WAMC?

[deleted1161377]

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[Mr.Smile12]

What non clinical community service have you done? You have a lot of clinic adjacent activities so it helps you if you can show you don't need to be in a clinical or health/wellness environment to care for people.

 

[deleted1161377]

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[Faha]

Where is your state of residence ? Your low GPA, and to a lesser extent your lack of non clinical volunteering, will limit your chances at top tier schools.

 

[theoceanman]

Although you research is impressive, you lack community service and mission-fit to more than half the schools on your list. It's not that your stats are a problem, but rather I think you haven't been involved with your community enough nor shadowed enough to recognize the purpose of being a physician and the populations you want to serve. You should shadow more in primary care such as FM/IM/Pediatrics. You should also achieve more clinical experiences, especially given your 2.5 years off from undergraduate, and also aim to achieve quite a few community service experiences that allow you to grasp an idea of what population base you would like to serve in the future, such as rural or underserved.

Although I hate to say it, but your school list, with schools such as UPenn, Cornell, Columbia, Vanderbilt, Emory, etc. all being heavy on mission-fit and getting hundreds of applicants with your stats but more service, I think it will be difficult for you to get interviews from there. You may be very limited to the schools you can apply to, with many potentially screening you out due to low shadowing hours and lack of community service. I would recommend potentially postponing it another cycle, as tragic as that may sound.

 

[deleted1161377]

My state of residence is PA, and I have a MA tie. I am not attached to my list and would rather apply to lower schools than wait a year.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Thank you for your response. I have about 80 hours of non-clinical volunteer experience (teaching children biology and doing more general community service internationally).

I should also mention I have about 35 hours of shadowing experience.

Tough love time. You need to take a growth year and boost these numbers up.

You will likely be eliminated during screening for not reaching 150 hours at submission in clinical experience and 150 hours for non-clinical service orientation experience... in the US. You need much more service orientation to have a shot at many of the lower tier schools.

If you are intent on not being a reapplicant, I would suggest adding DO schools. Still, they would probably yield-protect due to your high MCAT (only 25% matriculated with AACOMAS applicants in your range of GPA/MCAT, 64.3% AMCAS acceptance).

You have a decent shot for Ph.D. programs at medical schools; I guess you could apply MD/PhD if you really wanted to take your shot there though you still need the service hours.

 

[theoceanman]

My state of residence is PA, and I have a MA tie. I am not attached to my list and would rather apply to lower schools than wait a year.

Although it is difficult to hear to take a gap year or a year off as that's one less year of being an attending in the future, it is the best course of action considering that you will be screened out by, metaphorically, 99% of schools; yes, even the "lower tier" schools because most of those "lower tier" schools have applicants that attempt to make up their less stellar stats with huge invested interest in community service, clinical outreach, and meaningful experiences that show that they are fit to be a physician.

Due to your current application being unable to meet the minimum clinical, non-clinical, and perhaps even shadowing experiences (most schools with your stat range expect 150+ hours, with a 100 hours in primary care focused shadowing), you will not only be yield protected by DO schools, but you will also not fit most of their mission and values, such as commitment to serving the rural and underserved populations across the US, even some schools targeting specific areas (PCOM South Georgia for example). Unless you show serious commitment to the DO philosophy, such as clinical experiences under DO physicians only, etc., you will 100% be screened out.

Your current mission-fit hardly shows passionate commitment to medicine and depicts more of a commitment to academics, such as a PhD, or a researcher. I'd recommend watching Ryan Gray's episode of a 520+ MCAT, 4.0 GPA student being rejected from every school they applied to and taking notes on what his advice was on improving their application: I believe this will provide key insight into a direction that you should take your application towards during your gap year or potential extended research year.

 

[LindaAccepted]

I agree that your school list is top-heavy, especially given your GPA. Was there a trend to your GPA? Extenuating circumstances?

Congrats on the MCAT, but there is a disconnect between your grades and your score.

There also seems to be a disconnect between where you've spent most of your time and your goal. You seem to be more interested in the lab than the clinic based on where you've invested the most time.

I think a year devoted to clinical exposure and service would improve your profile a lot.

 

[Faha]

My state of residence is PA, and I have a MA tie. I am not attached to my list and would rather apply to lower schools than wait a year.

I suggest these schools with your stats:
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Penn State
Commonwealth Geisinger
Pittsburgh
Vermont
Quinnipiac
Hackensack
Hofstra
Einstein
New York Medical College
Albany
George Washington
Eastern Virginia
Virginia Commonwealth
Wake Forest
NOVA MD
Tulane
TCU
Medical College Wisconsin
Rosalind Franklin
Western Michigan
Oakland Beaumont
Belmont (when it opens)
Apply in June and submit all secondaries by July