Too Late or Still Time?

[Amrazzz]

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Coming into college I really didn't know what I had to do EC wise to get into medical school. As a result, I pretty much slacked off during my Freshman year, doing about 30 hrs of non-medical volunteering for my scholarship and around 40 hours in the ER and Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitations in the summer. My sophomore year, I started research in an awesome Lab (I have been given my own project at the moment from which I will write my thesis this or senior year), and volunteering at my University's Medical Center Emergency Department as a Patient/Visitor liaison coordinating between ER doctors, nurses, patients, and families. This summer (between Soph-Junior), I was selected for the SURF program at a well known medical school from which I presented a poster. 🙂

Now it's time for Junior year and ready to get it underway but feel that I haven't accomplished much EC wise. I am going to continue research and volunteering and TA a class (winter quarter), but I severely lack non-medical volunteering which I feel is becoming more important these days. That being said, how will the lack-off non-medical volunteering contribute to my overall application?

I am desperately trying to find a tutoring opportunity at an elementary school near campus for which I will try to volunteer 2hrs a week but I don't want to add too many activities that will interfere with my GPA. If indeed get this opportunity most of my ECs will be concentrated in one year, will this look bad?

Still holding out on a 3.98, but fear it tanking this year with my course and EC load with MCAT studying.

SDN has made me more neurotic than I already am 😀

 

[pianola]

Coming into college I really didn't know what I had to do EC wise to get into medical school. As a result, I pretty much slacked off during my Freshman year, doing about 30 hrs of non-medical volunteering for my scholarship and around 40 hours in the ER and Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitations in the summer. My sophomore year, I started research in an awesome Lab (I have been given my own project at the moment from which I will write my thesis this or senior year), and volunteering at my University's Medical Center Emergency Department as a Patient/Visitor liaison coordinating between ER doctors, nurses, patients, and families. This summer (between Soph-Junior), I was selected for the SURF program at a well known medical school from which I presented a poster. 🙂

Now it's time for Junior year and ready to get it underway but feel that I haven't accomplished much EC wise. I am going to continue research and volunteering and TA a class (winter quarter), but I severely lack non-medical volunteering which I feel is becoming more important these days. That being said, how will the lack-off non-medical volunteering contribute to my overall application?

I am desperately trying to find a tutoring opportunity at an elementary school near campus for which I will try to volunteer 2hrs a week but I don't want to add too many activities that will interfere with my GPA. If indeed get this opportunity most of my ECs will be concentrated in one year, will this look bad?

Still holding out on a 3.98, but fear it tanking this year with my course and EC load with MCAT studying.

SDN has made me more neurotic than I already am 😀

Sounds like your ECs are fine. I wouldn't worry so much about the volunteering. You have at least 2-3 different things, right?

It's all in how well you can present yourself and what you learned on an application.

Make sure you do well on the MCAT; that will be the next major challenge.

 

[Amrazzz]

Sounds like your ECs are fine. I wouldn't worry so much about the volunteering. You have at least 2-3 different things, right?

It's all in how well you can present yourself and what you learned on an application.

Make sure you do well on the MCAT; that will be the next major challenge.

Yea, I volunteered at my local and university hospitals. Non-medical wise I did random volunteer events to fulfill my scholarship requirement (30hrs/year), but no commitment to one single activity, other than hospital.

 

[pianola]

If you can fit in another activity, it'd probably be nice, of course. But I would say don't do it at the expense of the MCAT.

Haha, on my application, I listed one community service event that I only spent 3 days doing (a few hours each day). (I didn't lie or omit that on my application, either, I made it entirely clear that I spent only 3 days doing it).

It's not so much WHAT you did as HOW you present it. Both matter, of course, but you really have to be able to explain what you got out of your volunteering/research whatevs.

 

[Prof Chaos]

Well I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you are in pretty bad shape. The amount of work you would have to do to get your application somewhere where you'd even have a snowball's chance in hell is almost unfathomable. I mean all those non-medically related volunteer hours will really make you look unfocused and terribly immature. What were you thinking doing that?? I've never heard of anyone being accepted without having at least 3 solid years of volunteering in a hospital for 5 hours/week. Your research experience is also pretty lame, most successful applicants have been published at least by the end of their Freshman year, if not sooner. Everybody presents posters so having done that won't help you, although if you had not presented I can guarantee that you wouldn't receive a single interview when you apply. Your gpa is also very borderline and if you are just now beginning to study for the MCAT I doubt you will score above a 30. You need at least a 38 to even be considered at most MD schools.

I know that becoming a doctor is your dream, and I don't want to crush that, but you need someone to be a voice of reason and give you a reality-check. MD is pretty much out of reach at this point. You *MAY* have a small shot at some of the lower-tier DO schools, but I would seriously consider looking at the Caribbean.

 

[Amrazzz]

Well I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you are in pretty bad shape. The amount of work you would have to do to get your application somewhere where you'd even have a snowball's chance in hell is almost unfathomable. I mean all those non-medically related volunteer hours will really make you look unfocused and terribly immature. What were you thinking doing that?? I've never heard of anyone being accepted without having at least 3 solid years of volunteering in a hospital for 5 hours/week. Your research experience is also pretty lame, most successful applicants have been published at least by the end of their Freshman year, if not sooner. Everybody presents posters so having done that won't help you, although if you had not presented I can guarantee that you wouldn't receive a single interview when you apply. Your gpa is also very borderline and if you are just now beginning to study for the MCAT I doubt you will score above a 30. You need at least a 38 to even be considered at most MD schools.

I know that becoming a doctor is your dream, and I don't want to crush that, but you need someone to be a voice of reason and give you a reality-check. MD is pretty much out of reach at this point. You *MAY* have a small shot at some of the lower-tier DO schools, but I would seriously consider looking at the Caribbean.

😀 Thanks for the reality check! 😀