General Application Questions

[JustMeditate]

Hey Guys!

So, the plan for me is to apply next cycle, giving me about 1.5 years to find any weaknesses in my application and fix them. I am confident when it comes to my plan for obtaining/my current hours of clinical volunteering, shadowing, and research. I just have a few general questions I would like answered.

1). By the end of this semester, I'll have around 200 hours of nonclinical volunteering. My only concern is that this work has been restricted to my spring breaks, primarily because I tutor, am actively involved in several clubs w/ leadership positions, and have been maintaining my 4.0 GPA during the semester. Is this a major problem? I could technically start some work weekly to get some regular nonclinical volunteer work into my app, but to do so WOULD take significant time away from the clinical volunteer work I am trying to accumulate. If this is a major problem, how long would I have to keep up weekly volunteer gigs to fix the problem? I am trying to use my time wisely.

2). I've been tutoring for a few years now, and was wondering if it would be worth it to try and score a TA position for two semesters, or if I should just continue my tutoring gig. I ask this primarily because I have around 20 or so postsecondary experiences that I could put on my app, but I can only pick fifteen. If TAing won't be all that helpful to me, and tutoring looks almost as good, it might me a good idea not to put it on my app, and put in something else. On the other hand, if adcoms think TAing is AWESOME, that'd be good to know. And does tutoring and TAing count as leadership?

3). I've seen Catalysk mention that clubs don't actually matter when it comes to your application, unless you scored a leadership position in one, or did some volunteer work in it. Is this true? I was hoping to list a few clubs on my app, to demonstrate that I have some pretty awesome hobbies. Is this a good idea? Should I not bother to list clubs on my app, and leave that room open for non-club related activities?

Thanks!

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[Catalystik]

1). By the end of this semester, I'll have around 200 hours of nonclinical volunteering. My only concern is that this work has been restricted to my spring breaks, primarily because I tutor, am actively involved in several clubs w/ leadership positions, and have been maintaining my 4.0 GPA during the semester. Is this a major problem? I could technically start some work weekly to get some regular nonclinical volunteer work into my app, but to do so WOULD take significant time away from the clinical volunteer work I am trying to accumulate. If this is a major problem, how long would I have to keep up weekly volunteer gigs to fix the problem?

2). I've been tutoring for a few years now, and was wondering if it would be worth it to try and score a TA position for two semesters, or if I should just continue my tutoring gig. I ask this primarily because I have around 20 or so postsecondary experiences that I could put on my app, but I can only pick fifteen. If TAing won't be all that helpful to me, and tutoring looks almost as good, it might me a good idea not to put it on my app, and put in something else. On the other hand, if adcoms think TAing is AWESOME, that'd be good to know. And does tutoring and TAing count as leadership?

3). I've seen Catalysk mention that clubs don't actually matter when it comes to your application, unless you scored a leadership position in one, or did some volunteer work in it. Is this true? I was hoping to list a few clubs on my app, to demonstrate that I have some pretty awesome hobbies. Is this a good idea? Should I not bother to list clubs on my app, and leave that room open for non-club related activities?

1) A "major problem" would be having no nonmedical community service at all, which we see all too often. Having 200 hours is above the average compared to other applicants. IMO regular involvement with one organization for an extended period would be the ideal, but what you've done is perfectly acceptable, so why not continue to stay involved and keep building hours as you have been.

2) Tutoring and TAing are equally valuable and both would be looked on as Teaching, rather than Leadership, most of the time.

BTW, when you run short of spaces, it is sometimes possible to group experiences in creative ways so as to include more of them.

3) I should butt out on this one, but instead, I'll add more thoughts: If you have a club where you attained a leadership position, you would list the club and describe what you achieved through your position under Leadership.

If you are a member of a service club that performs community service, you can list it under Community Service/Volunteer-Nonmedical and give details of what you did.

You can list all your other clubs under "Hobbies" or under "Other" in a single space to save room, with a brief description after each. While this doesn't get you points in adcomm eyes, it does give a sense of your interests and leisuretime activities, which adcomms like to see. Joining clubs just to have something to list would be silly though. You can just as easily engage in hobbies with friends without belonging to an official organization and still put it on the application.

Some Hobbies are so awesome that they are worthy of their own space. It would be up to you to determine that.

 

[2050vlsb]

1. I don't see you limiting your nonclinical volunteering to school breaks as a red flag if you're pursuing other clinical and school activities during the school year. It'll be on your application and with the number of hours you've accumulated, I doubt schools will look too deeply on when you exactly performed the community service. Again, however, this is with the assumption that you can account and explain how you used your time during the regular school year.

2. I don't think tutoring or TA'ing is the type of activity that will make or break your app .. its something that people do widely enough that, for example, an interviewer might ask you to expand on a bit, but won't necessarily dwell extensively on. Given that, I think you should base the decision more on how the two positions would differ, and whether you might enjoy TA'ing after having done tutoring for so long .. it'll probably require a slightly different skill set and may get you some new experiences. As for adding it to your AMCAS, you can combine activities under a single heading, e.g. if you were tutoring and TA'ing within a single department or field, you could list the activity as "(Subject/Dept) TA/Tutor" and the explain the different responsibilities in the description. You don't need to have every activity be listed separately.

I don't know if I'd automatically consider either to be considering leadership, especially if you're just coming into a program that's already set up. I mean, if you're TA'ing and then independently organize review sessions or coordinate something on your own, you could possibly swing it. But, at least with classification, this activity would definitely fall under "Tutoring/Teaching"

3. I don't know if they wouldn't help at all, but I agree that given how easy it is to say you were a member of a club with actually doing anything, med schools may not give it much a whole lot of weight. If you do have any unique activities or activities that say a lot about you in terms of your interests, you should consider putting those done. At my interview earlier this month, my interviewer was just flipping through my AMCAS summary, and one of my clubs caught his eye (a cultural org) caught his eye and we ended up chatting about it .. it definitely took the heat off and proved I had interests outside of medicine.

 

[JustMeditate]

Thanks guys! Your advice has been immensely helpful!