the role of pre-med advisors

[tigress]

I went to a small school where currently one of the bio teachers is serving as pre-med advisor. I see people writing about committees and things but my school just has her. So what exactly is the role of the pre-med advisor in the process, like in terms of LORs and organization, etc.??

thanks

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[Mr. Seeds]

I went to a small school where currently one of the bio teachers is serving as pre-med advisor. I see people writing about committees and things but my school just has her. So what exactly is the role of the pre-med advisor in the process, like in terms of LORs and organization, etc.??

thanks

Let's see, from my experience their role is to dissuade you from even trying, give you misleading or dowright false information about applying, and use your letters of recommendation to wipe their butts and then tell you they "misplaced" them.

But, of course, once you get in and boost their program success rate they become your best friend.

 

[stinkycheese]

Let's see, from my experience their role is to dissuade you from even trying, give you misleading or dowright false information about applying, and use your letters of recommendation to wipe their butts and then tell you they "misplaced" them.

So true about the dissuasion part. I am so tempted to mail mine a framed copy of my acceptance letters.

 

[PsychStudent]

Why did they try to dissuade you?

 

[45408]

I for one, have a kickass pre-med advisor. Aside from telling me what classes I need to graduate, she keeps us apprised of all kinds of volunteer/research opportunities. Her office also collects all of our LORs and will send them out to schools as needed. I signed a waiver saying I wouldn't read them.

 

[stinkycheese]

Why did they try to dissuade you?

Any applicant with a less-than-sparkling record will be dissuaded by our advisor so that the school has a very high rate of acceptance from those who apply. Of course, it's meaningless to brag that 90% of our applicants to med school get in when they're hand-picked and anyone with the smallist blemist on their transcript is kicked to the curb.

 

[Winged Scapula]

Let's see, from my experience their role is to dissuade you from even trying, give you misleading or dowright false information about applying, and use your letters of recommendation to wipe their butts and then tell you they "misplaced" them.

But, of course, once you get in and boost their program success rate they become your best friend.

Sounds like we went to the same undergrad.

The above is especially prevalent at universities without medical schools. The advisor is someone without a background (or much of an interest) in medical school education and often does not have any CURRENT knowledge about the subject.

 

[masterMood]

Sounds like high school guidance counselors to me.

You're not going anywhere except community COLLEGE!


Prowler, where'd you go for undergrad?

 

[45408]

Sounds like high school guidance counselors to me.

You're not going anywhere except community COLLEGE!


Prowler, where'd you go for undergrad?

Just my big state university. I come to SDN with more of my complex questions, but in terms of getting set on the right track, my advisor was great.

 

[JohnB79]

My advisor was crap... I only talked to him so that he would know who I was when writing a composite letter of rec to send to med schools when I was applying. Basically my advisor didn't really care about us, well that was the feeling I would get. Sometimes I would ask him specific questions and he would give me the same stuff I already knew. But hes really good when you've gotten interview on giving advice. Now the Pre-Health secretary she is awesome and does a whole boat load of work. need to get her a thank you card and a gift certificate to TGI Fridays

 

[Blake]

Those guys were useless to me, useless I tell ya !

 

[tigress]

Okay so regardless of how useful or useless you found the advisors to be, what do you actually NEED them for in terms of AMCAS? I'm already out of college so a lot of the advising part doesn't apply.

[When I was undergrad there was a different pre-med advisor who was so awful. He basically never helped anybody with anything and left us all clueless, and tried to tell us we weren't good enough and all. He got fired though. Curiously, I recently saw his name as the author of an MCAT review book. Funny, I thought he was way too clueless to be in that position. Anyway, the current advisor is an awesome teacher who I really loved as a student.]

 

[ShyRem]

My school also has biology profs as "pre-med advisors". Let me tell you: they know nothing. Get your information from ANYWHERE else. Our advisors here are telling people they have an excellent shot at acceptance with a 24 MCAT, and advise against retake with a 26 MCAT. they will write a LOR, but don't collect them to send out a packet for you. They also tell everyone they "have" to be a bio major.

I wish I had found this forum WAY earlier in my quest. The advice I got here was SOOOOO much better than the crap my advisor gave out.

 

[NorCalGirl]

Okay so regardless of how useful or useless you found the advisors to be, what do you actually NEED them for in terms of AMCAS? I'm already out of college so a lot of the advising part doesn't apply.

[When I was undergrad there was a different pre-med advisor who was so awful. He basically never helped anybody with anything and left us all clueless, and tried to tell us we weren't good enough and all. He got fired though. Curiously, I recently saw his name as the author of an MCAT review book. Funny, I thought he was way too clueless to be in that position. Anyway, the current advisor is an awesome teacher who I really loved as a student.]

At my undergrad, the "pre-med" adviser was an English teacher. And our school didn't even have a letter service (to distribute letters of rec). So basically, I never spoke to this "pre-med" adviser and didn't need anything from him to apply to med school. You don't need them to fill out your AMCAS. I didn't!

 

[CanuckRazorback]

I am so glad but saddened at the same time that I am not the only one in this situation. We have 2 pre-med advisors, both of which are not good enough to do research so they automatically get assigned to advise pre-meds (they have to do something right?) I too have learned so much more from this site than from my adviser. I wish I had known that applying early was the key. Our advisor actually told us that as long as my sent our AMCAS by November 15th, we would be fine Then, I found out about this site and started panicking a little when I saw people were interviewing in August!!!

Our advisors have the tunnel vision that everyone at my school will end up going to our only state school, which is so wrong. Our FR/SO adviser has made quite a few pre-meds cry I personally cannot stand her. Worse, she is Canadian just like me and advertises that fact widely. She is giving us a bad rep!

