Winter semester/ECs

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Accalia

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Hey guys,

My school has a 4-1-4 schedule, so I take a month-long class in January. I thought this would be a good opportunity to get in some extracurricular-type activities (or just to take some great classes and meet great people). I have a few options, which I broke down by category, and I would like any advice you could offer. Categories are in bold, and individual classes/activities are separated by commas.

Teaching/mentoring: public school teaching/tutoring/mentoring in NYC, mentoring/decision-making program for abused children, college awareness program

Volunteering (non-teaching)
: resettling refugees in Maine, internship in any field in Georgia (the country, not the state--I would do something medical, if I did this), community screening for Alzheimer's Disease, eye care in Nicaragua (this last one sounds amazing, but is really expensive)

Research: Bio, Chem, Biochem or Psych (I would try to get placement in a neuro lab) at my college--good thing about this is the possibility to continue, though I am graduating next year

Field work/shadowing: can pretty much be anything in a medical field or medical research lab

Public Speaking: there is an Ethics Bowl course and a public speaking one, which might help with interviews

Medicine-related courses
: "Epidemiology, Public Health, and Leadership in the Health Professions" , Cardiovascular Medicine, Global Health (I'm really interested in epidemiology and public health)

Note: I am interested in *all* of these. None of them would be taken just to improve my application.

So far I have EMT-B volunteer work, shadowing a pulmonologist, T.A.ing EMT, tutoring Bio and Chem, a bit of volunteering (just a few hours a week taking leftover food to shelters/the Salvation Army) two summers of psychology research at different labs, and a semester of independent research (no publications, posters, etc. from any of my research though). I will also do a semester long empirical lab project in behavioral medicine next year.

Thanks so much ahead of time!

E.T.A. If I stay on campus, it is possible to do more than one of these things.

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It looks like you have pretty solid, well-balanced ECs. Maybe a little bit research-heavy from my perspective, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I'd recommend doing something clinical (unless you have a research project that you just can't turn down). I'd say that aside from your interest, taking a course would not be as important as a volunteer experience.

If I were in your spot, I'd take Epi and find a hospital where you can do some volunteering (cliche, but everyone does it).
 
It looks like you have pretty solid, well-balanced ECs. Maybe a little bit research-heavy from my perspective, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I'd recommend doing something clinical (unless you have a research project that you just can't turn down). I'd say that aside from your interest, taking a course would not be as important as a volunteer experience.

If I were in your spot, I'd take Epi and find a hospital where you can do some volunteering (cliche, but everyone does it).

Thanks for your input! Wow, I would never have thought that my ECs were research-heavy, especially since it's all psych research and isn't continuous. I'm also looking at ways to incorporate leadership experience into my profile. I'll admit that I'm not sure what exactly counts as leadership, but I'll browse other threads for that. Maybe my EMT T.A.ing would, seeing as it was a reasonably intense T.A. position (volunteer, at least 4 hours a day, 6 hours a week during January, and I held review sessions up until their exam in March).

By the way, I love your screenname, DendWrite. :D
 
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