Verappa_Mills
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- Apr 8, 2026
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- Medical Student
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Hi all,
I'm crowdsourcing perspective because I'm a little lost based on information I've gotten so far.
I'm attending a T10 USMD with P/F preclinical and P/F clerkships. No AOA, no GHHS, few ways to meaningfully distinguish myself (especially as an MS1 with no faculty evals or anything). I'm set up with a research mentor who is not crazy productive but is cool and someone I like. I expect I'll probably have a low amount of pubs but probably I'll be first author on something before I graduate. If needed I could probably latch onto a resident and get something small published later on. My pace in med school ECs has been leisurely, I'm mostly focused on crushing step.
I'm hearing from some people "Well, that's it, you made it". Like I don't need to do anything from here other than following through on step and research. In general just...don't mess up the big stuff. Other people are telling me "no, it's go-go-go, keep piling stuff on, more research, join professional societies (...what do these do?), get leadership positions (wtf does club leadership matter??), invent a thing, find a way to fill community needs, etc", but I'm unsure how much is real and how much is "don't get comfortable/be aspirational"-type encouragement that is well-intentioned but blurs the lines between "need this to match" and "go out there and have fun". I'm engaged in things that I find fun right now, but I just don't want to learn that I have been misallocating my time way too late in the process when what they really meant was "you actually have to do way more stuff for professional advancement".
I've met with radiology folks at my institution but the vibe seems like "reach out to me in a year if you're still interested, this is very early" which I understand, keep learning about medicine/other specialties and don't box yourself in, but like...I don't actually know what that means for me in the meantime. What should I actually be doing? Is this enough? Learn stuff and follow whatever you think is cool?
Partially too, and I don't know if this is an answerable question--just how big is my advantage being at a school like this? There's no way to distinguish myself or mess up right now, my transcript will be a carbon-copy of my peers more or less. That will change a little bit on clerkship but tbh not much "Nice to work with. Keep reading. Final grade of Pass" or whatever. Is that it? That's like...dumb. Anyway, interested in folks' thoughts or help in reconciling what information I've received.
Edit: I should say, I'm almost an M2, not a new arrival to med school. Forgot we're so close to a new wave of students coming in.
I'm crowdsourcing perspective because I'm a little lost based on information I've gotten so far.
I'm attending a T10 USMD with P/F preclinical and P/F clerkships. No AOA, no GHHS, few ways to meaningfully distinguish myself (especially as an MS1 with no faculty evals or anything). I'm set up with a research mentor who is not crazy productive but is cool and someone I like. I expect I'll probably have a low amount of pubs but probably I'll be first author on something before I graduate. If needed I could probably latch onto a resident and get something small published later on. My pace in med school ECs has been leisurely, I'm mostly focused on crushing step.
I'm hearing from some people "Well, that's it, you made it". Like I don't need to do anything from here other than following through on step and research. In general just...don't mess up the big stuff. Other people are telling me "no, it's go-go-go, keep piling stuff on, more research, join professional societies (...what do these do?), get leadership positions (wtf does club leadership matter??), invent a thing, find a way to fill community needs, etc", but I'm unsure how much is real and how much is "don't get comfortable/be aspirational"-type encouragement that is well-intentioned but blurs the lines between "need this to match" and "go out there and have fun". I'm engaged in things that I find fun right now, but I just don't want to learn that I have been misallocating my time way too late in the process when what they really meant was "you actually have to do way more stuff for professional advancement".
I've met with radiology folks at my institution but the vibe seems like "reach out to me in a year if you're still interested, this is very early" which I understand, keep learning about medicine/other specialties and don't box yourself in, but like...I don't actually know what that means for me in the meantime. What should I actually be doing? Is this enough? Learn stuff and follow whatever you think is cool?
Partially too, and I don't know if this is an answerable question--just how big is my advantage being at a school like this? There's no way to distinguish myself or mess up right now, my transcript will be a carbon-copy of my peers more or less. That will change a little bit on clerkship but tbh not much "Nice to work with. Keep reading. Final grade of Pass" or whatever. Is that it? That's like...dumb. Anyway, interested in folks' thoughts or help in reconciling what information I've received.
Edit: I should say, I'm almost an M2, not a new arrival to med school. Forgot we're so close to a new wave of students coming in.
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