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*~*~*~*Official AMCAS "Work/Activities" Tips Thread 2012-2013*~*~*~*
Started by sector9
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Focus more on accomplishments and what you gained rather than describing what you did. Don't repeat information mentioned in the experience name and organization name. You definitely can't be writing paragraphs, should be a very small paragraph, 5-6 lines (on AMCAS pdf) max.
Hey Catalystik, I think I read somewhere on this thread that we should specify whether or not something was paid. Obviously ones in a "volunteering" experience type category are not paid jobs. But for non-volunteering categories (research, leadership, teaching/tutoring), do we need to specify whether or not we were paid---I want to avoid describing these things and focus more on unique achievements or accomplishments and what I gained, since all of my descriptions are around 700 characters. Thanks!
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So I was involved in an activity from Jan 2010-May 2010, then from Sept 2010-Dec 2010, and then once again from Jan 2012 to May 2012. What should I do for the start and end date?
Bullets or succinct narrative style can be mixed and matched as seems best suited to what you wish to convey, which will hopefully convey some passion here and there. Your superb writing techniques can be demonstrated in other places, like the PS and Secondary essays, or with the "Most Meaningful" activities.
1) I think that mentoring activities, like this one, best belong under Teaching/Tutoring.
2) It depends on what you are counseling about, and how often. If you have a fair proportion of depressed or anxious callers, for example, and are speaking to them at length, or are triaging suicidal callers and passing them off to professional counselors, that could be looked at as clinical experience, IMO. If you are giving dating advice, then not so much.
You don't have to do anything you don't want to, but adcomms like to know these things, so it is desirable. If the status of an Experience isn't evident from your description or from the organization (a student organization or well-known community service group are presumed to be volunteer, eg), try to either insert the word "paid" somewhere in the space or add the word "Employment" or similar to the title. And if it is a community service, add the word "Volunteer" to the name you give the activity. If an activity receives class credit, since it's on the transcript, you need not do either. JMO.
Use your judgement. Sometimes responsibilites are universally known and need not be described, such as for a waitperson job, hobbies, or with shadowing. Sometimes there are no duties, like with Awards, which also have no learning component, and may or may not have had an impact on you. Sometimes the responsibities vary by experience so it's important to list them, like with research. With this last, you might have disliked it so much that discussing the impact would not be wise.
Three ideas:
If you have the space to list it twice, you could label one as 1/2010-12/2010 and name it "Academic Year XXXX" and the other 1/2012-5/2012 and call it "More XXXX" to differentiate the two listings.
If you are short on space, you could just list the most recent dates, 1/2012-5/2012, and then in the description give the other two date spans. If appropriate, like with clinical volunteering, you could give a grand total for hours at the end of the space.
Alternatively, you could list the full date span, 1/2010-5/2012, not fill in the header's hours per week, call it "Intermittent XXXX", list the three date spans in the description, with hours per week and/or total hours.
i'm having a hard time figuring out how to write about my current full-time position in this format. the entire 2000 characters allowed for experience description + experience summary is hardly enough for me to describe my responsibilities. is it sufficient to talk about why the experience was meaningful in my personal statement and leave the portion in work/activities for description?
You can do that, but I fear that 2000 characters worth of job responsibilities will make a lot of eyes glaze over. And the "Most Meaningful" space is intended for the use of discussing impact and transformative nature, and not what you propose to do. A lot of a Medical Assitant's duties can be implied. Can you work on pruning it down to hit the highlights, maybe running it by a family member when completed? One must strive not to bore one's audience.
i could probably shorten it some, but the problem is that for me to have room to talk about the transformative nature of the experience, i would need to delete A LOT of it, and i don't want to downplay my responsibilities because it is a very intense position and the highlight of my app. i also don't want to repeat information that i'll be using in my personal statement. besides the eyes glazing over, do you think i'll be losing anything by saving the "in depth analysis" for my personal statement and leaving it out of the work/activities?
As long as the 'insights gained' are somewhere on the application, you won't lose anything.
