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It's not about daring to be different, but having the confidence to be yourself.
Is anyone else sick of trying to "unique"?
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Definately!! I'm sick of worrying about having enough EC's or defending/explaining my choices of EC's. Frankly, I don't have the time to be president of six student organizations AND volunteer AND shadow 75 hours. I work hard just to get good grades...why should I have to jump through hoops to beat out pre-meds that do nothing but study and participate in every relavent EC?
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What makes you think of it as "beating out" everybody? Yes, you have to be a desirable candidate, but I don't think most of us think of it as "beating" anyone out; at least I don't. I want them to succeed and I have the confidence in my own abilities and accomplishments to be able to help them succeed in any way I possibly can (e.g., hook them up w/ docs to shadow or clinical experiences or tutor them or whatever is needed -- I figure we can "both" get in; I'm not competing with everyone else at my school nor am I competing with all of you, per say, or at least that's my attitude, lol). Just do what you enjoy and live your college years to their fullest...oh yeah, and while doing that, hopefully your medical aspirations will shine through. I can only speak from my own experience, but it seems that if a given area of medicine is interesting to you, it should shine through in your premed experiences with minimal effort from you. Intentionality is important for sure but there is no such thing as "The One Road to Medical School."
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I do spend too much time thinking about school and applying. My free time usually goes to studying or surfing the web. I don't have any hobbies but I really wish I did.
I wish I can just take a year off to find something I really like - like hiking, skiing, snowboarding, travelling, shark diving, playing a sport, playing an instrument, having an obsessive love for motorcycles or something random, dancing, acting, painting, having some sort of a collection, or singing.
Most of these are talents which would require a lot of time to develop. Others are just really expensive. Some are just things that aren't feasible unless you're very committed. Does anyone here have any interesting hobbies?
To respond to the question:
Yes, I'm sick of it but it's important. It's hard to be unique because, by definition, you have to be doing something not everyone else is doing. And in premed terms, that means you have to be doing something in addition to what everyone else is doing. That's why being unique is so important to med schools. It not only proves you have a personality, it proves you can handle pursing a personal interest in addition to all the work that goes along with being premed.
I wish I can just take a year off to find something I really like - like hiking, skiing, snowboarding, travelling, shark diving, playing a sport, playing an instrument, having an obsessive love for motorcycles or something random, dancing, acting, painting, having some sort of a collection, or singing.
Most of these are talents which would require a lot of time to develop. Others are just really expensive. Some are just things that aren't feasible unless you're very committed. Does anyone here have any interesting hobbies?
To respond to the question:
Yes, I'm sick of it but it's important. It's hard to be unique because, by definition, you have to be doing something not everyone else is doing. And in premed terms, that means you have to be doing something in addition to what everyone else is doing. That's why being unique is so important to med schools. It not only proves you have a personality, it proves you can handle pursing a personal interest in addition to all the work that goes along with being premed.
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I think a good test of whether an essay prompt is bull**** or not is whether at least 50% of the essays written for the previous year can be used to satisfactorily and coherently answer the new essay prompt.
You know what's a really cool and unique thing all pre-meds want to do?
Go to medical school.
Once medical schools actually figure that out I think we'll actually have a congruence of minds.
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Also, one things that people havm't really talked about is that being "interesting" requires money. The most interesting people i know who have doen all kinds of cool stuff like camping in mongolia, skiing the alps, and went sailing around the world. They aren't so much as interesting as just rich. These are people that can afford to go volunteer in africa for months at a time, or backpack through asia. I mean, i would love to do any of these things, but where am I going to just going to get teh 10,000 dollars to do them? So bascially, if you think about, by demanding "unique" ECs is an indirect way to screen out less wealthy candidates.
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How singularly unique of you.
For the most part I've heard the opposite. Most med students say that they do not spend all of their time studying or in class. I imagine if that's true you can find time to do the stuff you care about. This isn't the same as having a free abundance of time to do some of the stuff you enjoy, but I find it hard to believe that a lot of people are wholly incapable of managing things they enjoy in addition to their medical school work.
