Research summer before M1

[gratitude3333]

Re-posted this from the MD students forum as would like to hear people's opinions on doing this:

Is anyone thinking of doing research at their medical school pre M1? Before anyone says spend your summer relaxing, I 1) love research and am hoping to transfer to MD / PHD at my school and 2) will go crazy if I'm home with my fam all summer (the dynamic there isn't great for my mental health). If you did do research summer before M1 do you recommend it / have any tips?

Thank you for any insights!

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[Housekeeping_Gene]

How much time do you have? You won't likely find a paid research position only 2-4 months in length, but if you're graduating early maybe you could swing it. If you don't care about getting paid, then you could definitely find work in a lab for a summer, a lot of PI's would love to have you. Also, reach out to some SURF program coordinators to see if they would accept a student matriculating to medical school in the fall. I doubt it, but you never know.

 

[jarednogeek]

My interview at one school said if accepted to contact him if I wanted summer researchers (not my thing I’m relaxing) but maybe contact profs at your future univ

 

[DrFortiusNatando]

My advice is that once you commit to a school, make arrangements to move to the area as soon as possible after classes or your gap year responsibilities are complete. Start looking NOW for mentors based on your area(s) of interest. Especially if you have experience, many PI's will take an incoming medical student. In the summer before I started medical school, I ended up finding a PI doing the same type of research I had done in my gap years and transitioned to the lab for the summer. I was able to spend a few hours a week in the same lab during my first year and would have been able to do my first summer research in the same lab.

Some schools have a formal pre-first year research summer program, but even if there is nothing formal, there are always PI's who are looking for research assistants. You will be more attractive to them than a regular college student. Expect to send a lot of emails and get few responses, but send short emails encapsulating your experience and why you are writing to them - ie specify that you are an incoming medical student to that school. I get many unsolicited emails each week that are clearly spit-balled, but if I got an email from a matriculating student who was interested in my research, I would really try hard to find a summer project for that person. (In most situations, you can not work for free, even if you want to, so the only hitch is that any potential PI has to find funding to pay you.)