<p>Future neurosurgeon talking here :)</p>
<p>Haha, but in all reality, do you guys have time for fun or is it all just "OMG RAWR MCATS-GPA-RESEARCH GAHHH"? :P</p>
<p>Btw, I'm a junior in HS right now.</p>
<p>If you are doing it right, you will.</p>
<p>^ agree, in fact, the only person I knew who had that attitude didn’t get into med school.</p>
<p>You have to be good at managing your time. </p>
<p>If you keep up with your studies (don’t cram for exams), keep up with your assignments, then you should have time for some R&R. </p>
<p>Not many kids are studying on Friday nights. ;)</p>
<p>Mother of one med student and one senior pre med here…</p>
<p>I can assure you than neither of my kids spent Friday night languishing in the library stacks. Both had multiple recreational and social activities they participated in all through college. </p>
<p>Like m2ck said–you need to be good at time management and self-discipline. </p>
<p>Besides if you study 24/7, your brain rots and you turn into a zombie.</p>
<p>Father of premed (plans on being a future neurosurgeon, too). S is very involved but it took him a little while to figure it out. Year 1 he didn’t get too involved. He did have fun but wasn’t involved in many ECs. As he saw how others were involved, he figured that if he didn’t stress out over each grade of every assignment, quiz & test, he could get involved in other activites. Might have gotten a little over involved year 2 but grades didn’t suffer too much and found a good balance year 3. The key is time management. You have to schedule everything from classes to meetings to study time to fun time.<br>
One of the worst things you can do is skip having fun. You need some down time from studying plus the other thing you do will make you a better med school candidate.
Good luck! The fact that you are concerned about it and are asking shows you have a leg up on most students.</p>
<p>Some colleges have a good cooperative learning atmosphere – U. Rochester and Caltech, etc. my s1 is in the 1st team of ultimate frisbee and frequenctly travels. I think it hurt his gpa a bit. whenever his cell phone butt calls me or my wife, we keep hearing laughters of both girls and boys, so i even suspect he is having too much of a social life. 
So, to answer your question, OP, you can have a social life, just do a better job at managing time and gpa than my s1 (who WILL make a medical school somewhere) and you will be fine.</p>
<p>Pre-meds have great fun (if they are not anti-social hermits) and even Med. Students have life, although Med. School is tons harder and much more time limiting.<br>
My D. was even in Sorority which was one of her best experiences and she was on club sport team, for one year though, that was a bit too much. She also did all of her EC’s and had an awesome job during school year, while having almost nothing to do and relaxing with her HS friends during her summers (no single summer class!). Trip abroad was also part of it to the place of her life long dream. And she also graduated with Music Minor (great fun with this one).
You will be fine, but academics is first priority, do not get me wrong.</p>
<p>
Miami, i kept hearing this … such as the HS -> premed -> medschool -> residency -> fellowship the difficulty grows exponentially … or something like that. I couldn’t help thinking … maybe their capacity grows exponentially too? so that at each level they can cope with it without getting killed by the work? my two nephews are in medical profession, one doing fellowship in ENT and another in MD/PhD 6th year. They kept telling my boys that it only gets harder, so enjoy while you are in HS, and my S1 took the advise seriously and enjoyed his HS years… and he is working very hard now to make one med school while s2 didn’t listen to his cousins so seriously and graduated top from his HS and he is set for a top medschool while attending a top college. So, don’t scare the kids (I know you are not, miami, but others) because some kids may listen and because human intellect/volition grows exponentially to meet any challenge at any level in the future.</p>
<p>I think the top medical school candidates are used to being busy. They were good students in high school, probably involved in a couple sports and music, participated in some clubs. They were used to being gone from 7in the morning to 6 at night then doing homework. When kids get to college, that time being “in” school moves to being about 2 hours/day, on average. You have 4 or 5 more hours in college to fill with “stuff”. Even if you spend those 5 hours studying, you still have the 3 hours you used to study in high school to do “stuff”. I thin that is the hardest transition busy kids have moving to college, TOO much time.</p>
<p>If you want to have a good life as a premed and get into a medical school after four years in college, these are some of the things you should do in HS:</p>
<p>1) Do well in foreign language so that you may be placed out of the college foreign language requirement.
