What do you wish you had known?

[supersnakess]

---

Members do not see this ad.

I thought this would be a good place to post this. I'm still in high school, and it's not like I'm studying for the MCAT or anything, but I'm interested in pursuing medicine. So, what, as people who are having to reapply, would you have done to get yourself into med. school. Specifically, what do you know now that you wish you had known then.

Thanks.

 

[BNHWC2009]

I thought this would be a good place to post this. I'm still in high school, and it's not like I'm studying for the MCAT or anything, but I'm interested in pursuing medicine. So, what, as people who are having to reapply, would you have done to get yourself into med. school. Specifically, what do you know now that you wish you had known then.

Thanks.

That's smart. If you know you want to go into medicine don't get distracted. Make sure you choose some close friends who want what you want and who will be able to motivate and support you. Make sure you are friends with a few pre-med students at your college who are a year or two ahead of you so they can give you specific advice (I.e. which classes to take and when, which profs are best, advice on getting LORs, apps, etc). Watch them go through the process and ask questions. Learn from them. Lastly, don't waste your time worrying over partying, guys, etc. Everything in moderation, but don't lose sleep (or study time) over it. Hope that helps. Props to you for asking--that's really smart. Keep it up through college, work hard, and I'm sure you'll be ready for med school in no time 🙂

 

[DocHawk117]

Get clinical experience early. Buy this book for your application "Perfect Phrases for Med School Acceptance". Get an internship http://people.rit.edu/gtfsbi/Symp/premed.htm . As much clinical exposure as possible will ensure that this is the career path for you (most important), look great on AMCAS, and most likely result in great LORs. Also, sign up for MCAT in nov/dec, so you can take it and have results by May/June. Then, submit your AMCAS as early as possible (no reason not to have it in on June 1).

 

[soccrwon]

I thought this would be a good place to post this. I'm still in high school, and it's not like I'm studying for the MCAT or anything, but I'm interested in pursuing medicine. So, what, as people who are having to reapply, would you have done to get yourself into med. school. Specifically, what do you know now that you wish you had known then.

Thanks.

I've learned that:

People will tell you that it's ok to get Bs and Cs as you are "adjusting" to college life your freshman year. Those people are doing you a disservice by trying not to hurt your feelings (mom and dad I'm looking at you! 😉) Know the core classes that you MUST succeed in (General Chemistry, Biology, Organic Chemistry, Physics) and ensure you receive As in these courses.

Learn how the science GPA is calculated for the MCAT and be very aware of your total GPA and science GPA as you move through school.

Contact your pre-med department at your school and set up quarterly or semester appointments to meet with them, discuss your progress, and give them the opportunity to get to know you as a person. Some schools require that the pre-med department write them a recommendation letter for med school. Find out if your school does this.

Starting freshman year, find a place to volunteer that interests you (hospital, clinic, etc) and continue this volunteering throughout college. Not only does it look good on your app, but it will help you confirm whether or not medicine is the career for you.

Know that you need to obtain at least three letters of recommendation from professors to go into medical school. Freshman year is a bit early to begin angling for these, but make a point to attend professor's office hours, ask about their research, and get used to talking about yourself and what interests you. Then, your soph and junior year you can find a professor in the sciences and non-sciences that you know well enough to have them write you a letter.

Find out what the MSAR is. Look at medical schools in your home state and surrounding area. Look at the average GPA and MCAT score of applicants who get into these schools.

If you are a perfect pre-med robot, you will do all these things. If you are human, as many of us are, you will find yourself will hobbies and interest that don't necessarily align with medical school, but are interesting and rewarding. You'll struggle with classes, develop better study skills, and possibly still fail. And you're going to have a great college experience!

(But seriously, guard your science GPA with your life. I mean it.)

 

[TriagePreMed]

Always take the easy professors. Never fall into that lie of challenging yourself. Max the hell out if your pass/no pass units on unimportant classes; it's the only way to have free time. take other bs classes like piano or golf because it'll make you sound well rounded while being lazy. Always go to office hours. Some teachers are softies and will take it easy on you. At worse, you learn more and get a good recommendation. Look for research and volunteering early on. And never ever trust your counselor.

Sent from my SCH-R910 using Tapatalk

 

[GoSpursGo]

Moving to hSDN.

 

[Drrrrrr. Celty]

I wish I had known that there are so many Liberal Arts Colleges in my state that are both incredibly easy to do well in, cheap ( Give good scholarships), and have small class sizes. Don't fall for the prestige lie and think that a lesser gpa from a high ranked school ( Save for Harvard) will be worth more than a high gpa from a low ranked school.
Make sure you have a decent amount of extra curricular, but remember quality is better than quantity. So doing 2-3 good ECs for 1-2 years >> 6 for 4 months each. But also don't let your EC's low your gpa.

