WAMC: 4.0/ 516

[robin6170]

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Hey! I'm working on putting together a list of schools for this upcoming cycle and need advice on any schools I should cut or add.

My stats: Fl, GPA: 4.0, MCAT: 516 (129/129/129/129)

undergrad school: in-state public

Paid clinical
110 hrs as a patient care assistant last summer
getting my MA license to work at a physicians office during my gap year (estimated ~1,700)

volunteer clinical
50 hours ambulating patients (cut short due to covid)

non clinical volunteering
75 hrs in a hospital
265 hrs note taker
70 hours camp counselor for children with congenital heart disease
80 hours animal shelter
200 hrs started club to provide free tutoring services to middle and high school students

Jobs
1080 hrs learning assistant for gen chem 2 and gen bio 2
100 hrs mentoring freshmen

Hobbies
1000+ hrs playing keys. play for my church a ton
100 hrs horseback riding (cut short due to covid)

Research
1060 over the course of 3.5 years in cardiovascular research
completed an honors thesis, poster presentation (first name), name appeared in an abstract, 2 future publication (under review/ getting submitted so they probably won't be published by the time I apply)

Shadowing
170 hrs in various subspecialties (electrophysiologist, interventional pediatric cardiologist, neonatologist, pediatric electrophysiologist, online shadowing random specialties)

safeties

• George Washington (512)
• West Virginia (511)
• Vermont (513)
• FSU (507): focus on rural medicine (I’m not really interested in rural med, but it’s my undergrad university)
• Oregon (512): low yield

target

• USF (518)
• UF (516)
• UCF (515)
• UMiami (514)
• emory (515)
• Colorado (515)
• Ohio state (516)
• Cincinnati (517)
• Thomas Jefferson (514)
• Indiana (513)
• Arizona (516)

slight reach

• case western (518): super OOS friendly
• Brown (516)
• Dartmouth (516)
• wake (512): low yield
• Georgetown (513): low yield
• Uconn (513): not OOS friendly but have family ties there
• pitt (518): OOS friendly

Reach
have family ties in CA (which is why I have so many CA schools)

• USC Keck (517): low yield
• UCLA (516): low yield
• UCSD (516): low yield
• UCSF (517): low yield
• Vanderbilt (521): prefers high stats, huge reach
• Michigan (519): OOS friendly, but high stats
• UNC (515): not OOS friendly
• Boston (519): OOS friendly, but high stats
• Virginia (520): OOS friendly, but high stats

 

[Faha]

Oregon, UCSD, UConn, Arizona, West Virginia and UNC admit very few non residents with no connection to the state. Georgetown is looking for applicants with many more clinical exposure hours than you have. Add Florida Atlantic and Florida International.

 

[robin6170]

Oregon, UCSD, UConn, Arizona, West Virginia and UNC admit very few non residents with no connection to the state. Georgetown is looking for applicants with many more clinical exposure hours than you have. Add Florida Atlantic and Florida International.

Thanks for the feedback! I do have family ties to both Connecticut and California.
The Arizona phoenix campus offers interviews to a decent amount of OOS, where you referring to the Tuscan campus?
For Georgetown, I agree with you, but I would regret it if I didn't at least apply.
I'll add FIU, but FAU requires an LOR from a math professor lol, and I did not form a relationship with any math teachers.
Thanks again for your help.

 

[candbgirl]

Your clinical hours are low. Projected hours are just that and don’t really impress ADCOMS. Everyone knows projected hours might or might not get done.
And I really have no idea what you did for most of your nonclinical volunteering. When you apply be sure to do a better job of explaining everything.
You’ve got a lot of OOS public schools on your list. Maybe rethink that strategies and look at some private schools. Oregon doesn’t take many OOS applicants, Cali sends hundreds of IS applicants to OOS schools every cycle.
You have good stats so you should be fine with a more focused list. Good luck,

 

[robin6170]

Your clinical hours are low. Projected hours are just that and don’t really impress ADCOMS. Everyone knows projected hours might or might not get done.
And I really have no idea what you did for most of your nonclinical volunteering. When you apply be sure to do a better job of explaining everything.
You’ve got a lot of OOS public schools on your list. Maybe rethink that strategies and look at some private schools. Oregon doesn’t take many OOS applicants, Cali sends hundreds of IS applicants to OOS schools every cycle.
You have good stats so you should be fine with a more focused list. Good luck,

are there any specific private schools you recommend I add?

 

[Faha]

Thanks for the feedback! I do have family ties to both Connecticut and California.
The Arizona phoenix campus offers interviews to a decent amount of OOS, where you referring to the Tuscan campus?
For Georgetown, I agree with you, but I would regret it if I didn't at least apply.
I'll add FIU, but FAU requires an LOR from a math professor lol, and I did not form a relationship with any math teachers.
Thanks again for your help.

Unless you attended college in those states or are a former resident, those family ties will not matter. Arizona Phoenix interviews less than 4% of OOS applicants and both Arizona schools are looking for URM applicants.

 

[chilly_md]

Try adding:
Western Michigan
Hofstra
Saint Louis
Creighton
Medical College of Wisconsin
Rochester

You should try to increase your non-clinical volunteering and have it be outside your comfort zone. Note taking and tutoring are academic related and are very common to see. To admissions, it will seem you only had 70 hours of working with others through the camp counselor activity.

 

[candbgirl]

are there any specific private schools you recommend I add?