Is it possible that the employment experience lends its self to being split into more than one activity, due to having clearly defined subcomponents, like teaching/coaching and leadership? Doing that could give you more space. This is a common strategy for some applicants, like those who are exmilitary.
there is a very large shadowing component; however, i had to fill most of that space with the names and titles of all the doctors involved :-/
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I found an answer to my original question in case anyone had this question further on down the line.
Apparently classified patents are mirrored by patents in the white world, which contain non sensitive information (ie nonspecific) at most, and at minimum are just a placeholder. So if someone wanted to claim "credit" for a classified patent as a publication they should simply reference the white one.
Edit: white, or white world refers to unclassified material. In this case unclassified patents are searchable at the US patent office, or as an easier but unofficial method on www.Google.com/patents
Dmf
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Could you maybe edit into your post what is meant by "white world." Is there a citable database that covers it?
Sure thing. Thanks again for all you do.
I appreciate your getting back to us with the information. 🙂
One generally lists the most prestigious form in which one's data was presented. If you list the published abstract under Publicatons, you'd give a formal citation as well as the database from which is can be Searched. The poster would then be mentioned later in the same space, and not in its own spot under Posters/Presentations.
It is arguable that if the journal is low impact and/or the published abstract can't be Searched in PubMed, that the Poster presented at a national conference would be the more prestigious. If you decide to keep it under Posters/Presentations, after the poster is cited, along with your place in the author list, and who presented it, then you can mention the published abstract and cite it, mentioning the database where it can be found. (If the titles are identical, you don't have to repeat it.)
Sorry if this has already been asked/entered, I did a quick search and didn't find anything.
I've been extremely involved with orientation programs at my university and am including that in my work/activities. For the programs I worked 40 hours each week, but this was only for a week in July and a week in August each year. Is it okay to enter this in as 40 hours/week for my time commitment if I say in the description that these were week long programs? I don't want it to look like I'm grossly exaggerating my time commitment.
I've been extremely involved with orientation programs at my university and am including that in my work/activities. For the programs I worked 40 hours each week, but this was only for a week in July and a week in August each year. Is it okay to enter this in as 40 hours/week for my time commitment if I say in the description that these were week long programs? I don't want it to look like I'm grossly exaggerating my time commitment.
To help make the time commitment perfectly clear, if you want to enter that you worked 40 hours per week, I suggest you title the activity something like, "Biannual Orientation Week Program (or Leader, if you were)" then give details in the narrative about when these took place and how many times you did it, along with duties, etc.
I don't have many ECs, and my W & A reads as follows;
Awards
-academic scholarship
-dean's list
-honor's program
Volunteer
-two semesters, at two different hospitals
-mentor
Shadowing
-one summer in the ER
Employment (secretarial positions)
-one short job summer post high-school
-one job throughout college
Research
-for credit, last three semesters
Should I
1) Postpone submitting my primary in the hope that I'll manage to add another listing btwn soon?
2) Say anything about a year spent at a religious institution abroad?
Awards
-academic scholarship
-dean's list
-honor's program
Volunteer
-two semesters, at two different hospitals
-mentor
Shadowing
-one summer in the ER
Employment (secretarial positions)
-one short job summer post high-school
-one job throughout college
Research
-for credit, last three semesters
Should I
1) Postpone submitting my primary in the hope that I'll manage to add another listing btwn soon?
2) Say anything about a year spent at a religious institution abroad?
Is it really appropriate to put "Guitar" as an artistic endeavor? I've only played out a couple of times, but I've been playing for years. I just feel that it looks minuscule compared to everything else.
Can I list research if I took it for credit?
Okay, I seriously don't know if I'm filling in the Work/Actiivities section the right way. Do I have to expand upon on my experience description or do bullet points work just fine?
Here's an example of one of my ECs:
Experience Type: Teaching/Tutoring
Experience Name: Teacher's Assistant for Organic Chemistry I and II
Experience Description:
*Proctored and graded examinations.
*Helped answer student questions on group quizzes.
*Organized exams.
Please help! 🙁
Here's an example of one of my ECs:
Experience Type: Teaching/Tutoring
Experience Name: Teacher's Assistant for Organic Chemistry I and II
Experience Description:
*Proctored and graded examinations.
*Helped answer student questions on group quizzes.
*Organized exams.
Please help! 🙁
Include it with the Research description.
