MD How important is volunteering for residency matching?

[btuck]

M1 here. I know that by far the most important aspect of your residency application is Step 1, you do not have to remind me. What I want to know is, if I find a volunteering position that I actually enjoy, is it worth taking time out of my busy schedule to do it? I want to volunteer for multiple reasons, but the end goal of any medical student is to get the residency position of their dreams, so let's say that I am able to do well in school and score well on Step 1, will volunteering have any impact whatsoever on my application?

I am mainly asking this because I know that volunteering is a HUGE aspect of one's AMCAS application to medical school and was wondering how much it factors in for residency.

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[radsisrad]

Not at all. But it might help you snatch AOA.

 

[btuck]

Thanks for the input. I think I will hold off on volunteering as I do not want to get involved with it and then during fourth year regret all the time I spent volunteering when I could have been studying, at the gym, etc.

Instead, I think I am going to try to get more involved with internal leadership - possibly try to become an anatomy TA, get involved with admissions, administration, etc. as these are things I think I will enjoy more. Do you think these things will be looked more favorably upon or does it really just come down to USMLE score and clinical evals?

 

[radsisrad]

Being a TA is good - it'll make you a bit of money as well as force you to review material for Step 1. And, yeah... you can stick in in the ERAS application.

 

[JP2740]

Just do like 1-2 things to just have something for that section but honestly no one cares. If you have a lot of research people especially won’t care

 

[W19]

No one cares...

 

[Donald Juan]

Do things that you enjoy, get involved in ways that make you happy. Don't do it for a resume booster and definitely do not do it at the detriment of your sanity, grades, or step scores.

 

[throwaway1939]

volunteer if you want to

don't be one of those stupid fake altruist who only volunteers because it helps them. medical school is full of idiots like this.

personally, i've never volunteered since I was like 19 years old and i probably will never volunteer except for stuff for my kids school or family stuff. **** doing work and not getting paid

 

[lekarsz_90]

If it is important to you and won't take away from your study time do it. Volunteering can be therapeutic.

 

[Atom612]

As a current fourth year....I have literally never heard anybody in my class express the feeling that they wish they would have spent more time studying. Quite the opposite. I do, however, hear people say they wish they would have been able to spend more time with family/friends or doing things they enjoy.

Maybe that's because they're fourth years who have presumedly passed their board exams? I know two upperclassmen that were club leaders that failed their boards and now can't rotate with their rest of their class. I'm sure they wish they would have spent more time studying.

The leadership positions will have about the same value as volunteering would. The important thing is that you have SOMETHING on your CV besides school-related activities that you can talk about in interviews. You don't want to look like someone who does just school stuff all the time (nor, I would think, would you want to be someone who does just school stuff all the time). So like I said: stop worrying about how it looks on your application and just do something you enjoy. That's what will look best come residency application time anyway.

Can you expand on this? I've done some volunteering stuff (only a dozen hours or so, not a club leader or anything), but I have a wife and a family. When I'm not doing school-related stuff or studying, I spend time with them. I imagine I'll do the same with what little free time I have as a resident. I obviously can't put "family time" on my CV. Will I really look bad to program directors just because I prioritize my time by being with my family when I'm not at school?

 

[Atom612]

That makes a lot of sense, I'll keep that in mind. I didn't know that there was a hobbies/interests section like that (I'm only an M2). I'm a "member" of a number of interests groups, attend the meetings occasionally (usually held at lunch) and have done some associated extracurricular things with them. I just haven't had the drive to get a leadership role in any of them.

 

[Nucleophile1]

When people fail their boards, the problem is typically that you didn't study correctly, not that you didn't study enough. I actually noticed that the blocks where I studied from the time I got home until the time I went to bed, I did worse than when I made time to take care of myself and do things I enjoy. Burnout is super real and it will hurt you just as much as not studying enough. Oh, and one guy in my class has two young kids - during M1/M2 he would go home after class, spend time with his family until the kids went to bed around 8, then study for a few hours until he went to bed. He's now applying to a competitive surgical subspecialty so obviously his Step score was fine lol. Meanwhile, I studied from the time I got home from class to the time I went to bed, didn't honor a single class and had a well below average Step 1 score.

I think it depends on the person. When I increased the amount of time that I studied, my grades went up quite a bit.

It's definitely important to take time for things you enjoy but I think that if I only studied a few hours per day after class like the guy you mentioned, I definitely would not score as high.