I mentioned private schools because they don’t care about IS v OOS. So look at some in cities/states you’d like to live in for whatever reasons.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Please rewrite your volunteering experiences to tell us what you did, not where it took place. I am hoping your descriptions for your application are more informative.

I don't really see any significant community service that stretched you to working with a community unlike yourself. Maybe the camp counselor bit but -- again -- no details to confirm, and not a lot of hours. Starting a tutoring club is more leadership and not volunteering, and playing piano for your church is more like volunteering than a hobby but not community service.

No more shadowing or clinical experience needed, but you are really missing that community service orientation attribute in what you have given us.

 

[robin6170]

Please rewrite your volunteering experiences to tell us what you did, not where it took place. I am hoping your descriptions for your application are more informative.

I don't really see any significant community service that stretched you to working with a community unlike yourself. Maybe the camp counselor bit but -- again -- no details to confirm, and not a lot of hours. Starting a tutoring club is more leadership and not volunteering, and playing piano for your church is more like volunteering than a hobby but not community service.

No more shadowing or clinical experience needed, but you are really missing that community service orientation attribute in what you have given us.

haha, of course I'm going to be more detailed in my app, I just didn't want to include a bunch of activity descriptions that I didn't think you would read through. But since you ask l'll add them.

110 hrs as a patient care assistant as hospital: triaged patients, took vitals, discharged patients, drew blood etc. I've got some pretty good stories and experiences from there.

50 hours ambulating patients: we would help the patients walk while they were hospitalized. I got to connect with a lot of patients and see improvements on their conditions.

75 hrs in a hospital (one summer while I was home from college): worked in the lab so mainly just transporting lab samples, no patient contact
265 hrs note taker: I think the name implies what I did. did so for courses such as orgo, physics, genetics, and some other electives.
70 hours camp counselor: a camp for children with congenital heart disease, mentored them and monitored them for any medical emergencies, got to connect with them while they didn't have to worry about their condition since the medical staff was on sight. helped them navigate how to approach college apps, their last year in high school, and other heavier topics such as how can they cope with not having kids or how do they tell their parents they want to see their physician alone (somewhat of a big deal for kids with congenital issues). genuinely an experience that changed my view of the patient and physician relationship.
80 hours animal shelter: walked dogs, helped train a few that needed some behavioral issues addressed. did this more so for fun
200 hrs started club to provide free tutoring services to middle and high school students: we tutor students in low income areas and partnered with an organization that houses children who come from difficult living/family situations. also have a website to do online tutoring in which we've connected with schools in the area so that they can direct their students to us. not too much success with the website though as many schools have told us they are having difficulties motivating the students to ask for help.

1080 hrs learning assistant for gen chem 2 and gen bio 2: main role was to provide additional help to students in these courses. with classes that had 300+ students it was hard for everyone to get individual help from the teacher so that's where learning assistants filled in the gaps. basically a TA. through this I developed a passion for teaching and would like to teach once I'm much older (like when I hit the age where its no longer safe for me to practice on people)

100 hrs mentoring freshmen: with the switch to online schooling, my university wanted to offer freshman a program that helped them adjust to college while it was online. I helped them plan their schedule, develop good academic habits, and just offer advice whenever they needed it.

1000+ hrs playing keys. play for my church a ton: Im not planning on making this a volunteering activity. I just love to play and wanted to share my skills with my local church
100 hrs horseback riding (cut short due to covid): may or may not add to the app depending on how many of the 15 slots I take up with other activities

1060 over the course of 3.5 years in cardiovascular research
completed an honors thesis, poster presentation (first name), name appeared in an abstract, 2 future publication (under review/ getting submitted so they probably won't be published by the time I apply): got to the point I was teaching other doctors/ postdocs protocols I had designed and implemented to help with their research.

I forgot to add in the original post that I am part of a preheats organization that focuses on service (AED). Ive helped with creating and handing out "care packages" to residents in a city near here that got devastated by hurricane Michael and helped with some events at the med school. no leadership position in that club tho.

extra notes

there's some random volunteering I did either through churches or other clubs that I don't want to make an activity description for each, should I just group them all into 1 and list what they were and how many hours? or just leave them out?

when I write my activity description, I'm planning on drawing from specific experiences to show my impact, rather than just tell the adcoms my duties.

obviously with COVID many places didn't allow for in person volunteering so I did the best with what I had. Also not having a car the first 2 years of college really limited me to staying on or near campus. I know adcoms won't really care about that but I just want to provide some context for you all. I really don't think they will look at my experiences and say "well she didn't volunteer out of her comfort zone so no interview for her". I did what I could and what I enjoyed, I just want them to be able to see me through my activities. I appreciate your words of wisdom nonetheless.


let me know if y'all need anymore clarification and thanks for the advice so far!

 

[robin6170]

*I said preheats in the last post, I meant prehealth

 

[chilly_md]

If you had volunteered more than once or twice for your church and clubs, you can group them together and list the hours. If they were just a few hours for each though, just leave them off. It wouldn’t be very significant to have an activity that’s only 10-20 hours spread across multiple organizations.

You are a worthwhile applicant but I would not recommend assuming that any admissions member reading your app won’t say "well she didn't volunteer out of her comfort zone so no interview for her". Many applicants have strong profiles and do not gain interviews at most of the schools they apply. With the majority of your clinical experience being projected hours, it is hard to say how your application will be interpreted when your most impactful experience related to medicine or altruism seems to be the 70 hours as a counselor. It is usually best to remain on the safe side when trying to predict how things will go.