I'm counting potentially 8 entries from your list. You'd have 9 if you enter the experience of living in another country (which many do). And you'd have 10 if you include Hobbies or Artistic Endeavors, which I strongly recommend. Nine to ten is the average listed.
I would not wait. Even if another activity develops, you wouldn't have much to say about it after a month. You can save it for future update letters instead.
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Maybe "Guitar Player" would be a better title. If you've only performed twice, you could list it as a Hobby instead of an Artistic Endeavor. But I'd still mention the public performances.
Yes. Whether the research involvement is via volunteerism, employment, or class credit, there should always be a listing under Research.
Bullet points are fine. And you don't have to expand on it further. But surely you could add a sentence about the impact the activity had, below what you've written. This was one of my activities, and I mentioned how the activity boosted my self-confidence as I developed the ability to manage a large rowdy group of like-aged persons and my organizational skills. Etc.
Hi, I have a question about putting in a contact. I worked in a retail job my freshman year (feels like forever ago) and my manager is also long gone and I have absolutely no contact information for her. All I have is the phone number of the store...is it legit to put myself as a contact in this situation?
Thanks
Thanks
I volunteer as a Chemo Buddy to a young girl with cancer. I come visit her when she's in the hospital undergoing chemo, hanging out, playing games, just trying make the chemo a little less difficult and give her parents a few hours to themselves. I'm not sure whether or not to classify this as clinical or nonclinical. I can definitely "smell" the patients (per LizzyM) as I'm in the hospital in close proximity to my buddy. Doctors, nurses, and others are coming in and out and I kind of get a sense of what they are doing clinically. However, my role is mainly to cheer her up and be a caring friend. Also, as of now I only have one non-clinical volunteering activity and its pretty generic, not sure whether to round out my app w/ another non-clinical activity or to classify it as clinical volunteering. So what do you thing, clinical or non-clinical? Thanks
Someone in the store (or at a headquarters) has access to old employment records or can tell you where they are. Call and ask with whom you can verify an old employment record. Get their name and number. You are not providing this information for a reference, so the contact doesn't need to know you. The information would only be used to verify dates of employment.
As comfort during treatments is of therapeutic benefit, I'd look at this as clinical experience, but you could easily spin it as nonmedical if that is your preference. Here, you get a choice of how to classify it, IMO.
From what I've seen in the previous replies, I think 'Other' is fine.
Thank you, Catalystik! I have three questions.
1). I volunteered at a vet's office in which I provided assistance to the owners of the animals, obtained and recorded patient case histories, helped clean the place and answered owner inquiries (this was before I was interested in human medicine). What should I put under Experience Type and Experience Name?
2). I was a freelance Spanish tutor and I never got paid for helping students out. Do you think it's significant enough to put in my application?
3). How do you preview the AMCAS application to check if the writing format is coming out correctly? I read something about PDF preview but I have no idea how to do that or where to find it...
Hey Cat I have a couple questions for you since you're dominating this thread:
(1) I have 14/15 in my W&A filled. I combined some of my less-impacting experiences (one of which 3 are in one, several others are 2 to 1 slot), but in that sense I had to sacrifice their reflection to, well, nothing with this abysmal 700 character limit. Should I separate them into two slots (2 less impacting with minor description and one more impacting with more reflection) to fill the 15/15?
(2) Additional to the last one, I worked and volunteered as two separate activities, but they were doing the same thing. They both happen to be very reflective, but are similar since they're the same activity, just different employers for work and leaders for the volunteering. How would you handle this? The work is one of my 'big three,' whereas the volunteering is only ~100 hours total.
(3) I studied abroad, should I put all my activities under a "Study Abroad" category and list it as one of the 'big three', or since I did two separate things there and one of them was much more important should I separate them and put just the most important one as a 'big three'? I currently have it split, as it was difficult to elaborate on both of them since they were both important. One was significant research and the other was a medical internship, both at the same time during the trip.
(4) This is unrelated, but I don't want to start a whole new thread. I have separated parents, one of which lives in my home state where I was born, and the other lives in a neighboring state where I go to school. Do I qualify for residency in both or just one (*my state of birth*)? And if it's one or the other, wtf do I do? The states in question are MN and *SD*.
