What was one extracurricular that stood out the most from your application?

[deleted947805]

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I was wondering what unique thing you did during undergrad and how it had a huge impact in making you stand out amongst other applicants. Please do share what you believe caught the admissions committee’s attention when reviewing your application.

Thanks 🙂


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[ciestar]

My nonclinical volunteering. Not quite sure what drew all my interviewers toward it, but many of my essays/life experiences worked together with it. My passion for service for the underserved shown through which is probably what got me over the hump despite my very average stats.

 

[freedoctor17]

Similar to ciestar, it was my nonclinical volunteering with underserved. A lot of my essays also revolved around it and it was the thing I always got asked about. It played a big role in my why medicine though so that's probably why. My second most asked about one was probably tied between my research and my teaching experiences, but both much less than the first.

 

[EMS0821]

Either AmeriCorps or firefighter. Both got brought up at each interview.

 

[Hass_Love_Fitness]

I started a successful business; that’s always something that gets asked about at my interviews.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

My time as a pro musician. The military too, but almost everyone has been the most interested in my music career. Except one guy, but he was prior enlisted so he wanted to hear about that a lot.

 

[Lucca]

MD interviewers usually want to hear about my time as an interpreter at a free clinic. I didn’t do it for an insane number of hours or anything (only about 100) and I wouldn’t say free clinic experience is very unique either but interviewers always ask about it.

In terms of what stood out the most I dont think I had one super “unique” experience moreso than a bunch of little very interesting experiences (interpreted for legal teams helping refugees seek asylum, worked with an organization that helps run an advanced physics summer school in Palestine to increase access to biomedical research at Palestinian hospitals, edited several campus publications, was a camp counselor, won writing awards, etc).

What I thought would be my most major non-research EC, the >1000 hrs I put into a leadership position where I got a lot of pretty substantial stuff accomplished, has barely been brought up!!

 

[H.E. Pennypacker]

I did the usual types of volunteering and it seemed to be helpful, but my most rewarding was assisting with the music at a local church near campus.