 

[QuizzicalApe]

Hit the ground running in college. If you make mistakes in your first semester, you can absorb them with good grades later but it is a lot easier on you if you just don't make those mistakes to begin with.

Don't overtax yourself. You have a limited amount of time. If you have hobbies, friends, and classes, you may not want to strain things by also throwing in a job.

Something that I didn't intentionally do as a strategy but did anyway and you should too: Read for fun. It absolutely does not matter what. Read voraciously and relentlessly. Philosophy, crime novels, wizards, biographies, whatever. Get used to reading, parsing, and understanding. It will make so many of your future tests (and you have oh so many of them) easier if you develop as a critical reader with a broad vocabulary.

Clinical volunteering and shadowing matters. Get some out of the way early in college and keep doing some now and then to avoid the stress of rounding up just as much in a shorter time later.

 

[penguindoc2012]

I've learned that:

People will tell you that it's ok to get Bs and Cs as you are "adjusting" to college life your freshman year. Those people are doing you a disservice by trying not to hurt your feelings (mom and dad I'm looking at you! 😉) Know the core classes that you MUST succeed in (General Chemistry, Biology, Organic Chemistry, Physics) and ensure you receive As in these courses.

Learn how the science GPA is calculated for the MCAT and be very aware of your total GPA and science GPA as you move through school.

Contact your pre-med department at your school and set up quarterly or semester appointments to meet with them, discuss your progress, and give them the opportunity to get to know you as a person. Some schools require that the pre-med department write them a recommendation letter for med school. Find out if your school does this.

Starting freshman year, find a place to volunteer that interests you (hospital, clinic, etc) and continue this volunteering throughout college. Not only does it look good on your app, but it will help you confirm whether or not medicine is the career for you.

Know that you need to obtain at least three letters of recommendation from professors to go into medical school. Freshman year is a bit early to begin angling for these, but make a point to attend professor's office hours, ask about their research, and get used to talking about yourself and what interests you. Then, your soph and junior year you can find a professor in the sciences and non-sciences that you know well enough to have them write you a letter.

Find out what the MSAR is. Look at medical schools in your home state and surrounding area. Look at the average GPA and MCAT score of applicants who get into these schools.

If you are a perfect pre-med robot, you will do all these things. If you are human, as many of us are, you will find yourself will hobbies and interest that don't necessarily align with medical school, but are interesting and rewarding. You'll struggle with classes, develop better study skills, and possibly still fail. And you're going to have a great college experience!

(But seriously, guard your science GPA with your life. I mean it.)

Agree with everything above. Your GPA is key. If you get a low GPA, be prepared for an uphill battle, one that may add years to your quest to gain acceptance to med school.

 

[iforget2]

Be aggressive when looking for volunteering opportunities, shadowing opportunities, and research opportunities. These things aren't just going to simply show up for you to sign up for. Many of them you need to fill out an application and go interview and compete against other students who want these opportunities just as much as you do. Start looking early and apply for as many as you can, even if you're a freshman.

 

[WellWornLad]

Don't take pre-med offices or pre-med students too seriously. They know the basic rules very well but are generally clueless on what makes a med school applicant stand out. When you are standing on the other side of the application process you'll see how incredibly homogenized 75% of the applicant pool is, like they all followed the same recipe for baking a pre-med cake. Well guess what, the adcoms are stuffed to the nuts with pre-med cake and would much rather talk to someone who took some independent direction in their life that falls outside the traditional pre-med playbook.

If you want real advice, find a 4th year med student on the admissions committee of his school (just don't do it the year you are applying or it will look inappropriate).

 

[kthon9]

During high school, take as many AP or PSEO classes that you possibly can. Once you get into college, you can hit the ground running with your science classes. I did this and it helped enormously once the MCATs rolled around because I had learned all the information needed and then some. I was able to take the MCAT early and get my apps ready early.

Also, one mistake I made was that I jumped around to a bunch of different extracurriculars. Pick something and STICK WITH IT. Start volunteering at a hospital right away and do that all through college.

 

[Drrrrrr. Celty]

I regret not realizing that it doesn't require a crap ton of connections to volunteer at places. If I could go back I would try to start volunteering at the start of my freshman summer.
I would also have tried to get some research early so I could have gotten a pub.

 

[davidbm95]

If I could give you some tips that weren't mentioned that much I would say volunteer consistently not all over the place in 20 different hospitals... Stick to a couple for the long run (Med schools love consistency).

Another piece of advice is check the professor out online at ratemyprofessors.com BEFORE you take the class and trust me this will help tremendously because you will hopefully go far the best professors.

 

[davidbm95]

Agree with everything above. Your GPA is key. If you get a low GPA, be prepared for an uphill battle, one that may add years to your quest to gain acceptance to med school.

I agree, an upward trend from a low GPA shows a rising applicant and can look great on your app, but obviously you never want to start out with a high GPA to begin with.