2) Take AP Cal AB
3) Take AP Bio, Chem, and possibly Physics to shore up your pre-req background
4) Take AP PSY, AP Econ, Human geo to get humanity credits
5) Take AP English Language to get credits for English </p>
<p>Make sure that your college will list the these college courses and credits you earn .</p>
<p>col2cal,
There is no sense of posting here without telling the truth. If you want to hear wonderful rosy happy go lucky stories, I do not believe that Pr-Med topics is correct site. Scary stories is one thing, reality is another. One can and should work very hard to acieve his ultimate goal and enjoy his life as much as he could. Nobody in real world (including Med. Schools) is looking for anti-social hermits spending most of their time in their room studying. On the other hand, one has to have GPA very close to 4.0 in both HS and college to be successful pre-med and Med. School applicant.
Another point is, do not listen too much for anybody’s advise, know your own strengths and weeknesses, know how to have a blance in your personal life, what takes you personally to achieve and what relaxes you, makes you happy and more productive (you, not somebody else). Yes, it takes pretty mature person, and yes, some mature faster than others and that is some point to consider also.</p>
<p>MiamiDAP—that is a really odd post?? People come here TO get personal opinions/advice. If no one is supposed to listen to that advice why have a board like this at all?</p>
<p>Wow thanks for all the great responses! I’m prepared to work hard too. Are any of you guys (or your sons) finding it difficult to apply to med school? (filling out apps, going to interviews, ect.)</p>
<p>Sent from my SGH-T959V using CC</p>
<p>I found apps to be grueling, interviews were much more enjoyable, and I did them during a gap year. I couldn’t imagine doing them during the school year. </p>
<p>Since you are a HS junior, I would say worry MUCH more about your apps to college for now and put med school stuff on the back burner.</p>
<p>"If no one is supposed to listen to that advice why have a board like this at all? "</p>
<p>-if you listen to people more than to yourself, you will find out the hard way. Everybody is different. We are not proffessionals here, we do not know personality and all details of specific applicant. Actually, even proffessional advisors are just that - ADVISORS. The ultimate best decision should come from within. Again, this is my opinion, others might have listened to others with great success their whole life and follow their advice, we do not do that in our family. I am where I am now because while I listen, I avaluate my own circumstances. I expected that my kids (both are adults) will do the same and they did. This is the only way known to me. There is a lot of useful info here, there are also various opinions of various people all of whom have very different backgrounds, including me.</p>
<p>Thanks for all this advice! What about pre-med is so difficult? Surely it must be the internships/research/MCAT, because you can major in an easy major right?</p>
<p>If you can’t make it into med school without enjoying college, you need to find a different field. As great as being a doctor can be, it’s not worth having a miserable undergraduate career.</p>
<p>As far as difficulty…it’s a different sort of thing. Being a good resident is far different than being a good student. And the time commitment is also very different. As a resident, your schedule is dictated to you, there’s not a whole lot of choices. Then again, even as a pre-med, you’re not going to choose to work for 16 or 28 hours in a row. Residency programs tend to follow the ACGME work hour rules closely…as a soon to be a first year fellow, I can tell you the rules are more like guidelines. In pediatric critical care (what I’m doing), our call is taken in the hospital no matter what, so our hours are probably pretty close to the rules, but specialists that take home call…the heme/onc and neurology fellows (among others) at my children’s hospital are on call a week at a time. They don’t have to come into the hospital, but they get calls from the floor and the ER multiple times a night. That said, there are many, many, many interns, residents and fellows who have kids, are married or getting engaged, or have otherwise active social lives. You just find ways to do the things that are important to you - career, family, friends, etc.</p>
<p>I think it all depends on the college you go to. I go to a good liberal arts college and have time to socialize in addition to my studies. I have friends who went Ivy League and they are working their tails off. The key, my understanding, is to do very well wherever you go. You don’t want to be in the bottom third of your class, even if you are Ivy League.
I have friends who went to mediocre colleges but excelled and got into med school. I also have friends who went to good colleges and did ok, but had a hard time getting in.</p>
<p>If premeds plan out their work properly (and when they do work they give it total focus), then having lots of fun is very doable. Granted, the premeds I associate with, party with, and hang out with are all smart. But they also party hard, so win-win!</p>