Also, on being "unique", I think Apumic overstates slightly the ease at which one's individuality may show in one's application. In my attempts to manage school work and hang out with friends, time to do things that I purely love dwindles. I enjoy reading, for example, but if I devoted enough time to read a couple books a month even...I'd have no free time. I'm not a fast reader and in between studying and other people, it simply would allow time for little else. Even if I did squeeze out time I spend with friends, which I do, there's a limited amount of time available that I can divide between my many activities. For someone like myself who finds a lot of stuff cool and interesting, there's a lot that I find interesting and that probably makes me unique that adcoms will simply never see because time is limited.
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I didn't mean to convey that you won't ever have any free time ever, never, forever-ever, but there are certainly plenty of people who have to kick ass constantly just to stay afloat. I, for one, have a whole lot more time than most people, thanks to never going to class. I'd say most people have time for one dedicated activity and maybe half-ish have time for that dedicated activity plus something else like a weekly pick-up game of whatever. Perhaps 1/8 of people are in that terrible study-constantly-to-barely-pass boat. No matter who you are or how efficiently you work, though, there will be times that your life simply evaporates in the face of a crushing workload.
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There are many hobbies that one can engage in at low cost. Several years ago, I interviewed a candidate who bought broken cameras and vintage electrical items, repaired them and sold them on eBay. Another made sculptures from found objects and yet another made silver jewelry.
Writing poetry, novels, or musical compositions doesn't cost much, nor does drawing with pencils or charcoal. The same goes for collecting seashells or rocks, or birdwatching. You can get into photography and artistic expressions using photographs and computer graphics at many different price points. Aside from the cost of gear, some athletic activities are relatively low cost.
Camping in Mongolia is exotic but the National Parks in the US offer a variety of opportunities for back country camping, hiking, canoeing etc that can be done on a very reasonable budget (some members of my family have been doing it annually for years at a rather modest cost).
Jobs can make you stand out. Over the years I've interviewed a union organizer, Senate staff member, Naval officer, ballpark hot dog vendor (2 of them, actually), a few ambulance drivers (full time after college), and I've reviewed applications from a professional athlete & a beauty pageant winner. I can't remember how many Teach for America and Peace Corps volunteers I've seen over the years. Everyone is unique but sometimes it is hard to stand out or be memorable. It is possible to be memorable (in a good way) without being a millionaire.
The problem stems from the vast number of qualified applicants to med schools. Adcoms need newer and newer ways to differentiate between applicants. This results in a ridiculous situation.
Be yourself, but not if "yourself" is too introverted (did you guys see the post where the girl was rejected for being too introverted?)
Do only those ECs that you like...but no research will red flag you at many schools. Plus you pretty much have to volunteer at hospitals (which often tends to be very tedious).
Have nonmedical interests, but what if you just like hanging out with friends or family?
Have hobbies, but what if you just enjoy strumming a guitar /running/working out/any other ordinary activity? Let's face it, these are not "unique" activities...
Be yourself, but not if "yourself" is too introverted (did you guys see the post where the girl was rejected for being too introverted?)
Do only those ECs that you like...but no research will red flag you at many schools. Plus you pretty much have to volunteer at hospitals (which often tends to be very tedious).
Have nonmedical interests, but what if you just like hanging out with friends or family?
Have hobbies, but what if you just enjoy strumming a guitar /running/working out/any other ordinary activity? Let's face it, these are not "unique" activities...
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No one said that you need to be "unique". In fact, each of you snowflakes is unique by virtue of your fingerprints.
However, what you need is a "hook". Something that makes us say, "how interesting! It would be fun to talk to this applicant, let's invite 'em to interview." Then when you are interviewed you need to show some enthusiasm and passion for something you've done as this draws people in makes them believe you are an interesting person.
So, let's say that you like to cook and you asked your grandmother to teach you to make a traditional dish and then you and your grandmother made 12 dozen of them for a special occasion. Now you might write in your PS that you learned your dumpling making skills from your grandmother but that she also provided your first introduction to [some chronic disease]. Then you go on about your mad dumpling making skills but also about how your interest in grandma's condition led you to do x, y, and z culminating in applying to medical school. Now you might get labeled as "the dumpling maker". Are you the only applicant who knows how to make dumplings? Of course not but that with your other stuff is going to be a memory aid to the adcom as your application makes its way through the system.
