I'm filling out a volunteer application for my local children's hospital, and it asks if I need verification of my volunteer hours. My inclination is to say no, partially because I'd prefer the volunteer coordinator to not assume I'm doing this because I have to. What do you guys think? Do adcoms want written verification of our clinical exposure?
volunteer hours verification
- Thread starter bashir
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I would say no. As long as there is proof you were there (i.e. coordinator can respond with "yes" if a school asks by phone/e-mail), you should be fine. I don't think they will want to know exactly how many hours you were there. It really doesn't matter imo. I sign in every Saturday with my hours at the hospital, but I don't know/care how many hours I have. It's required for me to sign in and out, but I wouldn't have bothered otherwise.
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You can just leave a contact number if they want proof of your hours. You might as well say yes, though. Volunteer coordinators aren't stupid. They know that most everyone under the age of 30 who volunteers is doing it at least partially for selfish reasons.
Another question: The application has me prioritize volunteer positions I'm interested in from a list of the names and descriptions of positions available. Some of them sound like great fun. What could be better than being a "Book Buddy" (a volunteer who takes the reading cart throughout the hospital, checking out books to families and reading stories to children) or being a "Child Life" volunteer ("volunteer activities may include one-on-one activities with children or participating in a variety of fun planned group activities i.e. reading groups, birthday or slumber parties"?
I guess I'm just confused as to what kind of experience we're supposed to be getting. Obviously something like this would get me patient contact, which I know is a plus, but it doesn't seem like I'd get a lot of exposure to medicine. I guess I'm also worried that doing volunteering that's fun and therefore obviously not a huge sacrifice would somehow diminish the "credit" I get. (And yes, I am doing this primarily to get into medical school, though I am excited about it nonetheless.) Am I crazy?
I guess I'm just confused as to what kind of experience we're supposed to be getting. Obviously something like this would get me patient contact, which I know is a plus, but it doesn't seem like I'd get a lot of exposure to medicine. I guess I'm also worried that doing volunteering that's fun and therefore obviously not a huge sacrifice would somehow diminish the "credit" I get. (And yes, I am doing this primarily to get into medical school, though I am excited about it nonetheless.) Am I crazy?
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Medical schools are not expecting you to learn everything about medicine from your time volunteering - you will learn that in medical school and on the wards. What they do want you to experience is the "atmosphere" of medicine. They want you to be around grief, and stress, and sometimes all around helplessness, and you could experience that atmosphere by doing any of the things you are considering.
To put this into perspective for you - when I volunteered before medical school, almost 80% of my time was spent sitting with Emergency Department patients who didn't have family present. I had the chance to keep them company, listen to their fears and concerns, and just be there for them. When I applied to medical schools, most interviewers responded very favorably when I mentioned that experience, even going so far as to say that they thought I learned much more from my one-on-one time with the patients than I would have in a more typical volunteer role.
If you want to read books to patients, do it. I don't think it will hurt you at all. 🙂
does that mean i can put taking care of drunk ppl after parties has my volunteer activity? it has grief, and stress, helplessness.... and sometimes more than that 😛
