WAMC CA ORM (3.79, 516)

[Ammran1234]

Hi All, this is a lengthy WAMC, but I would appreciate any insight from adcoms, students, and others alike.

1. cGPA and sGPA as calculated by AMCAS or AACOMAS: 3.79 and 3.70
2. MCAT score(s) and breakdown. Include all (non-voided) attempts: 516 (130/128/129/129)
3. State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US): CA
4. Ethnicity and/or race: ORM, Asian
5. Undergraduate institution or category: T20 Public
6. Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer):
   1. ~600 hours as a Health Advocate for public safety-net hospital - we essentially went door to door in the acute care tower helping patients out to ensure they had all the social services (food stamps, health insurance, etc) they needed upon discharge from the hospital
   2. ~800 hours as a triage volunteer at the free clinic I currently volunteer at, additionally I organized and help jump-start an insurance clinic within the free medical clinic, which aims to connect uninsured patients at the clinic with Certified Enrollment Counselors to help them apply for low-cost and subsidized health insurance
   3. ~100 hours as a COVID-19 tester in my local neighborhood health center during COVID-19
7. Research experience and productivity
   1. ~400 hours as a Research Assistant in Health Services Research: examined CA Department of Health Care Services Reports and used those as well as interviews with County Health Systems to understand the unique challenges of delivering behavioural health care in rural CA
   2. ~2000 hours as a Research Assistant in Health Services Research: was part of the team that looked at and measured the success of a CA Medicaid Waiver program implemented throughout the state, 2 posters and an abstract, as well as an acknowledgement in the final report that was submitted to the California Department of Health Care Services
8. Shadowing experience and specialties represented
   1. 40 hours (Pediatrics)
9. Non-clinical volunteering
   1. ~300 hours signing up patients for health insurance and answering related questions in the local community as well as the local campus organization that helped the unhoused population -- Certified Enrollment Counselor for Covered California
10. Other extracurricular activities (including athletics, military service, gap year activities, leadership, teaching, etc)
    1. 150 Hours as an intern for my local state representative, helped constituents, wrote up a bill idea for my representative related to Medi-Cal (CA Medicaid)
    2. 75 Hours as a health policy intern for my university student government in one of the senate offices
    3. 40 Hours as an Undergraduate TA for a Chemistry class I took the year prior
    4. 300 Hours as part of a club whose mission was to advocate for increased access to healthcare in CA - did this all my years in school and one of the higlights was coordinating call-ins among a coalition we worked with and eventually helped legislation get passed at the state level
    5. 100 Hours as Vice President for my pre-medical fraternity at my school: helped plan out events
    6. 200 Hours as a Public Health Commissioner for the large county that I reside in: get to interact with public health department and discuss issues critical to the county, as well as helping to push legislation to the Board of Supervisors for my county
    7. 200 Hours to jump-start a separate commission at my university that is dedicated towards all issues health-advocacy and running that commission for the first 1.5 years
    8. 2000 Hours as a full-time Internal Consultant in my gap year at a F500 healthcare company working in mapping patients to the correct care team and insurance plan, interacting with major health plans (Aetna, Humana, etc)
11. Relevant honors or awards
    1. Eagle Scout, Merit Scholarship at my University, TEDx Talk, Patient Advocacy Organization Scholarship Recipient, Service Award from my Chancellor
12. Anything else not listed you think might be important
    1. LORs from my professors are most likely going to be generic, but my PI letters and my letter from my manager should be good!

As you can see, health policy is a big part of my application and it is something that I hope to tie in with my future career in medicine. I have aspirations for working to help set and create health policy for the government after being in clinical practice, so any schools that I am missing would be greatly appreciated. Additionally, I have a large school list and fully intend on applying to 60-70 schools. I want to do this in one shot if possible, and I have been saving up money from my gap year job in order to pay for a large amount of schools.