However, what you need is a "hook". Something that makes us say, "how interesting! It would be fun to talk to this applicant, let's invite 'em to interview." Then when you are interviewed you need to show some enthusiasm and passion for something you've done as this draws people in makes them believe you are an interesting person.
So, let's say that you like to cook and you asked your grandmother to teach you to make a traditional dish and then you and your grandmother made 12 dozen of them for a special occasion. Now you might write in your PS that you learned your dumpling making skills from your grandmother but that she also provided your first introduction to [some chronic disease]. Then you go on about your mad dumpling making skills but also about how your interest in grandma's condition led you to do x, y, and z culminating in applying to medical school. Now you might get labeled as "the dumpling maker". Are you the only applicant who knows how to make dumplings? Of course not but that with your other stuff is going to be a memory aid to the adcom as your application makes its way through the system.
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The schools that will red-flag you for no research are schools that are trying to focus on producing the next generation of academic physician and physician-scientists. If you aren't intersted in that career trajectory, if you don't want to do research, then those schools are not a good fit for you. Don't blame the school.
How can you know that you want to engage in a career that involves the care of the sick if you've never been around the sick. Hospitals are not the only place where you will encounter sick people but hospitals are ubiquitous and easily identified. Willingness to perform humble acts of service for others, particularly if those others are sick or injured seems to be a good measure of the heart of a physician. Also, keep in mind that you will be asked to perform your share of "scut" as a trainee and if you aren't willing to do your share of the tedious work, then you aren't going to be a good team member through your training.
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the real frustration/challenge i think is not being unique but how to spin the 'uniqueness' in a manner that is both engaging and not overtly self-serving..
heck if i know how..
heck if i know how..
I'm not blaming the schools at all, I'm saying that it's a rational, even necessary way to differentiate applicants. But some schools that require research certainly train a fair share, if not a majority, of medical students who will not go into academics.
Secondly, I agree that all premeds should volunteer at hospitals. That doesn't make it any less tedious; there are exceptions, of course, I do remember enjoying a few of my hospital volunteering shifts.
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While I understand where you're coming from and certainly there is no doubt that people with more resources (whether financial, human, networking, etc.) are going to find things to be easier (as a general rule in life), I think you underestimate what can be done w/ limited resources but some ingenuity. Most of my experiences have nothing to do with going abroad or anything like that. They are mostly things I did to earn a living (chose clinically oriented jobs) or things that fulfilled a local need (e.g., working in a free clinic or joining a health advocacy program). Adcoms don't really care at all whether you learned leadership or diversity or whatever skills through a study abroad or work abroad program in the Congo or downtown Detroid/Los Angeles/Chicago or in a rural, underserved area. No matter where you are, some things are universal -- human beings get sick, we suffer, we experience pain (physical, emotional, psychological, etc.), we get hurt, we are different (i.e., diverse), etc. While I understand that learning those kinds of lessons 5-10 mi from home (at a nearby hospital, clinic, non-profit, or whatever) may not seem nearly as "exciting" as learning them in a far-off land, an adcom evaluating your file isn't going to view the person who's traveled all over the world as necessarily "better" or "more interesting" unless "you" don't effectively sell your own experiences.
Who ever said "all premeds should volunteer in hospitals." 👎
I know Lizzy didn't, although that's where I am guessing you pulled it from. Premeds should have pt contact and, preferably, some responsibility for pt care/outcomes (according to some adcoms). However, I'd argue that if there are other opportunities for pt contact/responsibility, those other opportunities are probably the better ones to pursue, since many hospital volunteering opportunities turn out to be very little in the way of actual pt care.
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All the "You are unique becuase you're you" posts are lame. Sure if you have very good MCAT/GPA/cliched volunteer/research experiences and apply to 25 schools you'll get in to a couple of places even if you are aren't unique. Otherwise you definitely need to be unique (or very lucky).
