Many hours of generic ECs

[mstpgrind]

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Hi - I was just wondering how bad it is to not have a “theme” to an application.

As in, how do thousands of hours of generic ECs look (say, 500 hours of EMT, 300 of hospice, 600 of scribing, 400 of PCT, etc.) if all activities are “generic premed” ECs?

I’m trying to clear up a disagreement between myself and my premed advisor; my understanding is that a while a theme can help at all schools, it is almost necessary for T20s, and unnecessary (but still useful) for all other schools.

My premed advisor (at a large public school that has an affiliated T20 med school) is telling me that a theme is necessary for *all* schools, because “schools get 10,000+ applications, and everyone has many hours of generic activities, you need a way to sell yourself as unique.”

Thanks!

 

[mstpgrind]

I would actually agree with your advisor that a theme is needed to make a solid application. However, that doesnt mean a theme showing similar and consistent set of activities. Rather it is much more important to be able to write a narrative showing what attributes, characteristics, and traits that these activities show about including larger concepts you have learned from them. The theme could be as simple as linking these via an overarching concept such as "relationships" to people, colleagues, science, research or just a stylistically create a theme. I always define a medical school application as a coherent, concise and compelling narrative showing a strong pattern of motivation. commitment and achievement. Your PS (and secondaries) present the theme that are supported by the evidence in activities. Or another way to look at it, the PS is the complete picture on a puzzle and the activities are the pieces of that puzzle.

Just quick examples I have recently helped advisees use was an engineer in "building relationships," a military veteran wrote around "service." Some people have themes with important steps or points on their path to medicine. As an exercise I would take a word or a few words and use that to help you put a narrative together. As I said before, "Relationships" is usually my starting point but it could "lessons learned" , "people" . "community," etc.

So yes your advisor is correct a theme is needed. However she is incorrect when that means all your activities must be linked as somehow consistent or in the same direction. In your PS you get to pick what you want the adcom to see, you get to create the them about your and your path to medicine and these activities, in what characteristics or lessons learned, as evidence to support that theme

Thank you so much - this really clears things up for me!

 

[EdgeTrimmer]

Yes, you don't need thousands of hours of volunteering but need a theme. Didn't you ask your premed advisor to guide you to come up with a theme?

 

[mstpgrind]

Yes, you don't need thousands of hours of volunteering but need a theme. Didn't you ask your premed advisor to guide you to come up with a theme?

Well, I’m a CS major and I’ve done a couple of software engineering projects (like making an app to connect people who need food to those who have extra food swipes, etc.). However, I’m not sure how to relate that to medical school rather than just “helping people.”

 

[EdgeTrimmer]

Well, I’m a CS major and I’ve done a couple of software engineering projects (like making an app to connect people who need food to those who have extra food swipes, etc.). However, I’m not sure how to relate that to medical school rather than just “helping people.”

Your theme could be finding solutions to problems underserved/disadvantaged people encounter in their daily lives, non-clinical experience which medical schools wants to see. BTW, I am not an adcom, just a parent. So taking it for whatever it's worth 🙂