Hi everyone, thanks for taking the time to look over this. I am a traditional, first-time applicant and wanted to get some outside feedback about my application and school list.
cGPA and sGPA as calculated by AMCAS or AACOMAS:
3.82 cGPA, 3.79 sGPA
Biochem Major
MCAT score(s) and breakdown:
518 (132/128/130/128)
State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US):
Ohio resident
Ethnicity and/or race:
White/Male
Undergraduate institution or category:
Large state school
Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer):
~60 hours (during summer in my hometown) volunteering at a children's hospital. Time was split between the errands desk which handled a little bit of everything and the music therapy center which had a lot of patient interaction.
- 200 total hours at a different hospital. Started by escorting patients, then moved to the ED.
Research experience and productivity:
1500 hours in a microbiology lab within a large hospital. Have my own long-term project. 2 poster presentations (one at university, one at regional conference) and 1 talk at the hospital. No publications but we should be starting a paper soon (I will be 1st or 2nd author) and my PI will make mention of this in their LOR.
Shadowing experience and specialties represented:
-60 hours Internal Medicine
-8 hours Pediatric Intensivist
-8 hours GI (including some OR time)
-5 hours Pancreatic surgeon (clinical only)
Non-clinical volunteering:
-70 hours helping to train future service dogs
(This is the part of my app I'm most worried about)
Other extracurricular activities (including athletics, military service, gap year activities, leadership, teaching, etc):
-Peer-led team leader for a general chemistry course for chem and biochem majors (600 hours over 4 semesters + will be doing 2 more semesters next year). Ran a weekly workshop for students where we did some chem problems and talked about anything they've been struggling with in or out of class. Was part of the first year of the program/ helped pilot it.
- Tennis coach (probably about 4000 or so hours over the past 5 years). Coached for a few city programs and at a country club for 4 summers. Mostly coaching children for group lessons, but I also did private lessons here and there and worked with adults pretty often.
Anything else not listed you think might be important:
- My girlfriend of many years is applying for optometry school and we are trying to stay in the same city if we can. Of course, I know the typical response to this and I want to preface it by saying that we know how hard/ partially unrealistic this is. In the end, we will both go where we think we need to be, regardless of the other, but we are just hoping we can both find and be accepted to schools we like in the same region. There aren't many optometry schools and the main cities for her are Columbus, Philly, Chicago, and Memphis. I've never been to Memphis but I love all the other cities. I found every med school I thought I was competitive for in these cities and added it to my school list, but maybe I missed one or am not as competitive as I think for some.
School list (tentative):
(In no particular order)
University of Toledo
Boston University
Wright State
OSU
Rosalind Franklin
Wash U
Quinnipiac
University of Chicago
Cincinnati
Georgetown
Sidney Kimmel
Loyola
Temple
U of Michigan
Northwestern
Rush
Penn State
U of Pennsylvania
U of Tennessee (I know this is very OOS unfriendly, but its the only school in memphis)
Tufts
Wayne State
Drexel
Case Western
Also might apply DO to Ohio University and Midwestern, but I'm not sure yet.
Thanks for the help!
cGPA and sGPA as calculated by AMCAS or AACOMAS:
3.82 cGPA, 3.79 sGPA
Biochem Major
MCAT score(s) and breakdown:
518 (132/128/130/128)
State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US):
Ohio resident
Ethnicity and/or race:
White/Male
Undergraduate institution or category:
Large state school
Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer):
~60 hours (during summer in my hometown) volunteering at a children's hospital. Time was split between the errands desk which handled a little bit of everything and the music therapy center which had a lot of patient interaction.
- 200 total hours at a different hospital. Started by escorting patients, then moved to the ED.
Research experience and productivity:
1500 hours in a microbiology lab within a large hospital. Have my own long-term project. 2 poster presentations (one at university, one at regional conference) and 1 talk at the hospital. No publications but we should be starting a paper soon (I will be 1st or 2nd author) and my PI will make mention of this in their LOR.
Shadowing experience and specialties represented:
-60 hours Internal Medicine
-8 hours Pediatric Intensivist
-8 hours GI (including some OR time)
-5 hours Pancreatic surgeon (clinical only)
Non-clinical volunteering:
-70 hours helping to train future service dogs
(This is the part of my app I'm most worried about)
Other extracurricular activities (including athletics, military service, gap year activities, leadership, teaching, etc):
-Peer-led team leader for a general chemistry course for chem and biochem majors (600 hours over 4 semesters + will be doing 2 more semesters next year). Ran a weekly workshop for students where we did some chem problems and talked about anything they've been struggling with in or out of class. Was part of the first year of the program/ helped pilot it.
- Tennis coach (probably about 4000 or so hours over the past 5 years). Coached for a few city programs and at a country club for 4 summers. Mostly coaching children for group lessons, but I also did private lessons here and there and worked with adults pretty often.
Anything else not listed you think might be important:
- My girlfriend of many years is applying for optometry school and we are trying to stay in the same city if we can. Of course, I know the typical response to this and I want to preface it by saying that we know how hard/ partially unrealistic this is. In the end, we will both go where we think we need to be, regardless of the other, but we are just hoping we can both find and be accepted to schools we like in the same region. There aren't many optometry schools and the main cities for her are Columbus, Philly, Chicago, and Memphis. I've never been to Memphis but I love all the other cities. I found every med school I thought I was competitive for in these cities and added it to my school list, but maybe I missed one or am not as competitive as I think for some.
School list (tentative):
(In no particular order)
University of Toledo
Boston University
Wright State
OSU
Rosalind Franklin
Wash U
Quinnipiac
University of Chicago
Cincinnati
Georgetown
Sidney Kimmel
Loyola
Temple
U of Michigan
Northwestern
Rush
Penn State
U of Pennsylvania
U of Tennessee (I know this is very OOS unfriendly, but its the only school in memphis)
Tufts
Wayne State
Drexel
Case Western
Also might apply DO to Ohio University and Midwestern, but I'm not sure yet.
Thanks for the help!
