Medical How many EC's should someone with 1 gap year have? (MD)

[GoSpursGo]

I'm taking one gap year, but do I need to have 15 experiences? I have no idea how I can get 15 meaningful experiences without it seeming like fluff. Do people who take 1 gap year really have 15? I always feel like I'm not doing enough and the fact that I might need to have 15 activities gives me anxiety. Also, if I take a gap year, am I automatically pooled with all non-trad applicants? Like someone who took 5 gap years would be compared with me, but they would obviously have more EC's?

The number of experiences isn't as meaningful as the number of hours and the quality of the experience.

There are no "traditional" and "non-trad" pools. Everyone is in the same pool, and the most qualified applicants get accepted, regardless of whether you did it by going straight through from college to med school or if you took multiple years to check all the boxes.

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[GoSpursGo]

Thank you so much for responding. But, how do I know if I'm doing enough?

General benchmarks that I have seen are getting ~150 hours of clinical experience and ~100 hours of nonclinical volunteering as a minimum. But ultimately, your primary job is to do well academically. It's much easier to take a gap year and check these ECs boxes later than to repair a GPA that you messed up because you stretched yourself too thin.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Don't worry about the pool you are in. If you are a good applicant, you will be noticed. Meaningful ECs>>> 15 crap ECs. You want to make sure you can discuss your work at the interview. If you have 15 things but didn't do much, how are you going to have a meaningful conversation.

I once knew someone who was published in a JAMA article. When I asked her what she did for the paper, she said "I fed the fish." I wonder how she was able to talk about this at an interview.

 

[GoSpursGo]

Again, those are minimums. If you otherwise have a strong app you could try applying and see what happens.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Thanks for responding. So, do only top applicants and super non-trad applicants have 15 ECs? Also, how are adcoms feeling about covid affecting EC's? Do they acknowledge that its been harder to get opportunities or do they not care at all?

Again, anyone can get 15 ECs if you are just trying to get them. It’s the experiences you have that you have placed a lot of time and effort into that are gonna be the ones that help you.