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All the activities you mentioned is still very middle upper class. I am currently working with inner city population, and they didn't have parents that cultivated their artistic abilities or do they have much capability to travel as most families don't even have cars. I agree that it is possible to be memoriable without being a millionaire, but it's pretty hard when you are poor.
And the whole point is why do does one have to be memorable (collecting seashells, writing poetry, fixing broken cameras, being professional athletes) in order to make a good doctor? These things are important, but shouldn't be weighed in equalness to academic ability. I rather that my dcotor spend all their free time studying rather than palying football
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I remember there being some type of book on this basically it explained the horrible crime of being average. The ultimate irony of the whole novel being that, statistically, you are exceedingly likely to be in the bottom 25% and middle 50%, than the top 25%.
From this you take the idea that being yourself is the most important thing. It's not necessarily the things you do, but how you approach and why you do them.
We all have our own unique line of thought.
From Ricky Gervais: "My friend had an idea to make a watch that tells you how long you have left to live...you know just look down at your wrist and it tells you the years, months, etc. and I said great but how does it work?...he said well you'd just put it on your wrist"
From this you take the idea that being yourself is the most important thing. It's not necessarily the things you do, but how you approach and why you do them.
We all have our own unique line of thought.
From Ricky Gervais: "My friend had an idea to make a watch that tells you how long you have left to live...you know just look down at your wrist and it tells you the years, months, etc. and I said great but how does it work?...he said well you'd just put it on your wrist"
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If I'm reading applications and I have a half dozen from the same school and all have gpa between 3.67 and 3.76 and all have MCAT between 30 and 32, how do I choose which to invite for interview? (I can only recommend 3 of the 6 and only 1 or 2 will make the final cut). I'm going to choose the applicant who is memorable or interesting.
Believe me, you don't want a doctor who has no time or inclination to do anything but study. The healthiest people engage in some leisure time physical activity and some interests outside of their professional activities. My most recent surgeon runs marathons (in his 40s) and is a remarkable artist as well as a talented surgeon who also runs an academic program.
Don't make excuses for inner city kids. They have eyes, they have hands. Most anyone can afford the cost of a pencil and a scrap of paper. A curious kid can study and record the behavior of pigeons or squirrels, there are church choirs and pick up games of basketball.
I've interviewed some inner-city and otherwise poor kids over the years. One was in the Navy at the time of the application, another Air Force, yet another had worked a job during HS to buy school clothes & supplies for herself and a sibling, yet another had graduated, completed a master's degree and was teaching community college. So I guess you can say that inner-city kids can distinguish themselves through occupational pursuits after college. Stll, I contend that opportunities are available to anyone with the initiative to grab 'em.
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given that GPA/MCATs is very similar, then sure, memorability can be a selection factor. yet every year, many kids with very strong academics don't get into medical school while those that have very questionable academics do.
I agree that it is important to not spend all your time studying, and have physical or artistic pursuits, but relaxing activities like going to the gym, watching movies, reading books, talking with people, i think are all things that can be something that a person does well not studying, YET in medical school applications, they are considered worthless next to runing marathons and being an awesome artists (which both don't sound like something teen mothers have the time to be cultivating by the way).
Inner city kids have to deal with abusive parents, gang violence, drug dealing, truancy, teen pregnacies, working long hours, broken families, and the list goes on. While they can distinguish themselves through occupational pursuits, other opportunies (that everyone else have) are very limited.
I still believe that opportunies are availiable to anyone with the initiative to grab them because that's what I have been taught. But happens to the kids who never got to learn that?
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Just be yourself. Med-school applications will be filled with unique robots - people trying way to hard to pass themselves off as being "well-rounded people". I think if someone is trying to make themselves well-rounded they probably aren't. They're just well-rounded robots. If your trying to be like them you won't be unique. Don't bother. It's a joke. Just be honest with the things that you like to do, even if they seem "mundane". If it's what you like, then it's what you like. It's you.
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A teen mom can get to and through medical school but it might be on a different time table. See http://www.yale.edu/opa/arc-ybc/v35.n28/story100.html for one example.
