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Should I wait a cycle? Just starting to get clinical/shadowing now
- Thread starter resiroth
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Take the gap year. You have basically no ECs other than research. You need to interact with people. Weight training is nice but not likely to come up ever, and really, 3 hours/week is not much. To be honest I think you have very little chance anywhere without a gap year focused on clinical opportunities. Have you done any volunteering? Service to others would help you too. Get some shadowing, some volunteering. A year of research is fine, and a conference is good, but those don't stand on their own without clinical and service experience.
UCs have different missions, but I think you need the gap year to even be considered.
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I agree that you should take the gap year to develop a rich pattern of activities that demonstrates who you are. Engage in activities besides the clinical volunteering that require people skills, like some nonmedical community service that helps the poor, ideally leading to a leadership position where you manage (groups of) peers to get a job done. Teaching is another EC that is well regarded. You can get a two-fer by teaching English to immigrants, or helping to coach a team (or even HS weight trainers), or tutoring in a poor high school district.
Everyone is going to say to take a gap year, which is not the wrong answer-- but I think WAMC can be too conservative. Remember the opportunity cost of a year of doctor money, and weigh that against the possibility of having to reapply. It's easier to say "wait" on someone else's behalf.
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I would think about what is most likely to happen with this kind of thing:
Are you going to: crush the MCAT (even though taking the MCAT and taking the SATs are very different beasts),
and get into your ideal school (despite not being at the head of the cycle, and not having much in the way of ECs)?
If you don't get in, now you have to reapply to these same dream schools, which I've gathered is not a small thing.
Applying next cycle:
If you realize you aren't prepped for the MCAT you can reschedule, you can put your app in June 1, you have more EC's, and maybe some money in your pocket from working during your gap year.
I'll probably get flamed for this but, as long as you were a biology/chemistry major and got mostly A's in prereq courses... MCAT = SAT, basically. It's harder, but you're also 4 years older and have been studying this stuff in depth. Some people just "know" how to take multiple choice standardized tests. They see the inference behind the VR questions, and can understand why one answer is "more right" than the other. If you did well on the SATs without extensive prep, then WITH some legitimate prep, the odds are in your favor.
Agreed with most of the other people here... The gap year is a decision only you can make. You have to weigh a bunch of variable that are impossible to weigh objectively. But if you don't think you're going to get substantial clinical experience, might be the right decision to go for it.
A lot of this changes if you get less than a 32 on the MCAT, and it changes dramatically if you get less than a 30.
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If you ask people who have taken gap years, you'll find that hardly anyone regrets it. Most people enjoy the short break between college and med school where they can pursue whatever they want, and as long as you keep up with volunteering, shadowing, etc, it will only benefit your application.
