECs are for your own enjoyment for the most part. As for getting into good residencies, grades in the early years are important, but not on par with USMLE scores or clinical rotation input.