national organization membership

[biojunky]

I was wondering if anyone could comment on membership (general and/or serving on subcommittees) in national organizations (AMA, AAP, ACS, etc) for medical students. Is it at all beneficial? Do the organizations contact the medical school to verify student status or anything else?
Please let me know if this post is in the wrong section.
Thank you for the response.
Sincerely
-biojunky

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[Raryn]

I was wondering if anyone could comment on membership (general and/or serving on subcommittees) in national organizations (AMA, AAP, ACS, etc) for medical students. Is it at all beneficial? Do the organizations contact the medical school to verify student status or anything else?
Please let me know if this post is in the wrong section.
Thank you for the response.
Sincerely
-biojunky

Not sure about the rest, but for the AMA-MSS (American Medical Association-Medical Student Section) they will verify that you are going to a US MD or DO school by asking your school. You authorize them to do this when you apply. You'll then be a member of your schools chapter.

I'd definitely recommend joining, just b/c they send out a lot of interesting info to keep up with medical news/policy/etc, you get a bunch of random benefits that more than pay for the membership (netters or rapid review path when you join, discounts on other rapid review books, etc), and if you take advantage of the opportunity to go to any of the state/national/regional meetings they're a ton of fun with the opportunity to meet a bunch of awesome folks from all over.

As for serving on a committee, there's dozens of opportunities at all levels of the org, especially if you want to go to any of the aforementioned meetings. Join and you'll get plenty of information regarding all of them, from doing something at your school to the state or even national levels. How active the org is on a chapter level obviously varies from school to school, but there's always support from the higher levels to try to get some stuff started. The AMA-MSS has students that serve on orgs like the NBME, LCME, NRMP as well as at all levels of the AMA (up to and including a student seat on the AMA board of trustees).

Disclaimer: I've been rather involved with the AMA-MSS for a few years, so that's my bias.

 

[sylvanthus]

I agree with the AMA-MSS. There are a multitude of opportunities to gain leadership experience and make connections. But, I am a bit biased as well. Otherwise, joining a specialty organization is also a good idea, as again, there are many ways to join committees, med student council, etc etc and get your name out there.