List Help - Maine applicant with ties to PA

[mw48235]

I'm looking for a bit of help with my current med school list. Maine doesn't provide a lot of state schools, which makes this a bit tougher. Any help is appreciated!

Background:

• White Female from Maine
  • Strongly tied to PA through undergrad and other factors
  • Both parents are nurses
• Graduated May 2019
  • Bio major, graduated in 3 years
  • Large, public university, not a top 20 school
• Been working ~9-10 months full-time in healthcare market research at a life sciences consulting firm since grad

Numbers:

• cGPA: 3.94
• sGPA: 3.89
• MCAT: 517 (130/128/129/130)

Clinical:

• ~70 hrs nursing assistant training at nursing home (another 110 hours with lectures and clinical skills labs)
• ~50 hrs volunteering in an urban university hospital PACU

Volunteering (non-clinical):

• ~70-75 hrs at a needle exchange in North Philadelphia (underserved community)
• ~8 hrs at Maine food pantries during holidays when I was home from college
• ~25 hrs at Philadelphia food pantries
• ~20 hrs at a public health research org

Shadowing:

• 8 hrs primary care physician
• 8 hrs anesthesiologists
• Was supposed to get another 16 hrs through an ortho surgeon in April, but COVID kinda wrecked that one

Research:

• 400 hrs in computational biology/genomics lab, not published

Work:

• ~325 hrs - Manager at a local ice cream shop (summer job during college)
• ~470 hrs - Writing Tutor through my undergrad institution
• ~2000 hrs - Market Research Team member at a healthcare/life sciences consulting firm

Miscellaneous:

• Studied abroad in 2 countries through a summer program, but it was not volunteer-based or clinical
• Won an award through my department at the end of undergrad for research/academics

Rec Letters:

• Committee Letter, plus 5 individual letters (all solid)

Current School List: --> Tried to start with schools in my states, everything else in no particular order

• Tufts (Maine Track)
• Temple (have ties)
• Jefferson (have ties)
• UPenn
• Pitt

-----------------------------

• Saint Louis
• Quinnipac
• UVA
• Mayo
• Vanderbilt
• Case Western
• VCU
• Emory
• Columbia
• Wash U
• Ohio State
• USF Morsani
• UNC
• Hofstra
• Kaiser

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[Faha]

I suggest these schools with your stats:
Tufts
Boston University
Dartmouth
Vermont
Quinnipiac
Albany
New York Medical College
Rochester
Hofstra
Einstein
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Penn State
Pittsburgh
George Washington
VCU
UVA
Duke
Miami
USF Morsani
NOVA MD
Tulane
TCU-UNT
Medical College Wisconsin
Western Michigan
Oakland Beaumont
Case Western
Ohio State
Cincinnati
Your low hours for shadowing and clinical and non clinical volunteering will limit your chances at top tier schools and schools that prefer applicants with many hundreds of hours of clinical and non clinical volunteering.

 

[mw48235]

Really appreciate it!

I saw that Saint Louis didn’t make the cut - was this on account of the hours you mentioned? Or did something else stand out that made it a bad match?

 

[Faha]

Really appreciate it!

I saw that Saint Louis didn’t make the cut - was this on account of the hours you mentioned? Or did something else stand out that made it a bad match?

Yes, the Jesuit schools (and Rush) are looking for those applicants with many hours of clinical and non clinical volunteering