WAMC / School List- 4.0/522, ORM

[certifiedloverboy]

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• cGPA/sGPA: 4.0
• MCAT: 522
  • 132/127/131/132
• VA resident
• ORM- White
• undergraduate- not prestigious

Clinical experience:

• 570 hours as an EMT-B for a private medical transportation company (paid)
• 360 hours as an EMT-B for a rural volunteer rescue squad (volunteer, one of my most meaningfuls)
• 120 hours (unpaid) spent in-hospital during a medical internship in Ecuador.
  • These hours consisted of me mostly shadowing different hospital services like ER and vascular and general surgery, but in my time in the ER I worked basically as an ER tech
  • However, the ultimate goal of this trip was more so for the immersion into a Spanish speaking culture (living with a host family etc.), as I am minoring in Spanish.

Research experience and productivity:

• 590 hours, one lab for 3 semesters.
• 1 first author publication, one co-author publication pending, 5+ poster and oral presentations at local conferences (no awards).
  • 240 of these hours were paid for a summer research internship I did at my university where I worked on the same project.

Shadowing:

• 100 hours. 40 of which were anesthesia. The rest is mostly primary care, but also have shadowed Ortho and Ophthalmology.

Non-clinical volunteerin:

• 100 hours at the food pantry apart of my church (one of my most meaningfuls).

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

• 230 hours as an undergraduate tutor (one-one-one appointments, which were 170 of the hours, and group sessions, which make up the rest).
• 2 years in leadership apart of our premed honor society club (primarily responsible for connecting students with doctors to get them shadowing experience)
  • Will be president for the 2025-2026 year (when I am applying)
  • Probably 150 hours invested into the club
• 170 hours as a paid TA for different undergraduate labs: Genetics, Cell Biology, General Chemistry.

Relevant honors or awards:

• ASBMB travel grant ($500)

I plan to apply in the upcoming cycle (2025-2026), and would appreciate any insight into the strength of my application and advice as to which schools I should apply to based on my stats. I am junior in my undergraduate, Trad, ORM applicant.

Biomedical sciences major, Spanish minor.

Seeing inequity as a rural EMT and volunteer for an underserved community has lead me to want to pursue schools focused on social justice, as well as preventative medicine.
School list:
UVA
VCU
Case Western
Harvard
Yale
Cornell
Wake Forest
UArizona
USF
UChicago Pritzker
UPenn
Mayo
Vanderbilt
Duke
UCincinnati
UPitt
UMich
NYU & NYU-Long island
Boston
Johns Hopkins
Columbia
Northwestern

Thank you!

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Welcome to the forums.

You should add all your Virginia schools. You are a strong fit with EVMS. I'd consider VT and VCOM if you want a rural (Virginia) angle. If rural is where you want to go, the Ivy+ schools you have I don't feel are good fits. It makes me question if you're just trying to dress up your application narrative to appeal to Ivy+ schools. They'll see your distribution of hours to make a call, but I have to see a little more advocacy (and non-clinical service orientation) to persuade me you are a fit with social justice schools

Would you consider HPSP or NHSC? How much work have you done with AHECs?

Do whatever you can to bump your food pantry hours up to 150 hours before applying to avoid getting screened out. High-metrics applicants like you should have at least 250 hours to be on pace with other applicants to "brand name" schools.

I would add Einstein. WashU also likes high-stat applicants. USF and Cincinnati don't seem to be a good fit to me. (UArizona?) I would suggest Dartmouth and perhaps Vermont (though you could be yield protected).

 

[certifiedloverboy]

Welcome to the forums.

You should add all your Virginia schools. You are a strong fit with EVMS. I'd consider VT and VCOM if you want a rural (Virginia) angle. If rural is where you want to go, the Ivy+ schools you have I don't feel are good fits. It makes me question if you're just trying to dress up your application narrative to appeal to Ivy+ schools. They'll see your distribution of hours to make a call, but I have to see a little more advocacy (and non-clinical service orientation) to persuade me you are a fit with social justice schools

Would you consider HPSP or NHSC? How much work have you done with AHECs?

Do whatever you can to bump your food pantry hours up to 150 hours before applying to avoid getting screened out. High-metrics applicants like you should have at least 250 hours to be on pace with other applicants to "brand name" schools.

I would add Einstein. WashU also likes high-stat applicants. USF and Cincinnati don't seem to be a good fit to me. (UArizona?) I would suggest Dartmouth and perhaps Vermont (though you could be yield protected).

Thank you so much for your reply!

Do you have any tips for what advocacy would look like now as an undergraduate? Also, would my clinical service as a volunteer EMT count towards my total service hours, or, as you suggested, are schools looking for more non-clinical service strictly? I've been wanting to do more non-clinical service at my food pantry, but they only operate every other Saturday, and I figured the quality of the hours were more significant than the number of hours. Should I look for an additional opportunity to get more hours before applying?

Since I want to go into primary care and work in my community, my goal is to graduate medical school without debt, so I am considering HPSP or NHSC. I don't have any experience with AHECs, so if you have any more knowledge on them please let me know!

Since I have the hard metrics to apply to Ivy+ schools, I figured the networking and medical influence I would develop would open many doors in my career down the line, so I thought I would apply.

Thank you so much for your time!