 

[Eye-eye]

Maybe that's because they're fourth years who have presumedly passed their board exams? I know two upperclassmen that were club leaders that failed their boards and now can't rotate with their rest of their class. I'm sure they wish they would have spent more time studying.



Can you expand on this? I've done some volunteering stuff (only a dozen hours or so, not a club leader or anything), but I have a wife and a family. When I'm not doing school-related stuff or studying, I spend time with them. I imagine I'll do the same with what little free time I have as a resident. I obviously can't put "family time" on my CV. Will I really look bad to program directors just because I prioritize my time by being with my family when I'm not at school?

Yes, potentially. Depends on the field and the program. If you're applying for a surgical specialty and don't have research, that can be a red flag. Other fields like EM may not care about that so much but would prefer to see some sort of out-of-curriculum effort to get to know more about the specialty. Or completely separate things like being active in an organization. But certainly not all fields care that much. What you WILL have to show, at least during interviews, is that you're a human, not a robot, and have some interests outside medicine and in your free time.

 

[GenSurgONLY]

That makes a lot of sense, I'll keep that in mind. I didn't know that there was a hobbies/interests section like that (I'm only an M2). I'm a "member" of a number of interests groups, attend the meetings occasionally (usually held at lunch) and have done some associated extracurricular things with them. I just haven't had the drive to get a leadership role in any of them.

I have been told you can add “leadership “ roles such as being a PTA member at your kids school. I am sure you have lead them in one way or another outside of home . I don’t think it has to be the “traditional” sense of leadership. Part of a club, yada, yada, yada.

Since you are married with kids like me; it’s easier to be a leader in their school activities.

 

[DrRedstone]

I will say my extracurriculars are the main reason that I am staying sane throughout the clinical years. So insofar as it is letting me get to a point where I can apply to residency, I think they are really important. I'm a youth mentor at my church and it's nice to see things outside the view of medicine.

 

[Lnsean]

No will care and everyone knows that this part of the app will be exaggerated and fluffed up like crazy.

 

[JenS99]

M1 here. I know that by far the most important aspect of your residency application is Step 1, you do not have to remind me. What I want to know is, if I find a volunteering position that I actually enjoy, is it worth taking time out of my busy schedule to do it? I want to volunteer for multiple reasons, but the end goal of any medical student is to get the residency position of their dreams, so let's say that I am able to do well in school and score well on Step 1, will volunteering have any impact whatsoever on my application?

I am mainly asking this because I know that volunteering is a HUGE aspect of one's AMCAS application to medical school and was wondering how much it factors in for residency.

It depends in which area you plan on volunteering.

Certainly volunteering in an area outside of medicine can show just how well rounded you are and can be a huge plus for the application but also as a conversation point during the interview.

When applying you want to “build your brand” on your personal statement, and extracurriculars go a long way in achieving this.

However all the academic stuff is far more important as you’re already aware.

 

[dubba7]

I was wondering the same thing. I wanted to apply to volunteer for this nonprofit organization: South Asian Heart Center. It assists south asians patients manage their coronary artery disease and diabetes with the guidance of Heart health coaches (volunteers). The volunteers conduct calls with program participants and make sure they are on track with their lifestyle modifications as advised.

I really think this will help me build my clinical "counseling" skills and communicating with patients even though there is no real patient contact. I'm not sure though if it will really benefit me in terms of residency applications.

Any genuine advice would be really appreciated. Thank you!

 

[scoopdaboop]

I was wondering the same thing. I wanted to apply to volunteer for this nonprofit organization: South Asian Heart Center. It assists south asians patients manage their coronary artery disease and diabetes with the guidance of Heart health coaches (volunteers). The volunteers conduct calls with program participants and make sure they are on track with their lifestyle modifications as advised.

I really think this will help me build my clinical "counseling" skills and communicating with patients even though there is no real patient contact. I'm not sure though if it will really benefit me in terms of residency applications.

Any genuine advice would be really appreciated. Thank you!

If you think you'd enjoy or like to do it, AND it doesn't get in the way of your studies, then go for it.. It's really that simple, Idk why people make it more of a big deal than that lol.

 

[CidHighwind]

People saying it doesn’t matter aren’t telling the whole truth. It’s not nearly as important as it was as a Premed, but having Gold Humanism or AOA because of it does help. Plus it’s hard to convince a PD that has a program that serves underserved populations to take you if you’ve never done that as a student.