I'm with you. There is no such thing as "unique." I personally had no interest in medicine until I participated (in a professional capacity) on my first of many volunteer-based medical missions to depressed regions of South America. I chose medicine when I was inspired to help the thousands of patients we COULDN'T help, despite performing hundreds of free surgeries.
So I eventually returned to finish my undergraduate degree, and I've spent four years doing research and EC's, all the while supporting myself. I've maintained a 3.9 GPA, published (as a second or third author) multiple times, and volunteered for Americorps 10+ hours a week. I'm 30 years old. Still I'm not at all unique or special compared to other applicants.
I'm not sure what it takes to be "unique." I hope that undergrad advisers see the pool of applicants much differently from how ADCOMs view us. I suspect they do. I was told that I need more volunteer experience. I spent all of high school (13-17 years ago!) as president of a club that literally built two different tutoring centers in inner-city areas, and spent 15 hours a week tutoring kids. I kept tutoring for free in my spare time for years before I started working in an operating room and donating my vacation time to help in Ecuador and the Dominican Republic. Once I started undergrad again, I tutored and mentored at a local community college, and volunteered 10-15 hours a week running programs at the hospital blood bank.
I'll admit that the work I've done in the past year or two is somewhat self-serving. But I volunteered for literally 15 years before I ever thought anyone would actually notice it! What more am I supposed to do??
Oh, they didn't. That was just the pre-med committee, which I think is fairly ridiculous. At my school, the pre-med adviser is no better than the typical high school guidance counselor. If you meet with him and he doesn't tell you you're hopeless (<3.5 GPA or <30 MCAT) he simply advises that you're not doing enough, regardless of your resume. This is the same guy who told me I needed three upper-level LORs. My best two LORs come from the physician I worked with (whose wedding and baby showers I attended!) who runs the medical mission abroad, and the chemistry department chair who gave me A's in honors gen chem and orgo, as well as jobs running workshops and coordinating the research grant. Both of them know me well and can attest to my capabilities, but he somehow believes that LORs from upper-level classes (in which there are 200+ students) will somehow be more meaningful. Wrong. But what can I do?
I've decided that my best course of action is to kiss his butt and hope that he'll write a decent committee letter. I chose to only get one LOR at my transfer school--from my department chair who has taught both 400-level classes. He's wonderful and will probably write me a great LOR, but nothing he writes can compare with the other two that I had when I came to this school as a junior. I earned the top score on 3 of 4 of our exams this year, and he likes me personally, but he just doesn't know me the way the other two know me.
I should start a separate thread about how ridiculous pre-med committees can be!
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A letter from someone who knows you very well (well enough to invite you to a wedding) is not the sort of letter that the adcom wants. Leave it in your packet of letters but be sure to have 3 letters from professors who have taught you in the classroom (or lab) and the higher level the classes the better (2 science, 1 non-science /humanities is the usual request). Sure, the letter may not say much more than how well you did in comparison to the other students and that you attended office hours (or that you asked good questions in class), or something like that. The problem with letters from friends (and I'd say that the doctor is your friend) is that they are judged as non-objective. The letters are usually trying to get at classroom or lab deportment including cooperation with other students and communication skills, intellectual curiosity, and work ethic as it relates to academic activities.
With regard to volunteerism, most applicants omit anything from HS in the experience section of the application unless it is something that continued in the same form into the post HS years. The experiences that are of interest are those you've had as an adult. Volunteerism is considered a measure of one's altruism. If you've done all you can, that's the best you can do. Volunteerism is often the way applicants gain clinical exposure but this is not the only way to do so. Your advisor may be saying that you don't have enough clinical exposure as an adult although if you've worked in an OR, you seem to have that covered.
Well, we're both. It is a paradox of sorts. The thing is, many people haven't really tapped in enough to what makes them unique. It doesn't have to be some major, grandiose thing. Although we each are very much like others, each of us in unique in the sense that no one else can be us, our souls, spirits, our full experiences, and the whole of our personhood.
Identical twins are different--even physiologically, each of them grows and develops in such a way that once you get to know them, you know which is which. I've always found this quite interesting.
