Teaching vs. Masters before matriculation

[IgweEmeka]

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I am starting to ponder what I would do if I am not accepted to med school this upcoming cycle. I am posting this thread in this forum because i want answers from actual smart med students and not neurotic know it all pre meds.
Alright, anyone wanna give their input in teaching for teach for America or some other form of teaching for a year, versus doing research and earning a masters during the time I am reapplying. Anyone have such experience please give me some positives or negatives. Thanks guys.

 

[LAZYGUY]

I would go for teaching.

If you are accepted next cycle and you are enrolled in a masters program, many schools require you to first finish your masters program. If its a one year masters program maybe that can work out for you but I dont see how that would give you an edge. Many people enter med school with masters degrees in this and that. Do what you feel you will be most happy doing. However, also take into consideration that if the masters program lasts more than a year, you may have to postpone your matriculation into medical school.

I am starting to ponder what I would do if I am not accepted to med school this upcoming cycle. I am posting this thread in this forum because i want answers from actual smart med students and not neurotic know it all pre meds.
Alright, anyone wanna give their input in teaching for teach for America or some other form of teaching for a year, versus doing research and earning a masters during the time I am reapplying. Anyone have such experience please give me some positives or negatives. Thanks guys.

 

[tinkerbelle]

Hmm. Well I did both- I did a one year masters program and then I taught for a year. Both were good experiences.

I think the masters program helped me a lot more than my experience teaching (in terms of getting into med school). But I think it depends on the person. How's your gpa & mcat score? Will a good masters gpa make up for an average undergrad gpa? How much do you like research? Make sure that the masters degree will be beneficial before you blow a lot of money on it. For me, I loved my masters program and it was worth every penny (I studied repro bio at the hopkins school of public health). And the program did exactly what I wanted it to do. I was an engineer in undergrad and the masters program gave me more exposure to medicine, biology, and public health. But also keep in mind that masters programs help you way more if you've *finished* the program before you apply. Otherwise you've barely done anything in program... so what exactly are you showing the AdCom that makes you any better than everyone else?

Now teaching is a lot of fun and will be really helpful, especially if you're interested in peds. Teaching shows that you can handle little kids, that you're patient, that you are comfortable in front of an audience, that you have the ability to make concepts simple and teach them to someone else, that you're diplomatic enough to deal with really annoying parents. All of these are great skills for a future doctor to have. But ask yourself: How much do you like kids? I didn't do teach for america. Instead I taught sixth grade math at a private school. The kids were awesome and I really loved teaching. But teachers do have their own problems... you'll probably be working in a public school... so you'll have kids with behavioral problems. And parents complain about everything (but then again private school parents are probably more anal that public school parents). Another good thing about working/teaching was that I made some money. I don't know how much teach for america pays, but starting salaries in this area for public schools is like 35k or something (which isn't bad at all).

Hmm. Wow, sorry, I wrote a lot 😛

 

[Freakingzooming]

I think the safe bet would be to get the masters- because generally it can't hurt to have another degree and more education.

But I generally have so much more respect for people who do Teach for America. That program can be damn right taxing. I have a friend whose in the John Hopkins/Baltimore Teaching for America and she's having a really rough time with her class. Baltimore as a city has its real dumps and she's in a rough area teaching her heart out. It saddens me though she is often reduced to tears in class, mostly out of frustration from teaching rowdy students. She is being worked to death, preparing classes, attending her classes at Hopkins as well. Her weekends are pretty much nonexistent.

But that's the Baltimore program and I'm sure other ones aren't as rough. But teaching kids anything to me is a great challenge. I think you should maybe apply for both and decide later. It's always best to have more options. I've heard it's rather competitive to get into the Teach for America programs anyways and rather easier to get into a masters program (tuition fodder really for big universities).