What do you do in your pre-med clubs?

[Vikes33]

I looked and haven't seen any thread like this, but sorry if it's a repeat. My friend and I recently "took over" our pre-med club because the leadership and the club itself was failing. It has been really frustrating the last year or so to put in a lot of effort and show up to club events, and have nobody but club officers show up, and to be regarded as a joke club on campus. At my school, the pre-med students are some of the most hardworking students and it's sucked to have us regarded as a joke among all the other academically focused clubs. My question to you guys is, is there anything awesome or fun or something that you do in your club that you love? Anything you have done as club members and/or officers and would recommend it to another pre-med club? I'd love the input! We are already going to talk to our adviser and see if she has any ideas for us, and talked to some club members. But the more ideas and information I can get, the better! Thanks for your help guys, and good luck on all your finals!

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[Mavs88]

I was a part of one this semester and some helpful things they did were organize volunteer opportunities for group members...have guest speakers.

Honestly though, I've found "XYZ pre-med club" to be fairly useless.

 

[plumhill]

You need to give students a reason to show up. Guest speakers (especially doctors or admissions people) tend to draw a crowd. Offer long-term volunteer opportunities, maybe at a free clinic, hospice or somewhere else. If you aren't near any clinical sites, even non-clinical volunteering will draw people. Maybe you can do MCAT prep stuff, or get someone from Kaplan or PR to give a talk and offer discounted classes. You can partner with a local charity and offer to fundraise for them.

In short, there is a ton of stuff you can offer, but considering how busy premeds are you need to give them a solid reason to show up, especially something they can put on an application.

 

[Doctor Strange]

I took over the pre-med club at my university my sophomore year and pretty much ran it for the next three years. Some popular things that we did were:
1. organize resources for local physician shadowing and clinical/non-clinical volunteer opportunities on our website
2. invite admissions speakers from local med schools to come talk about their school and offer tips on how to get in
3. hold workshops on "facts vs. myths" of being pre-med, the MCAT, admissions process, etc.
4. hold medical student panels where we invited alumni of our university that are currently in med school to come speak and answer questions
5. speakers from MCAT prep classes in the area to talk about their program and possibly offer discounts

Our pre-med adviser was a former adcom at a top 20 med school who now works full time to advise pre-health students here, so she was heavily involved in giving talks and offering insight into the admissions process.

 

[organdonor]

My favorite meetings were when we had current medical students or admissions officers speak to the group. Bonus points if they went to your school.

It may not be ideal, but many of the Caribbean schools were ALL too eager to send someone

 

[bambam92]

Talk about ivy league gunning and ish…you know Harvard or suicide?!

 

[Mt Kilimanjaro]

I looked and haven't seen any thread like this, but sorry if it's a repeat. My friend and I recently "took over" our pre-med club because the leadership and the club itself was failing. It has been really frustrating the last year or so to put in a lot of effort and show up to club events, and have nobody but club officers show up, and to be regarded as a joke club on campus. At my school, the pre-med students are some of the most hardworking students and it's sucked to have us regarded as a joke among all the other academically focused clubs. My question to you guys is, is there anything awesome or fun or something that you do in your club that you love? Anything you have done as club members and/or officers and would recommend it to another pre-med club? I'd love the input! We are already going to talk to our adviser and see if she has any ideas for us, and talked to some club members. But the more ideas and information I can get, the better! Thanks for your help guys, and good luck on all your finals!

When I was taking post-bacc classes I went to a total of two pre-med meetings for the free pizza. One was a Kaplan advertisement/promotion given by the regional Kaplan rep. She even had "discount coupons" available on the back table. The second one was just a disorganized mess. Then the club just stopped sending out emails or having meetings. The pizza was free, but the meetings were useless.

You could do a lot of things that would be helpful and require minimal emailing/logistics. Mine your alumni network for physicians who attended that institution for undergrad (or medical school if it's affiliated). Have them come in and talk about what they do all day and how they got there. Try to get them to get specific about finances, family considerations, frustrations, rewards, etc. Have a panel of med students talk about "lessons learned" from their experiences thus far. Invite admissions officers from local medical schools to come and talk about what it takes to get in to their institution. Invite a military recruiter and/or some military scholarship students to try to sell people on military medicine. Establish a longitudinal shadowing program at local hospitals that exposes people to a wide variety of specialities over the four years and makes the "foot in the door" process less daunting. Have book club-style discussions about medical school memoirs like "This won't hurt a bit" and "what patients taught me" or "house of god." Screen movies (with free pizza) like "The Waiting Room" and "Escape Fire."

