Taking a year off between M1-M2?

[happyinmed]

Hello all!

I am a first year US MD student at a midtier school. I am doing fine in school, and ultimately have learned through this life to prioritize my happiness. I love medicine but it not the only thing I want out of my life. I am 27 years old, (female) and for various reasons I am interested in starting a family soon. I think in order to do this it would be best to take a year off of medical school between m1/m2. During this time I would plan on working, doing some research, and keeping up on my studies as well.
My biggest question of course, is how will residency view this/ does anyone have exp in this?

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[Phloston]

The only thing residencies will care about are your numbers - i.e., what did you get on 2CK? And what are your grades? They don't care about anything else, even if that means you took a random 18 months off. Yes, people here will have their differing views. But it's just your numbers that matter. Make sure those are in check.

 

[Browns99]

The only thing residencies will care about are your numbers - i.e., what did you get on 2CK? And what are your grades? They don't care about anything else, even if that means you took a random 18 months off. Yes, people here will have their differing views. But it's just your numbers that matter. Make sure those are in check.

 

[Browns99]

I will disagree in that "The only thing residencies will care about are your numbers." First off, there are many other things that residencies (especially competitive ones) hold in high regards, like, letters of rec, school reputation, performance on sub-is, school evaluations, etc. Although a LOA may not hurt you, you still would need to explain why you decided after 1 year of school to start a family, not saying it will hurt, nor was it a poor choice to do it at this point but nonetheless, they may be interested in knowing why you in fact chose to do so after your first year. I know it is certainly a personal choice, and not likely to be held against you, but again, will simply need to be explained.

Again, numbers are not the only thing that matter!

 

[AlteredScale]

Hello all!

I am a first year US MD student at a midtier school. I am doing fine in school, and ultimately have learned through this life to prioritize my happiness. I love medicine but it not the only thing I want out of my life. I am 27 years old, (female) and for various reasons I am interested in starting a family soon. I think in order to do this it would be best to take a year off of medical school between m1/m2. During this time I would plan on working, doing some research, and keeping up on my studies as well.
My biggest question of course, is how will residency view this/ does anyone have exp in this?

So what is the actual reason you are taking the year off? Are you family planning? Well being?

 

[GoSpursGo]

I will disagree in that "The only thing residencies will care about are your numbers." First off, there are many other things that residencies (especially competitive ones) hold in high regards, like, letters of rec, school reputation, performance on sub-is, school evaluations, etc. Although a LOA may not hurt you, you still would need to explain why you decided after 1 year of school to start a family, not saying it will hurt, nor was it a poor choice to do it at this point but nonetheless, they may be interested in knowing why you in fact chose to do so after your first year. I know it is certainly a personal choice, and not likely to be held against you, but again, will simply need to be explained.

Again, numbers are not the only thing that matter!

I know we got into this in another thread, but while I can't presume to speak for @Phloston I think you're kind of missing the point. Nobody is saying the other pieces aren't important. Rather, I think the advice being given is that as long as one's academic credentials are otherwise intact, nobody is going to hold an LOA against someone who had a legitimate reason to take one. If a program asks why an LOA was taken, the OP could just say "for personal reasons," and as long as there is nothing in her academic record that raises a red flag the program probably won't have any cause to dig further.

OP, if you're asking because you want to start a family, I would suggest you look up whatever the maternity leave policy is for your school. I do not presume to know what makes the most sense for you and your family, but you may have options other than just pre-emptively taking a full year LOA.

 

[Browns99]

I know we got into this in another thread, but while I can't presume to speak for @Phloston I think you're kind of missing the point. Nobody is saying the other pieces aren't important. Rather, I think the advice being given is that as long as one's academic credentials are otherwise intact, nobody is going to hold an LOA against someone who had a legitimate reason to take one. If a program asks why an LOA was taken, the OP could just say "for personal reasons," and as long as there is nothing in her academic record that raises a red flag the program probably won't have any cause to dig further.

OP, if you're asking because you want to start a family, I would suggest you look up whatever the maternity leave policy is for your school. I do not presume to know what makes the most sense for you and your family, but you may have options other than just pre-emptively taking a full year LOA.

Sorry, but I clearly understood the point about the LOA, so not sure why you think that. I merely expressed my opinion about the comment that it's all about the numbers, but I guess open opinions that disagree aren't valued. Got it.

