Ideas on how to stand out?

[CaseVB]

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[Redpancreas]

Heyy SDN hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

So here's my biggest question. As I'm starting to dig deeper into shaping myself for medical schools, I came across this one problem. How do I make myself stand out?

I know it's common to say "make yourself the x applicant" and stand out among a stack of papers. But easier said than done.

I'm already a varsity athlete and sports are practically my whole life. How could I use that and push it to a point where I could benefit the community or something along those lines? A foundation would be interesting but I don't know what I would do or how to start it...

Toss out any and all ideas I'm all ears.

Thanks!

Forget about shaping yourself and just be yourself. Take risks, engage yourself in your passions...the only standard metrics are the MCAT/GPA/and some sort of clinical exp. All else is yours to choose from. Sorry if that's vague but the biggest thing I learned from this process is that if you engage in your interests you'll get the most out of college...which will translate to you being a much more experienced person coming out of college...which will naturally make you stand out in essays/interviews...and you won't sound rehearsed or ingenuine at all. Believe it or not, most of the people I've seen getting intoT20 schools had a lot of fun in undergrad (the productive kind) as opposed to others who were solely concerned with ECs/Grades/Shadowing/etc.

Ex. Don't be afraid to sacrifice that hour of studying (that you'll probably never get around to doing anyway) to go out and play a sport.


Ex. Don't be afraid of sacrificing what you're truly passionate about for what sounds better. If you'd rather sponsor someone in a club that works with suicide victims than clean test tubes, don't be afraid to do it.

Ex. Try to mix in a bit of dating/romance/whatever you want to call it. Not only will it make your time more pleasurable, but it will expand your perspective on life in general.