Gap Year Activities

[ARKR]

Hey all,

I'm currently in my gap year. I applied to medical schools but I want to make sure I strengthen my app in case I do have to reapply. I have very good numbers (LizzyM 78+), so ECs are my major concern. I have 50+ hours of clinical volunteering, 150 non clinical, TA'd a bit, tutored quite a bit (I really enjoy it, probably over 1000 hours at this point), 100+ of shadowing where I even did rounds for a bit. So far, I volunteer in hospice roughly 3-4 hours a week. I also tutor middle school - college age students about 16-20 hours a week as a job. I'm currently setting up a volunteer tutoring experience at my local high school, but it won't be many hours a week because I'm not available many after school hours due to my job. I also still help run a club at my school, despite having graduated.

I'd love to get research (probably my biggest gap at this point) but the only interviews I had wouldn't take me on because they figured they would lose me in August. While I obviously hope this to be the case, I would be curious if someone could give me advice on how to get into a lab. I live near philly, and am willing to work for free, but I know with tight restrictions on funding even free work isn't that appealing.

I also thought about scribing, but most of the companies in my area require a year commitment. I'd be willing to if I am not accepted, but obviously don't really know if that will be the case... Anyone have experience with scribeamerica and if they would take me given that constraint?

Any other thoughts? Any jobs I may not have explored that could be worth looking into? Would picking up a second job working in a coffee shop or the like be frowned upon?

I think after studying/working close to 60 hours a week for the last year being at 25ish hours a week makes me go a little stir crazy!

Thanks in advance for anyone who can offer some insight!

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[kevinsword91]

With your numbers and EC's I don't see how you would not get in somewhere so long as you applied wisely.

If you are really interested in scribing it might help to look into if the 1 year commitment has any penalties for breaking it. I know a few scribes who started when they were in the middle of application season and left well before they had worked a full year. Is that professional? No. Did they have to misrepresent themselves a little at the interview for the job? Probably. Just something to consider and look into. Very much depends on the company itself.

The possible timeframe you could have left makes research and scribing difficult. I think what you are doing now sounds fine and if the application cycle seems to be looking bleak you can always apply for a scribe job with a sincere 1 year commitment.

 

[ProudMD]

Are you getting IIs and acceptances? Or are you still waiting to hear back? Your stats are incredible, so I don't anticipate any problems getting accepted into more than one school.

 

[PlaqueBuster]

How late did you apply this cycle? Because you should be hearing back by now if you applied in a timely manner and applied broading to schools. I would just find a part-time job for now if you want to do something, because it is difficult to committ to something with the doubt that may get accepted and only have until August. Or you can volunteer at a hospital. If you don't hear anything in march or April then consider applying for research experience because you will have a year to committ since you will reapply.

 

[ARKR]

@PlaqueBuster

Sorry for the late response, thought I'd get an alert if there was a response to this. I applied pretty darn late. Long story short, I had a research job lined up to start in sept, it disappeared due to funding cuts. I was still gonna take the year, but I talked to a friend of my mothers who used to sit on an ad-com at a pretty highly ranked med school and she said with my stats i should just give it a go at schools slightly below my stat range and really talk up the teaching activities. If I don't get in I have a contact who said I can get into their research program for gap year 2 should it come to that. I was complete early-mid OCT, and applied to a normal amount of schools. Once the research position disappeared i got myself together as quick as possible and got a part time gig tutoring and volunteering with hospice.

I was hoping to avoid the whole hospital volunteering as I haven't heard great things but it may be the best option to strengthen my app just in case. Sometimes this whole process may make us a little bit to introspective, it can be hard to enjoy a little downtime

Thanks for your reply!

 

[ARKR]

With your numbers and EC's I don't see how you would not get in somewhere so long as you applied wisely.

If you are really interested in scribing it might help to look into if the 1 year commitment has any penalties for breaking it. I know a few scribes who started when they were in the middle of application season and left well before they had worked a full year. Is that professional? No. Did they have to misrepresent themselves a little at the interview for the job? Probably. Just something to consider and look into. Very much depends on the company itself.

The possible timeframe you could have left makes research and scribing difficult. I think what you are doing now sounds fine and if the application cycle seems to be looking bleak you can always apply for a scribe job with a sincere 1 year commitment.

Thanks for the advice. I think I applied relatively wisely in terms of where but not when (always wondered why people would apply late, and ended up doing so myself. Funny how stuff like that happens). I've really toyed with the idea of just applying and then leaving early but I'd rather not burn any bridges. I wish there was a way to volunteer as a scribe, as I really only want to do it to further my clinical experiences, and being a scribe seems like an excellent way to do just that. Seems like all the companies in my area are pretty hard and fast about the 1-2 year commitment thing.

I think like 12 people out of 250 got rejected with my stats/ethnicity last year. Hopefully I'm just being neurotic and don't fall into that group

 

[Norm0cephalic]

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[ridethecliche]

So you applied in sept?

I hope you're filling in your hours with a lot of stuff right now. Sorry to hear about the job status. I think it's total BS when that happens. I would never take a job that was contingent on funding at date of start for this very reason. If they said funding was only guaranteed for two years, then fine, but that's total bs right there.

 

[ARKR]

So you applied in sept?

I hope you're filling in your hours with a lot of stuff right now. Sorry to hear about the job status. I think it's total BS when that happens. I would never take a job that was contingent on funding at date of start for this very reason. If they said funding was only guaranteed for two years, then fine, but that's total bs right there.

Eh they never really told me it was contigent on funding. Just kinda said it was going to start in september. I probably should've asked. I'm trying to fill in the hours but its tough, probably gonna end up being a hospital volunteer in addition to my other activities... it'll put me around 40 hours a week