I clearly discussed the LOA and noted that it won't necessarily hurt you, you just need to explain why you chose to take it, that's all.

Either way, hopefully one's opinions here can be stated without someone saying, incorrectly btw, that they missed the point.

 

[GoSpursGo]

Sorry, but I clearly understood the point about the LOA, so not sure why you think that. I merely expressed my opinion about the comment that it's all about the numbers, but I guess open opinions that disagree aren't valued. Got it.

I clearly discussed the LOA and noted that it won't necessarily hurt you, you just need to explain why you chose to take it, that's all.

Either way, hopefully one's opinions here can be stated without someone saying, incorrectly btw, that they missed the point.

I just think you are focusing on one part of the post and it results very aggressively pushing back on a point that isn’t being made. Nobody was discounting the other things that you mentioned.

 

[Browns99]

I just think you are focusing on one part of the post and it results very aggressively pushing back on a point that isn’t being made. Nobody was discounting the other things that you mentioned.

This is my last post on the subject, but again, "very aggressive" is a mischaracterization, but as we see today, we are living in a time that when someone even mildly pushes back or defends their opinion, it is classified as "very aggressive, actually is pretty sad.

 

[Redpancreas]

Hello all!

I am a first year US MD student at a midtier school. I am doing fine in school, and ultimately have learned through this life to prioritize my happiness. I love medicine but it not the only thing I want out of my life. I am 27 years old, (female) and for various reasons I am interested in starting a family soon. I think in order to do this it would be best to take a year off of medical school between m1/m2. During this time I would plan on working, doing some research, and keeping up on my studies as well.
My biggest question of course, is how will residency view this/ does anyone have exp in this?

OP it's not clear why you're taking a LOA. You mention working, research, and keeping up with your studies. If you take working out of it (which provides minimal CV value anyways), you're doing research and studying a bit which is what most medical students are doing anyways. Why do you need a gap year to do this? If on the other hand you have a concrete goal (i.e. have a family, do a year-long, intensive, academic pursuit with an end-goal) that's different and can be explained as such on an interview. Just ask yourself what you ultimately want out of this year off. Your application is definitely going to have a flag in it come review time and I'm just saying that so you know. It may not be an obstacle id there's a simple explanation like you needed to start a family and all your other numbers meet expectations but if you take this year and have nothing to show for it (i.e. no new family, meaningful research. a new degree, year long fellowship, etc.), you'll be viewed similarly to someone who took 5 years to finish medical school.

Point of clarification: If you need to start a family and need time off to do that, there's nothing wrong with that. Review your school's maternity policies and figure out what's the best time to take off. It may be better off to do M2-3 gap or M3-4 if you can wait that long for the reason mentioned by the poster below. Ultimately, up to you.

 

[calivianya]

I don't have any direct experience with taking a LOA, but just purely thinking about boards, I really do feel like you risk losing a lot of M1 knowledge before you take step 1 if you take your LOA between M1 and M2. 99% of my board study was board prep materials, but I do remember there were questions on step 1 that I got right because I remembered some random factoid from class. I'm not sure I would have remembered those random facts if I had an extra year between M1 and taking boards.

I know step 1 will be p/f for you but I think it's worth considering.

 

[Redpancreas]

I don't have any direct experience with taking a LOA, but just purely thinking about boards, I really do feel like you risk losing a lot of M1 knowledge before you take step 1 if you take your LOA between M1 and M2. 99% of my board study was board prep materials, but I do remember there were questions on step 1 that I got right because I remembered some random factoid from class. I'm not sure I would have remembered those random facts if I had an extra year between M1 and taking boards.

I know step 1 will be p/f for you but I think it's worth considering.

I agree that board exams are worth mentioning. I just realized that with the M2-3 gap though, there is a similar issue with Step 2 now. Unless OP's school has made 0 post-Step 1/2 P/F which would be an anomaly, I imagine some of the M1 material will be Step 2 relevant.

Honestly talk with people with more in depth knowledge of the curricula and the know-how at your school to see how this gets done. Thinking about it broadly, the gap with the least issues is M3-4 as after your SubI +/- aways which aren't really cumulative, M4 is basically devoid of major stakes/assessments. That's probably not helpful though as you seem interested in a gap sooner than later and if you wait until the end of M3, you may as well progress to M4, get your SubI over, and then you'll have tons of spare time in M4. M4 is when a lot of people who have their stuff together got married/had kids.