Estimating Volunteer Hours

[TheBoneDoctah]

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So I made a dumb mistake and didn't keep track of my volunteer hours for a particular experience. I have been volunteering there for about 3 years now, but I only volunteer about one weekend every 2 months or so (This is how the program works). I am not sure how many hours I have, and neither does the coordinator because they switched managers. If I make a guesstimate of my hours here (around 80 hours) do you think they would actually call and check on this? It's not that I am lying, but I don't know what the manager would even say because she doesn't have me down for 80 hours since my other hours were with the other manager.

 

[snowflakes]

Talk to the manager before submitting your hours, ant tell him (or her) that you're listing him as a contact. Tell him how you've estimated your hours (and be conservative with the estimate), and make sure it sounds appropriate with him. Give him the contact information of the previous manager if he wants to verify himself but more likely than not, it will sound alright to him, and you'll be good to go.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Talk to the manager before submitting your hours, ant tell him (or her) that you're listing him as a contact. Tell him how you've estimated your hours (and be conservative with the estimate), and make sure it sounds appropriate with him. Give him the contact information of the previous manager if he wants to verify himself but more likely than not, it will sound alright to him, and you'll be good to go.

But the problem lies in the fact that for the old manager I wasn't signing in because we didn't have to. Hence the reason he is no longer manger haha.

 

[snowflakes]

But the problem lies in the fact that for the old manager I wasn't signing in because we didn't have to. Hence the reason he is no longer manger haha.

Right, but he can still vouch that you came in generally one weekend every other month starting three years ago, right? He'd still have a sense that 80 hours sounds about right, without having official sign ins.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Right, but he can still vouch that you came in generally one weekend every other month right? He'd still have a sense that 80 hours sounds about right, without having official sign ins.

I don't have his contact info. And I'm not sure if he would remember. It's a bad situation. It's not like 80 hours over 3 years is a crazy amount though.

 

[Lamel]

I think the general rule for estimating hours for activities is make your best guess, then add 200 hours to it.

 

[snowflakes]

I don't have his contact info. And I'm not sure if he would remember. It's a bad situation. It's not like 80 hours over 3 years is a crazy amount though.

So just talk to the new manager, and tell him you're estimating 80 hours based on x hours one weekend every other month for 3 years. I'm sure your new manager trusts you enough. Like you say, it's not like 80 hours over 3 years sounds like an exaggeration.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

I think the general rule for estimating hours for activities is make your best guess, then add 200 hours to it.

Hahahahhahahhaa hahahahah

 

[jm192]

Just do some rough math and go with it.

1. AMCAS isn't going to check it. There's no way to check it if they wanted to.
2. At some point, 140 isn't that much more valuable than 120 isn't that much more valuable than 100.

 

[aspirantmed]

I was only once asked at an interview about the hours I had listed for an activity - it was a very time consuming activity, and I wasn't surprised that the interviewer was skeptical of the authenticity of the commitment that I had listed on my application. As long as you can explain it if the topic arises, and provided that you send a heads-up to the activity's coordinator or point-of-contact that they might be contacted by a medical school representative, you are in fine shape.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Just do some rough math and go with it.

1. AMCAS isn't going to check it. There's no way to check it if they wanted to.
2. At some point, 140 isn't that much more valuable than 120 isn't that much more valuable than 100.

The way they could check would be to call the contact you supplied.

 

[el_duderino]

I think jim192 meant that AMCAS is not going to start calling references to check volunteer hours on applications.

Anyway, the answer is to contact the current manager and make sure you're on the same page just in case someone does call.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

I was only once asked at an interview about the hours I had listed for an activity - it was a very time consuming activity, and I wasn't surprised that the interviewer was skeptical of the authenticity of the commitment that I had listed on my application. As long as you can explain it if the topic arises, and provided that you send a heads-up to the activity's coordinator or point-of-contact that they might be contacted by a medical school representative, you are in fine shape.

How many hours did you have?

 

[aspirantmed]

2,800+, but it was more or less a full-time job, year-round, for several years of college.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

2,800+, but it was more or less a full-time job, year-round, for several years of college.

I don't think my 80 hours will raise questions

 

[jm192]

The way they could check would be to call the contact you supplied.

In theory, sure.

But: Do you REALLY think they're calling to verify the volunteer hours of every applicant?

If you had something that sounds far fetched or something VERY impressive, sure, maybe.

Something hohum like thousands of others...c'mon.