(1) I have 14/15 in my W&A filled. I combined some of my less-impacting experiences (one of which 3 are in one, several others are 2 to 1 slot), but in that sense I had to sacrifice their reflection to, well, nothing with this abysmal 700 character limit. Should I separate them into two slots (2 less impacting with minor description and one more impacting with more reflection) to fill the 15/15?
(2) Additional to the last one, I worked and volunteered as two separate activities, but they were doing the same thing. They both happen to be very reflective, but are similar since they're the same activity, just different employers for work and leaders for the volunteering. How would you handle this? The work is one of my 'big three,' whereas the volunteering is only ~100 hours total.
(3) I studied abroad, should I put all my activities under a "Study Abroad" category and list it as one of the 'big three', or since I did two separate things there and one of them was much more important should I separate them and put just the most important one as a 'big three'? I currently have it split, as it was difficult to elaborate on both of them since they were both important. One was significant research and the other was a medical internship, both at the same time during the trip.
(4) This is unrelated, but I don't want to start a whole new thread. I have separated parents, one of which lives in my home state where I was born, and the other lives in a neighboring state where I go to school. Do I qualify for residency in both or just one (*my state of birth*)? And if it's one or the other, wtf do I do? The states in question are MN and *SD*.
What is the verdict on including wages/pay for jobs and internships throughout the years? Yes? No? Doesn't matter? Depends?
1) Sadly, this is not viewed as clinical experience by MD adcomms. You should list it under Community Service/Volunteer-NOT Medical/Clinical.
2) It depends on whether you did this often enough/long enough for it to be a substantial experience, and whether you're sparse in the volunteer arena. Your Spanish language fluency level will already be evident from another part of the application.
3) Look on the very first page of the AMCAS application. On the right upper part of the page, there is a PRINT button. On the next page, only pick PDF format for the Print Preview, as HTML will mess up the formatting and bump up your adrenaline levels.
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1) If you have something further to say that you feel will enhance your application, then split up one of the entries.
2) I'd guess you're asking if it's acceptable to list the two in one space since the description/reflections could apply to both. Yes, you can do that. You'd put the major one in the header information under Employment or Other, pick a title that covers both, and mention in the narrative about the volunteer position, giving its separate dates, location, contact, etc.
3) As long as you have other Research and Volunteer experiences listed, I see no problem with having an "Experiences Abroad/Research and Clinical Internship" listed in the "Other" category.
4) This is best asked in the General AMCAS questions thread: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=895286
Sorry for the bump but did not want this to get lost as last post on the previous page.
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Sorry in advance for what is probably a stupid question, but I heard/read somewhere that each category title/experience type can only be used once (i.e. I can't have two separate experiences on separate "pages" listed as hobbies). That makes sense. But now I can't find where it says that in the AMCAS instructions.
This is true, right?
This is true, right?
This is kind of an organizational question.
I have carried a job since my 16 birthday working full time during each summer and probably 10 hrs a week during the school year both in HS and College. Is it worth making an activity labeled "Work experience" and listing all of the different jobs I've carried or should I just list the more recent full time jobs?
I am only asking because I know reviewers like it when you've worked during the school year but making a mega conglomerate of all of my work experience might be a bit of overkill. Also if I take this approach I don't know who to put as my contact. Thoughts?
I have carried a job since my 16 birthday working full time during each summer and probably 10 hrs a week during the school year both in HS and College. Is it worth making an activity labeled "Work experience" and listing all of the different jobs I've carried or should I just list the more recent full time jobs?
I am only asking because I know reviewers like it when you've worked during the school year but making a mega conglomerate of all of my work experience might be a bit of overkill. Also if I take this approach I don't know who to put as my contact. Thoughts?
You would not include the amount of your pay, but if you were paid (as separate from a stipend) as an employee, and didn't use the Employment category, you should either put something in the title to indicate it was paid, or fit the word "paid" in the description. JMO.
Repetitively engaging in risk-taking behaviors won't go over well with many adcomms. Playing cards with friends (if true) would be fine to include among your Hobbies, if you know your audience. Even that may not go over well in some regions of the country.
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