School List/WAMC - 3.7 cGPA/512 MCAT

[vulpixed]

Hello friends! The upcoming cycle is making me a bit nervous as a first time applicant and I'd love some help building my app and school list.

Graduated 2021 with a cell bio degree & chemistry minor
cGPA: 3.7, sGPA: 3.6
MCAT: 512 (127/127/130/128)
Ethnicity: SE Asian


Clinical Experience
I currently scribe at a clinic, been about 2 months. No shadowing hours :/

Research Experience
2000 hrs - research assistant (bench work), no pubs
200 hrs - cell bio research, no pubs

Non-Clinical Volunteering
150 hrs - hospital volunteering
300 hrs - non-clinical volunteering
1 week - mission trip in SE Asia
I’m supposed to start a new volunteer position this month, but my start date keeps getting pushed back due to covid 🙁

Extracurriculars
3 years in a leadership position
1000 hrs - tutoring
100 hrs - lab TA
600 hrs - PSR

Awards/Honors
Was in one of my school’s scholar programs for a year
Dean’s List a number of times, President’s List once

School List - I’ve only been looking at target schools so far and made this list pretty blindly lol.
MD: U of Washington, WSU, U of Hawaii, Temple, Morehouse, Carle Illinois, Drexel, OHSU, Rush, U of Arizona, U of Houston, U of Illinois, Tufts, Creighton, Geisinger
DO: WesternU, CCOM, PCOM, PNWU

My clinical experience is clearly my weak spot and I’m hoping to squeeze in some shadowing before the cycle starts (still debating on if that’s a good idea or to just wait a year to build these hours - would also love to hear some thoughts on that). Any other red/yellow flags I should work on? I have no pre-health advisor and very little friends/family in medical school, so any advice is welcome!

Thanks in advanced 🙂

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[Faha]

You should accumulate 50 hours of physician shadowing (including primary care) before you apply. The majority of the MD schools on your list are not realistic. Hawaii, OHSU, Arizona, Houston, Illinois, Geisinger admit few applicants with no connection to the state or region. Morehouse admits mainly applicants who are from the African American community and Rush and Creighton are looking for applicants with many more clinical and non clinical exposure hours than you have. Carle is looking for applicants with an engineering background. Your DO list is good. I suggest these MD schools:
U Washington
WSU
TCU-UNT
NOVA MD
Wake Forest
Virginia Commonwealth
Eastern Virginia
George Washington
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Penn State
Oakland Beaumont
Medical College Wisconsin
New York Medical College
Albany
Vermont
Quinnipiac

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Non clinical volunteering is also pretty limited. I don't get a sense of you don't things that take you out of your comfort zone from what is described so far. Traveling to Asia on a mission is okay but not having similar service to underserved communities in your neighborhood is not going to help you.

 

[vulpixed]

You should accumulate 50 hours of physician shadowing (including primary care) before you apply. The majority of the MD schools on your list are not realistic. Hawaii, OHSU, Arizona, Houston, Illinois, Geisinger admit few applicants with no connection to the state or region. Morehouse admits mainly applicants who are from the African American community and Rush and Creighton are looking for applicants with many more clinical and non clinical exposure hours than you have. Carle is looking for applicants with an engineering background. Your DO list is good. I suggest these MD schools:
U Washington
WSU
TCU-UNT
NOVA MD
Wake Forest
Virginia Commonwealth
Eastern Virginia
George Washington
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Penn State
Oakland Beaumont
Medical College Wisconsin
New York Medical College
Albany
Vermont
Quinnipiac

Thank you, Faha!

 

[vulpixed]

Non clinical volunteering is also pretty limited. I don't get a sense of you don't things that take you out of your comfort zone from what is described so far. Traveling to Asia on a mission is okay but not having similar service to underserved communities in your neighborhood is not going to help you.

Lol you are absolutely right. My new volunteer opportunity will be with underserved communities, but I'm definitely leaning towards another gap year for more experience and to learn to get out of my comfort zone. Thanks for the honesty! 🙂