How should I improve for next cycle?

[bigyeet]

I submitted everything before August, but, so far, I've only received a single II (in October) from my state school, 1 hold, and ~6 R's. Clearly, this cycle isn't going well, and an II doesn't guarantee anything. I've been pestering my advisor about weaknesses, but he can't find any (or he's not telling me). I've started a statistical research job in public health at a prestigious university, but what else should I do to beef up my application? My writing shouldn't be the issue because my advisors (and others) say it's strong.

Stats/ECs/School List: WAMC

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[deleted1053887]

Took a look at your WAMC.
I think you should improve your clinical hours. As you have noted, crisis counseling may not be seen as clinical experience by other people or schools, so perhaps with COVID is over, you can try to brush that up. Maybe my eyes are going blind from too many zoom calls, but you can also try to increase your nonclinical volunteering since I didn't see any, especially perhaps providing service to an underserved population. I'm not sure to what extent being a mentor for the economics department would count as nonclinical volunteering hours, but you are quite lacking in this area of service to others. Your stats look great, but your school list is a bit top heavy (I had similar stats and a similar school list as you the first time I applied) so maybe try to expand your school list next time. You can be a great physician even without being in a Top 20 med school! Since COVID era will probably hinder a lot of opportunities, you can even consider waiting a year or two before applying again so you have enough time to up your hours and gain more stories to write about, which is what I did. Adcoms will be able to see how you've matured since then.