Volunteering hours

[Umyo]

Hi,

I currently have 200 hours hospital volunteering (I did this in high school - can I still put it on my app?)

200 hours shadowing an endocrinologist (recent)

200 hours shadowing pediatrician

100 hours front desk/administrative work at a clinic (billing handling, insurance, appointments, etc) same clinic as pediatrician

Was wondering if I need more diversity in my hours or if this is enough.

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[Ismet]

you have plenty of clinical experience. now just be able to talk about what you learned from them. the last one is most likely not clinical experience, though.

 

[Umyo]

you have plenty of clinical experience. now just be able to talk about what you learned from them. the last one is most likely not clinical experience, though.

Can I still put the hours of hospital volunteering (200) that I did in high school on my med school apps?

It was a truly changing experience. I was officer and had to interview about 60 applicants every year and decide who to accept/decline.

 

[Apache1618]

I want to say that the application states it has to be from the end of high school to current. I don't have time right now to double check but I am sure someone else can verify or prove otherwise.

 

[LuciusVorenus]

I think you're only allowed to put high school activities that you continued into your college years. I would get some more clinical hours involving direct patient care (not just shadowing).

 

[Vans42]

Unfortunately I agree with the others, you probably should not use volunteer hours in high school. Schools really like to see a commitment to your volunteering, so if you start as a freshman and carry it on through college you should be golden. I would also suggest that it does not have to be clinical volunteering necessarily - help with something you are passionate about (it will give you more to talk about and will show the adcoms that you aren't just doing it to check off the box). As long as you have enough shadowing hours, you don't have to do clinical volunteering. I actually never did it haha, and so far it hasn't been a problem.

 

[Catalystik]

Can I still put the hours of hospital volunteering (200) that I did in high school on my med school apps?

You can put anything you like on your application, but a HS experience is not a good use of your allowed Experiences spaces unless you continued that experience into the college years. Rather, consider mentioning this experience in the Personal Statement as part of your journey to medicine.

I would consider that working at the front desk where you check patients in, make appointments for them, and field their phone calls to be an active clinical experience. Of course, you were likely dealing mostly with parents when working in a pediatric office, rather than the patients themselves.

Perhaps some of the (hefty number of) hours you spent in the passive observership of shadowing could be considerd "clinical" if you assisted the pediatrician or endocrinologist in some way that benefited the patient. If so, be sure that your description makes that very clear or list that time separately. If not, you might want to get in some additional active clinical experience before you apply where you personally interact with sick people if the point I made in the previous paragraph is correct.

 

[mcloaf]

Can I still put the hours of hospital volunteering (200) that I did in high school on my med school apps?

It was a truly changing experience. I was officer and had to interview about 60 applicants every year and decide who to accept/decline.

If it's something you did in high school and made no effort to continue in college I'm not sure people will view it as a transformative experience for you.

 

[kyamh]

OP, is one of these going to be a "most meaningful" experience? If you designate one of these that way, you have more space to talk about the impact the experience had on you. That way your application is richer as a result of your experience without changing the number of hours per se.

It seems as though many applicants get into great schools with comparable numbers of hours, or less. It's seems to be all about how your tell your story in your application.

 

[Umyo]

If it's something you did in high school and made no effort to continue in college I'm not sure people will view it as a transformative experience for you.

I'll still continue it but not as an officer then.

 

[Umyo]

OP, is one of these going to be a "most meaningful" experience? If you designate one of these that way, you have more space to talk about the impact the experience had on you. That way your application is richer as a result of your experience without changing the number of hours per se.

It seems as though many applicants get into great schools with comparable numbers of hours, or less. It's seems to be all about how your tell your story in your application.

Will keep this in mind, thank you.