Thanks so much to everyone who has been posting/answering questions. I appreciate it very much and I'm sure a lot of people on here would agree. :

 

[45408]

I have a faculty advisor in my department (a biology professor is my biology advisor - but I'll probably never need advice from him), but I have a separate pre-med advisor - it's her full-time job. Do you guys not have these? She's got a degree in something like counseling/advising.

 

[ShyRem]

I have a faculty advisor in my department (a biology professor is my biology advisor - but I'll probably never need advice from him), but I have a separate pre-med advisor - it's her full-time job. Do you guys not have these? She's got a degree in something like counseling/advising.

We do not, Prowler. Our "pre-med" advisors are nothing more than full-time professors in other areas (usually biology) who know nothing about medical schools. I, too, was told that as long as I apply before the absolute deadline I would definitely get in. Small colleges just don't have that kind of money to toss around to pay yet another counselor.

In truth, Prowler, the pre-med advisors at such small colleges are worse than nothing at all. At least at mine. Absolutely NO information on med schools, and worse than no information about applying. And no help whatsoever.

 

[OSUdoc08]

don't ever listen to an advisor

they will sign you up for classes you don't need, so you can stay at their school longer, making them more money in the long run

you should be intelligent enough to do your own research

 

[PineappleGirl]

One of the best pieces of advice I've ever received:

DON'T TRUST YOUR ADVISOR!

Sad, but true.

These people rarely know what they're talking about.

 

[CarleneM]

at my school, my pre-med advisor was a second year at harvard med. the two heads of our committee were also students at harvard med. in some ways, its good because they are close the application process and know what the current state of things are. but since they are students, i felt they took a very long time to take care of stuff and get back to their advisees. classes and whatnot got in the way. they are spread too thin, I think, and i definitely envy those who have full-time people working as advisors. I also wish I knew about SDN when I was choosing schools to apply to and stuff because my advisor gave me no advice on that other than that I had to apply to at least 20 schools. 17 was unacceptable but she didn't provide any feedback on the schools themselves, just that there were 20 of them....

 

[Ross434]

I havent dealt with our advisors when it comes to the actual application, but they seem to be pretty aware of what classes are needed and are really friendly with helping you structure your schedule to fit in the required sciences around your other classes. The biggest thing they do is probably explain the paperwork and help you get connected to a faculty who will let you research.

 

[45408]

don't ever listen to an advisor

they will sign you up for classes you don't need, so you can stay at their school longer, making them more money in the long run

you should be intelligent enough to do your own research

You should be able to discern if you can listen to them or not. Some of us do have worthwhile advisors, but it's becoming quite clear why most of you think your advisors suck! If my biology professors were my pre-med advisors, that would suck.

 

[scrappysurfer]

my undergrad has several full-time advisors. the result is:
1) told a student not to waste money applying MD, she is now an MD/PhD student
2) told me that my advanced placement would count for general bio and that i would not need biochemistry. when i applied this was not the case. result: i am leaving my job and returning to school full-time spring quarter to complete requirements for medical school so i can attend in the fall. i switched to pre-med late, but left a full year to complete these requirements. ultimate cost: $5000 minimum. i was afraid my family would contact a lawyer about having them cover the cost of me returning to school
3) letter service: i sent my letters to Mayo not one, not two, but 3 times. they sent my letters to michigan in two weeks, not the promised 5 days. result:missed deadline.
4) told me i was a lousy MD/PhD candidate. i have several interviews, including harvard

Advice: DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH. YOUR ADVISOR IS PROBABLY WRONG!!!!!

 

[skiracer90]

It definitely depends on your school. We have two pre-med advisors who have been at their jobs for a loooooooooooooooong time. They totally know this game called applying to med school and have connections with deans at various schools. I'm pretty sure everyone here is smart enough to determine whether or not their advisors are for nothing.

 

[browniegirl86]

You'd think that at one of the biggest schools in the country (UT-Austin) our pre-med office would be helpful. No.

They know less about medical school than I do. When I went to see the advisor, she basically looked up the schools I said I was interested in in a big book (I could have done this myself). She didn't know where Cornell was located! Keep in mind this is their only job. I have my bio advisor (who is awesome) and then a whole separate office of pre-med advisors. You don't stay with the same one either, they just pass you off to whoever's available. From what I can see, they just give you forms to give to your profs so that profs can write you letters. So we have a pre-med advising office which exists, but won't write a "pre-medical committee letter."

The only good thing about them is that you can have your letters of rec written in advance and then they'll hold them for you until it's time for you to apply. I'm a little nervous about starting the application process (for 2006) because I'm scared that they'll screw me over somehow.

 

[trying]

Its strange how so many people have had bad experiences with their pre-med advisor. I go to my state school in california, and my pre-med advisor is really awesome. They set up all kind of opportunities for students and are always e-mailing us about events. I have even seen them help out students from other schools. If your advisor sucks, and you know of a big school who had a good pre-med counseling office, try going there. They very worse thing they can do it not help you, but even then i am sure they can tell you where to get help.

 

[Smitty]

I agree with most of the above posts that pre-med advisors can really stink. I'm sure some are really good; guess it depends on where you are. I'm a 4th year med student, and my school advisors were really bad. I decided not to even go through the committee and instead did everything on my own. I got letters from faculty and pretty much figured out the system myself, which is actually not that difficult. I don't know if not going through the committee is an option for you guys, but I'm glad it was for me. Good luck!

 

[kapnut]

premed advisors are just premeds that did not get into medical school