School List:

Florida Atlantic University

Cooper Medical School

East Virginia Medical School

Florida International University

Indiana University School of Medicine

Oakland Beaumont University

Ohio State University

Oregon Health Sciences University MD/MPH

Stony Brook University

University of Vermont

Rutgers NJ

Rutgers RWJ

University of Toledo

UA Phoenix

UC Davis

UC Irvine

UC Los Angeles

UC San Francisco

UC San Diego

University of Central Florida

University of Cincinnati

CU Anschultz

University of Iowa

University of Michigan

University of Rochester

University of Wisconsin

USF Morsani

VCU Commonwealth

Virginia Tech University

University of Maryland

University of Massachusetts

Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine

Albany Medical College

Albert Einstein School of Medicine

Texas Christian University

Boston University School of Medicine

Case Western Reserve School of Medicine

Rosalind Franklin School of Medicine

Creighton University School of Medicine

Hofstra School of Medicine

Drexel University School of Medicine

Emory University School of Medicine

Quinnipac University School of Medicine

Gesiel School of Medicine

Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine

George Washington University School of Mediicne

Georgetown University School of Medicine

Icahn School of Medicine @ Mt. Sinai

Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine

USC Keck School of Medicine

Lewis Katz School of Medicine

Loyola University School of Medicine

Medical College of Wisconsin

New York Medical College

Penn State School of Medicine

Sidney Kimmel School of Medicine

Stanford School of Medicine

Brown University School of Medicine

Tufts University School of Medicine

Tulane University School of Medicine

University of Miami

University of Pittsburgh

Wake Forest School of Medicine

Wayne State University

Stryker Western Michigan

Northwestern University

University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine

Duke University School of Medicine

Rush University

Nova Southeastern School of Medicine

SLU School of Medicine

Columbia University School of Medicine

Weill Cornell School of Medicine

University of California, Riverside

Jacobs School of Medicine at University of Buffalo

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[Mr.Smile12]

How did your come up with this list? It seems way too random for me, and several public schools won't consider your application as an OOS applicant. 60 is way too many schools.

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[AJS59]

Hi All, this is a lengthy WAMC, but I would appreciate any insight from adcoms, students, and others alike.

1. cGPA and sGPA as calculated by AMCAS or AACOMAS: 3.79 and 3.70
2. MCAT score(s) and breakdown. Include all (non-voided) attempts: 516 (130/128/129/129)
3. State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US): CA
4. Ethnicity and/or race: ORM, Asian
5. Undergraduate institution or category: T20 Public
6. Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer):
   1. ~600 hours as a Health Advocate for public safety-net hospital - we essentially went door to door in the acute care tower helping patients out to ensure they had all the social services (food stamps, health insurance, etc) they needed upon discharge from the hospital
   2. ~800 hours as a triage volunteer at the free clinic I currently volunteer at, additionally I organized and help jump-start an insurance clinic within the free medical clinic, which aims to connect uninsured patients at the clinic with Certified Enrollment Counselors to help them apply for low-cost and subsidized health insurance
   3. ~100 hours as a COVID-19 tester in my local neighborhood health center during COVID-19
7. Research experience and productivity
   1. ~400 hours as a Research Assistant in Health Services Research: examined CA Department of Health Care Services Reports and used those as well as interviews with County Health Systems to understand the unique challenges of delivering behavioural health care in rural CA
   2. ~2000 hours as a Research Assistant in Health Services Research: was part of the team that looked at and measured the success of a CA Medicaid Waiver program implemented throughout the state, 2 posters and an abstract, as well as an acknowledgement in the final report that was submitted to the California Department of Health Care Services
8. Shadowing experience and specialties represented
   1. 40 hours (Pediatrics)
9. Non-clinical volunteering
   1. ~300 hours signing up patients for health insurance and answering related questions in the local community as well as the local campus organization that helped the unhoused population -- Certified Enrollment Counselor for Covered California
10. Other extracurricular activities (including athletics, military service, gap year activities, leadership, teaching, etc)
    1. 150 Hours as an intern for my local state representative, helped constituents, wrote up a bill idea for my representative related to Medi-Cal (CA Medicaid)
    2. 75 Hours as a health policy intern for my university student government in one of the senate offices
    3. 40 Hours as an Undergraduate TA for a Chemistry class I took the year prior
    4. 300 Hours as part of a club whose mission was to advocate for increased access to healthcare in CA - did this all my years in school and one of the higlights was coordinating call-ins among a coalition we worked with and eventually helped legislation get passed at the state level
    5. 100 Hours as Vice President for my pre-medical fraternity at my school: helped plan out events
    6. 200 Hours as a Public Health Commissioner for the large county that I reside in: get to interact with public health department and discuss issues critical to the county, as well as helping to push legislation to the Board of Supervisors for my county
    7. 200 Hours to jump-start a separate commission at my university that is dedicated towards all issues health-advocacy and running that commission for the first 1.5 years
    8. 2000 Hours as a full-time Internal Consultant in my gap year at a F500 healthcare company working in mapping patients to the correct care team and insurance plan, interacting with major health plans (Aetna, Humana, etc)
11. Relevant honors or awards
    1. Eagle Scout, Merit Scholarship at my University, TEDx Talk, Patient Advocacy Organization Scholarship Recipient, Service Award from my Chancellor
12. Anything else not listed you think might be important
    1. LORs from my professors are most likely going to be generic, but my PI letters and my letter from my manager should be good!

