WAMC 509 3.64/3.56 + school list advice

[Bucs2020]

---

Members do not see this ad.

Howdy!!! These are all my projected stats I will have by the time I apply in May 2026

cGPA and sGPA as calculated by AMCAS:

• cGPA: 3.64 sGPA 3.56 (major upward trend)

MCAT score(s) and breakdown. Include all (non-voided) attempts.

• MCAT: 509 (128/125/129/127)

State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US)

• FL

Ethnicity and/or race

• White male

Undergraduate institution or category

• Community college, then transferred to USF for BA in biology

Clinical experience

• Orthopedic Floor volunteer (200 hours)
• Emergency Room Volunteer (100 hours)

Research experience and productivity

• Clinical research with the Audiology department’s research lab at my university (600-700 hours)
  • Undergrad research assistant for 2 separate studies for my lab group
  • Currently have 1 poster, but expecting to have at least 1 or 2 more by the time I apply

Shadowing experience and specialties represented

• Orthopedic Surgery (50 hours)
• Psychiatry (25 hours)
• ER shadowing experience (150 hours)
  • Should I include this as clinical experience or just shadowing, because, after my first couple of times of just shadowing my physician, it turned into more of a hands-on experience where I was interacting with the patients under the supervision of the doc I was shadowing, rather than just shadowing?

Non-clinical volunteering

• Big Brothers Big Sisters of America (30-40 hours)
• Salvation Army food kitchen (50 hours)
• Florida Dream Center Adopt-A-Block (80-100 hours)
  • Did food pantry volunteering but mainly participated in community cleanups, doing a multitude of different things for people who did not have the means of doing it themselves
• Volunteering with children who have special needs (20 hours)

Other extracurricular activities (including athletics, military service, gap year activities, leadership, teaching, etc)

• Tutoring for General Chemistry (20 hours)
• Tutoring for Organic Chemistry (15 hours)
• Amateur bodybuilding (a lot of time)
  • Plan on finally competing in competitions during my application year because I’ll have the resources and time needed to do so
• Worked as an assistant warehouse manager all throughout my time in college
  • Would I be able to include this as leadership experience?

Relevant honors or awards

• Dean’s list 4 semesters at my community college
• President's list 1 semester at community college
• Dean’s list of scholars 2 semesters at USF

Other important stuff

• My sGPA is both weighed down because I got 2 Cs during my first semester in college. I transferred with a 3.47 GPA; however, my GPA at USF is currently a 3.9 with a very science-heavy course load each semester.
• I changed my major and began my pre-med journey when I was already a year and a half into getting my AA at my community college, which required me to stay there an extra year. Will this hurt my app at all if I’m able to explain my switch to pursuing a career in medicine?
• I was born and raised in Florida; however, my family is all from Pennsylvania, and while I don’t have any immediate family still living there, I do have a lot of extended family still up there. Would I be able to count that as having family ties to PA?

This is what my school list is so far, still a work in progress, but what changes should I make?

MD

• FSU
• FIU Wertheim
• Nova Southeastern
• Wake Forest
• Medical College of Wisconsin
• Temple Katz
• Rosalind Franklin
• University of Vermont
• Penn State
• Drexel
• Quinnipiac
• Albany
• Oakland Beaumont
• Thomas Jefferson U
• Geisinger
• Western Michigan
• Colorado

DO

• LECOM (Bradenton and Erie)
• Nova Southeastern
• OCOM
• CUSOM
• DMUCOM
• Touro COM
• PCOM
• WCUCOM
• VCOM
• ATSUCOM
• NYITCOM
• Incarnate Word
• Noorda

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Welcome to the forums. Are you graduating in 2026 or 2027? You've given us projected hours by that cycle to work with, and I want clarified when you will graduate.

You need more non-clinical community service if this is what you'll have by next spring.

1) You should have 150 hours minimum of service orientation activities: food distribution, shelter volunteer, job/tax preparation, legal support, transportation services, or housing rehabilitation.
PLUS
2) I disregard activities where you have fewer than 50 hours unless it's shadowing. Just having 50 hours in one activity is 1 hour every week for a year. That's checkbox behavior to me and won't impress me/my committees.

So consider putting all your efforts into FEWER impactful community projects. I might give you the hours cleaning the neighborhood, and there aren't many applicants I've seen do this. But how is this relevant to your career in medicine?

Where you graduated from high school and went to CC will count more than any family connections to Pennsylvania. You can network at recruitment events like the upcoming AAMC Virtual Fair next month though.

 

[Bucs2020]

Welcome to the forums. Are you graduating in 2026 or 2027? You've given us projected hours by that cycle to work with, and I want clarified when you will graduate.

You need more non-clinical community service if this is what you'll have by next spring.

1) You should have 150 hours minimum of service orientation activities: food distribution, shelter volunteer, job/tax preparation, legal support, transportation services, or housing rehabilitation.
PLUS
2) I disregard activities where you have fewer than 50 hours unless it's shadowing. Just having 50 hours in one activity is 1 hour every week for a year. That's checkbox behavior to me and won't impress me/my committees.

So consider putting all your efforts into FEWER impactful community projects. I might give you the hours cleaning the neighborhood, and there aren't many applicants I've seen do this. But how is this relevant to your career in medicine?

Where you graduated from high school and went to CC will count more than any family connections to Pennsylvania. You can network at recruitment events like the upcoming AAMC Virtual Fair next month though.

I'll be graduating Summer of 2026, and the non-clinical volunteering activities that I have less than 50 hours in are positions I'm just starting as of this week and next week, which is why my hours aren't going to be super high when I apply. My Adopt-A-Block volunteering position showed me a very broad scope of social and economic challenges people face. We did most of our work in low SES neighborhoods, and as I said before, we provided many services to people, such as lawn work to those who were at risk of receiving code violations that they would struggle to pay. I can extrapolate, but this was an activity I was passionate about because we worked in a lot of areas I grew up around and made me feel like I was doing my part to uplift my community, which aligns with one of my reasons for wanting to become a doctor. Thank you for your response!