Low to average service EC hours, t20 acceptance as traditional applicant?

[2018throwaway]

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Seems like many people have told @Goro that the t20 med students they know have hundreds to thousands of service EC hours (ie 700-1000+)

Any traditional EC applicants (ie no URM or insane EC like Nature pub or $1 mil startup type things) get into a t20 with low to average service hours (ie 200-400 hours excluding listed potential senior year hours)?

Do you think there was some part of your app that offset this, like a high amount of research hours and paper (under review or published), common theme in ECs, strong leadership position in student org, etc?

 

[efle]

I had only ~200 hours service and got into a few t20s, one even with merit scholly. You absolutely do not need 700+ hours of service, that is crazy.

I don't know about phrasing it as "offsetting" but it is true you need some kind of strength in your ECs though. Having just 200 hrs volunteering with no significant research or student group involvement or employment etc will be a problem.

 

[FlowRate]

Back of the envelope, I doubt most people have more than 600 (4 hours * 50 weeks * 3 years) legit hours. I bet I didn't have more than 200, but it's been too long to remember.

Got into several top 20's. But this was 6 years ago.

 

[Pagan FutureDoc]

Low research would likely be more of a deal breaker at t20 than low service hours. T20 love their research.

 

[GotIronKnee]

Yup. Had around 350.

 

[GotIronKnee]

Low research would likely be more of a deal breaker at t20 than low service hours. T20 love their research.

I'm not sure. I applied to two top 20s and got interviews at both, but I only had 400 or so hours of non-published, non-poster presented research.

 

[Goro]

Hey efle, can you PM me?

I had only ~200 hours service and got into a few t20s, one even with merit scholly. You absolutely do not need 700+ hours of service, that is crazy.

I don't know about phrasing it is "offsetting" but it is true you need some kind of strength in your ECs though. Having just 200 hrs volunteering with no significant research or student group involvement or employment etc will be a problem.

 

[Goro]

The n is small for my sampling. I do need to start tallying things up and make a post about all this.

Seems like many people have told @Goro that the t20 med students they know have hundreds to thousands of service EC hours (ie 700-1000+)

Any traditional EC applicants (ie no URM or insane EC like Nature pub or $1 mil startup type things) get into a t20 with low to average service hours (ie 200-400 hours excluding listed potential senior year hours)?

Do you think there was some part of your app that offset this, like a high amount of research hours and paper (under review or published), common theme in ECs, strong leadership position in student org, etc?

 

[mwsapphire]

I had only ~200 hours service and got into a few t20s, one even with merit scholly. You absolutely do not need 700+ hours of service, that is crazy.

I don't know about phrasing it is "offsetting" but it is true you need some kind of strength in your ECs though. Having just 200 hrs volunteering with no significant research or student group involvement or employment etc will be a problem.

Didn't you have like, several research pubs though? I think that counts as having lots of research offset the cookie cutter volunteering, if I'm not mistaken.

 

[efle]

Didn't you have like, several research pubs though? I think that counts as having lots of research offset the cookie cutter volunteering, if I'm not mistaken.

I only had posters when I applied and got my interviews, had a paper accepted very very late in the cycle and sent as an update

 

[kb1900]

I did not have more than 250 service hours total nor did I have any publications in research (1 poster) and was admitted to a t20.

Also used 9 of the 15 slots in AMCAS for activities. Quality >>> quantity

 

[bannie22]

i was less than 200 i beieve