 

[Ismet]

I was a part of a very active pre-med organization in undergrad, and I'm still involved with them now through med student panels, mock interviews, big sibs, etc. We could draw 80+ people to a single meeting depending on what was going on. Some of the stuff we did/they do now:
1. Guest lecturers, mainly doctors
2. Panels - med students, research opportunities, study abroad
3. Big Sib/Little Sib with the medical school
4. Shadowing program
5. Mock interviews with med students
6. Monthly volunteering
7. Alternative spring break to a rural West Virginia town to do blood pressure, glucose, etc screenings
8. Tour of the med school's anatomy lab
9. Suturing workshop on pig feet
10. Sunday study sessions every other week

and finally, we planned a big pre-health conference every year and invite the local Pittsburgh universities as well. Large school fair, speakers, workshops, mock interviews, information sessions, etc. Usually draws 300+ people. I know that would be a big undertaking for people who just took over the club, but maybe it's something you can work towards if your school is big enough.

If you're affiliated with a med school, activities with them are always good. The 10 things I listed above were our most popular meetings and activities.

 

[futuredoc8000]

I looked and haven't seen any thread like this, but sorry if it's a repeat. My friend and I recently "took over" our pre-med club because the leadership and the club itself was failing. It has been really frustrating the last year or so to put in a lot of effort and show up to club events, and have nobody but club officers show up, and to be regarded as a joke club on campus. At my school, the pre-med students are some of the most hardworking students and it's sucked to have us regarded as a joke among all the other academically focused clubs. My question to you guys is, is there anything awesome or fun or something that you do in your club that you love? Anything you have done as club members and/or officers and would recommend it to another pre-med club? I'd love the input! We are already going to talk to our adviser and see if she has any ideas for us, and talked to some club members. But the more ideas and information I can get, the better! Thanks for your help guys, and good luck on all your finals!

Well, when there is free food people show up. I am just a simple member of the pre-health club at my school (there's no pre-med, just pre-health), and when they had free bowling and pizza, heck I was there!
Free food and free entertainment is a way to get people to show up. Post flyers about pre-med events/meetings, and make sure to include in large bold font at the very top of the page: FREE PIZZA.

 

[masaraksh]

Whoops. I never attended a pre-med/pre-health club.

 

[Starry]

Free food is definitely the best initial draw. Then, add the stuff @Ismet said so people will think, "Hey, I can actually get something out of this that will help me get into med school/boost my resume!"
Events that are simply bowling or "fun" stuff is not the best for attracting people. Few will show up. As you said, pre-meds are hardworking and generally won't waste time doing something that doesn't provide much value. They'd rather be volunteering or shadowing or studying or the 99999 bazillion things pre-meds do.

 

[chillaxbro]

Give away tshirts that say "Trust me I'm a pre-med"

 

[Omppu27]

Basically everything everyone else has said. Also don't feel as if the club needs to meet every week. Biweekly or monthly would probably be better.

 

[TeddyBoomBoom]

Give away tshirts that say "Trust me I'm a pre-med"

haha lol

 

[shinsoochoo]

also give away t-shirts that say "trust me. I'm almost a doctor" 🙂

 

[Boolean]

Give away tshirts that say "Trust me I'm a pre-med"

We've got the "Trust me, I'm (Almost) a Doctor"

 

[Boolean]

also give away t-shirts that say "trust me. I'm almost a doctor" 🙂

Beat me to it! Didn't even notice.
I've noticed a good number of clubs also push for diversity. Anyone else noticed this? Not necessarily through direct membership, but I've noticed that most clubs like to have quite the wide array of diverse volunteering opportunities

 

[Ismet]

Beat me to it! Didn't even notice.
I've noticed a good number of clubs also push for diversity. Anyone else noticed this? Not necessarily through direct membership, but I've noticed that most clubs like to have quite the wide array of diverse volunteering opportunities

Technically the pre-med club I was in was geared towards minorities in medicine as it is the undergraduate chapter of SNMA, so many of our guest lecturers were minorities or discussed healthcare inequality. But we welcomed everyone and our membership was quite diverse, seeing as how we were the only pre-med group that was active weekly and had an official tie to the med school.

In terms of volunteer opportunities, something manageable we did was have a small volunteer gig each month. Volunteering at a soup kitchen, making valentines to hand out at the children's hospital, habitat for humanity, cleaning up trash in the community, etc.

 

[Vikes33]

Wow totally haven't been checking this at all, finals week got a little nuts. But thank you guys for the suggestions! It's a little tough because our state only has one state school, and isn't that close to us. But I love all the ideas! I think after midterms are over next quarter that we are going to do free pizza and a screening of Doctors' Diaries. Myself and the other president discussed basically really similar things to what you guys posted, but also talked about reserving a study room and studying in smaller groups. I think the benefit of a pre-med club is not just to help find ways to pad the resume, or even just WHOLE club bonding because that seems pretty forced and not very genuine, but meeting a few other pre-meds who are just as dedicated and at the same stage of classes or the application process. Because a lot of my classes are filled with people who want to get their PhDs, and so this is a really good way to make a few friends going through the same stuff. We are just trying to build that kind of community a little bit more for the pre-meds on our campus, which I think is pretty cool. Happy end of finals everybody!

 

[amazing tekkers]

We had guest speakers which included med students, physicians, admission committee members. We also had volunteering such as 5ks, preparing food, bonding events, etc.

Provide free food and people are bound to show up. Put out flyers, send emails, what have you.