I did nothing - can it be made up for?

[Contradition]

Title. For over a year after my graduation in 2020 (philosophy BA), I did essentially nothing. I can cite environmental factors, like COVID-19 and depression, or not having a car (or meaningful public transportation where I live), or the fact that I hadn't yet decided to switch tracks, but that doesn't change the fact that I did nothing. Furthermore, after starting a DIY postbacc, I moved at a glacial pace and studied only part-time for a few semesters without major extracurriculars on the side. I didn't really get my act together until I blew organic chemistry 1 out of the water and realized I have at least the aptitude for this. After this I started working as a tutor, volunteering (community service tutoring underserved people struggling with English literacy and doing clerical support for a homeless shelter's monthly free clinic, clinical volunteering in an emergency department), working as a scribe, and taking full-time or overtime course loads. I still have no research exposure. I have not taken the MCAT yet but with the amount of time I'm dedicating to study for it (I'll be taking it in April and have already started the whole 9 yards of Kaplan content review, UWorld, Anki, and AAMC materials) and a pre-content-review half-length diagnostic benchmark of 516 (a fluke? I don't know) I don't think a 520+ score is out of reach. I have to earn that, though, so we'll see. For what it's worth, GPA was 3.74 in my Philosophy BA and 4.00 in the DIY postbacc, with a cGPA of 3.83 between the two. It could be better, but my problem as I see it is extracurricular.

I don't want to drag the post out much longer, but my basic question is whether what I've done so far and plan to continue doing/add on (in particular, I plan to earn an EMT certification after I take the MCAT and start working/volunteering in a more hands-on clinical way, particularly with underserved populations) has a chance of making up for my previous indolence in the eyes of adcoms. Any insight or advice would be appreciated.

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[Dral]

Technically as a non-trad, adcoms might overlook lack of research. If it doesn't interfere with your studies, maybe a paid research position might work though. If something has to be left out though, I'd say it should be research in your case. You need to focus on volunteering, shadowing, and MCAT studying.

Have you done shadowing? Your tutoring is good and your clerical work is good, but I'd love to see you with some face to face volunteering with the homeless people at the shelter. The scribing is good.

It seems you have a lot on your plate. By the time you list out your activities, it might be missed that you didn't do anything in 2020 (at least when people are initially reviewing your app). Is there ANYTHING at all you can list for that year? You can always chalk things up to the pandemic for that year (but probably not 2021 and moving forward), but if you can even put one or two small things there, that would be great.

 

[Contradition]

Technically as a non-trad, adcoms might overlook lack of research. If it doesn't interfere with your studies, maybe a paid research position might work though. If something has to be left out though, I'd say it should be research in your case. You need to focus on volunteering, shadowing, and MCAT studying.

Have you done shadowing? Your tutoring is good and your clerical work is good, but I'd love to see you with some face to face volunteering with the homeless people at the shelter. The scribing is good.

It seems you have a lot on your plate. By the time you list out your activities, it might be missed that you didn't do anything in 2020 (at least when people are initially reviewing your app). Is there ANYTHING at all you can list for that year? You can always chalk things up to the pandemic for that year (but probably not 2021 and moving forward), but if you can even put one or two small things there, that would be great.

Thank you for your response.

I was looking for paid/unpaid research positions, but was having trouble, and I've put that on the back burner for now as I want to focus on the MCAT as well as I can with my existing commitments. I agree that it's probably a lower priority than volunteering and shadowing.

I haven't done any shadowing yet, but I have some physicians I meet while scribing/volunteering whom I plan to ask.

"Clerical" was the wrong word for the homeless shelter volunteering; it's very much face-to-face with the shelter residents. I just wanted a word to make it clear that it's not actually using the glucometer/sphygmomanometer/etc. and doing the clinical work of the free clinic.

The closest thing to a legitimately productive activity I did between graduating and starting the DIY postbacc was revising and improving my undergraduate honors thesis (it would be great if it was on medical ethics or something, but it's about the philosophy of language. I'm proud of it, though). Like I said, it was a really barren year. As an even more minor thing, I auditioned to appear on Jeopardy! (never got a call back, though).

Another activity I should add that's not exactly volunteering is donating platelets every 1-2 weeks (I'm a hard stick and sometimes bruise too much to donate again for a while), but I don't know if that even belongs on AMCAS. It's also a more recent addition. It's not for premed, it's just because of a patient with AML that I met while scribing.

 

[Dral]

I'd say the donating platelets should not show up on AMCAS. I'm not sure how you can talk about revising and improving your thesis. If you told me in a 'normal' year that's what you were doing, I'd be skeptical. But it was during the main year of COVID, so it's a little more acceptable in that regard.

Under an area where you document your thesis work (It's been awhile, but I suppose there is a place to put it), you can include the year of 2020 for time frame. More importantly, if asked during interview what you were doing that year, you can say something about how it was a difficult year due to Covid since it was difficult to volunteer/shadow/work in person so you used the time to work on your thesis.