Unique experience is a reality too--even as it is mixed with tomes and tomes of similar experiences to others.
"In every concrete individual, there is a uniqueness that defies formulation. We can feel the touch of it and recognize its taste, so to speak, relishing or disliking, as the case may be, but we can give no ultimate account of it, and we have in the end simply to admire the Creator."--Willam James
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😀
Usefulness is a choice, but that is cute. I guess some are "tools" and some aren't. LOL
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At the end of the day all you can offer adcoms is the best of yourself. For some of us that must include working full time to make ends meet, for others it might mean being captain of a crew team. What it comes down to is choosing activities because you enjoy them. For example, I don't really picture myself incorporating research into my activities because it doesn't interest me (I'm also not interested in academic/research-heavy schools). While I attempt to fulfill categories x, y, and z, I find time to do things I love. I got involved in foster care & training for future guide dogs. Medicine-related? No. But I love every minute of it. If adcoms don't accept the applicant I am then maybe I'm really not the best fit for their school...
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Its def a paradox because even LizzyM has admitted that uniqueness is a qaulity that adcom is looking for on the application, yet by virtue of being different, we are all unique people. So it stands to be argued that some uniqueness is better other kinds according admission, aka the more "showy" it is, and the more "special" it is tends to make the biggest splash and these things tends to be cultivated with support, whether those are time or money.
Also, of course it is possible to be the only one in a million that is able to accomplish something others can't. I think it's a porblem in our society that we then use the one in a million to justify why the 999,999 others who couldn't do it. It's like saying there are skinny people in the world, thus everyone who is fat is that way because they just didn't have as much drive to diet and excercise
Also, of course it is possible to be the only one in a million that is able to accomplish something others can't. I think it's a porblem in our society that we then use the one in a million to justify why the 999,999 others who couldn't do it. It's like saying there are skinny people in the world, thus everyone who is fat is that way because they just didn't have as much drive to diet and excercise
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Would being a pentecostal minister be seen as unique?
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I thought it was obvious. They like to accept the best and the brightest and those individuals with the most accomplishment in their lives. They will dress you up in little white coats, present you to your families as having accomplished something. And then, grind away at you, chip at you, day in and day out, up until someone breaks. And then they like to take their time and bask in the presence of young men and women breaking, listen to little cries choke off under their boots.
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After going through this application cycle, I have found that uniqueness holds more value at some schools (Mayo, Harvard, Vandy) than others (Wash U.).
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I was born to a very, very poor family. Most of the inner-city was higher on the economic scale than I was. My parents weren't readers, my mother had some artistic ability, but she hated writing. I still found time to write (and get published), rock collect (and not so much seashells because I couldn't get to the beach), and do several other things that were mentioned. I basically *had* to do things that were free and/or cheap since we couldn't afford a lot of things. My father would fix broken electronics and sell them for extra money, he also built a satellite dish from a can of tomatos and a paper towel holder (I kid you not). So a lot of the things LizzyM mentioned CAN be done by those with lower incomes, unreliable transportation, etc. I'm proof of that.
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i editted 50 essays last admissions cycle, and the really scary part is everyone's claiming to be unique, but 49 essays were almost identical. then the sad part is the writers try to convince you that they're unique after you tell them they're not. so for everyone who's sick of being unique, chances are, you're not actually succeeding at being unique.
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haha... that's a bit....how do I put this... self-defeating. If recommendations were made as to how to be unique by pointing out what most people don't mention (or similar or vice versa), s/he would in fact simply make a new thing "not unique." To be unique, you need to do things no one else is doing and have perspective others lack. Most premeds are similar -- 4 years of college, a few shoddy "clinical" experiences, a trip to Africa/Mexico/Asia, a summer of research in a bio/biochem/chem lab, a few meaningless leadership positions, etc. In other words, most premeds think they're "unique" because they have the same experiences everyone else has! (Oh yeah...and a few cliche observations about Africa/Mexico/Asia that make make them want to be a physician for a set of very "unique" reasons.)
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brilliant.
