What to do during gap year?

[Gcuvier]

Greetings SDN Community,

I am currently a senior at a public 4-year state school and have an anticipated graduation date of May 2019. I plan on taking the MCAT right upon graduation and would like to use my gap year to pay off student loans (private + fed) and gain more clinical/research experience. My questions are the following:

1. Where should I consider applying for a job given I'd like to pay off some student loans (~50k total with private and fed)? I'm willing to relocate and will have had 1 year of research upon graduation. If it matters, I am URM.

2. When should I start job searching/applying?

3. Is there anyone on here with experience with private undergrad loans willing to advise me?

I'd appreciate any help!

Thanks!

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[Roxas]

Can't comment on the research/loans, but if I could go back and take a gap year I would have tried to get a job scribing somewhere or as an EMT to get as much clinical exposure as possible. My classmates who did either of those activities were at a definite advantage, especially once we hit clinical years

 

[Catalystik]

I am currently a senior at a public 4-year state school and have an anticipated graduation date of May 2019. I plan on taking the MCAT right upon graduation and would like to use my gap year to pay off student loans (private + fed) and gain more clinical/research experience. My questions are the following:

1. Where should I consider applying for a job given I'd like to pay off some student loans (~50k total with private and fed)? I'm willing to relocate and will have had 1 year of research upon graduation. If it matters, I am URM.

2. When should I start job searching/applying?

1) Any job is fine. It doesn't have to be medically-related, so you're free to pick the one that pays best. Just be sure to continue both clinical and non-clinical volunteering of some sort during your application year.

2) It depends on whether you're planning to work as a restaurant server, in a university lab, or in corporate America.

 

[vanilina]

For my gap year I kept it simple. I worked retail which was definitely something different for me. It was the only option I had available but it worked out fine... learned a lot about people, made a ton of friends. I also shadowed and did clinical stuff at least 20 hrs a month. I don’t think anyone really cared about my job during interviews but they do like to know that you are doing something related to medicine (clinical experience).