As you can see, health policy is a big part of my application and it is something that I hope to tie in with my future career in medicine. I have aspirations for working to help set and create health policy for the government after being in clinical practice, so any schools that I am missing would be greatly appreciated. Additionally, I have a large school list and fully intend on applying to 60-70 schools. I want to do this in one shot if possible, and I have been saving up money from my gap year job in order to pay for a large amount of schools.


School List:

Florida Atlantic University

Cooper Medical School

East Virginia Medical School

Florida International University

Indiana University School of Medicine

Oakland Beaumont University

Ohio State University

Oregon Health Sciences University MD/MPH

Stony Brook University

University of Vermont

Rutgers NJ

Rutgers RWJ

University of Toledo

UA Phoenix

UC Davis

UC Irvine

UC Los Angeles

UC San Francisco

UC San Diego

University of Central Florida

University of Cincinnati

CU Anschultz

University of Iowa

University of Michigan

University of Rochester

University of Wisconsin

USF Morsani

VCU Commonwealth

Virginia Tech University

University of Maryland

University of Massachusetts

Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine

Albany Medical College

Albert Einstein School of Medicine

Texas Christian University

Boston University School of Medicine

Case Western Reserve School of Medicine

Rosalind Franklin School of Medicine

Creighton University School of Medicine

Hofstra School of Medicine

Drexel University School of Medicine

Emory University School of Medicine

Quinnipac University School of Medicine

Gesiel School of Medicine

Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine

George Washington University School of Mediicne

Georgetown University School of Medicine

Icahn School of Medicine @ Mt. Sinai

Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine

USC Keck School of Medicine

Lewis Katz School of Medicine

Loyola University School of Medicine

Medical College of Wisconsin

New York Medical College

Penn State School of Medicine

Sidney Kimmel School of Medicine

Stanford School of Medicine

Brown University School of Medicine

Tufts University School of Medicine

Tulane University School of Medicine

University of Miami

University of Pittsburgh

Wake Forest School of Medicine

Wayne State University

Stryker Western Michigan

Northwestern University

University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine

Duke University School of Medicine

Rush University

Nova Southeastern School of Medicine

SLU School of Medicine

Columbia University School of Medicine

Weill Cornell School of Medicine

University of California, Riverside

Jacobs School of Medicine at University of Buffalo

I agree that this list is way way too long.

Here's what I would remove off that list to start:
-Indiana
-Oregon
-Maryland
-Virginia Tech
-Iowa
-TCU (save yourself the trouble of filling out TMDSAS if you're only going to apply to 1!)

I would identify the 25-30 schools that I like the most and apply to those. Be sure to keep the California schools (with some exceptions - idk much about California so I'll defer to the adcoms here) and otherwise apply broadly with your mission fit in mind.

Your stats and activities look good in general; I would maybe recommend seeing about getting 10 more hours of shadowing in another non-pediatrics discipline, but overall if you apply broadly, write well and prep for interviews you have a very good shot of having multiple A's at the end of the day. Good luck!