<p>There are no best bets. A first author pub in nature/nejm/etc wouldnt get you an acceptance. Just do your best in college and when the time comes, maybe you’ll be a superstar. It’s great that you have big dreams, but get into college first.</p>
<p>Depends on what you mean by “special.” In my opinion, if you want to make HMS a safe bet, I think this is the bare minimum:</p>
<p>4.0 GPA from top UG school.
45 MCAT.
Multiple 1st author papers in nature, science, cell, NEJM, and JAMA.
Founded a charity organization that benefits some population of underserved people and should probably be generating at least 1 million dollars/year in donations.
Since you’d obviously be so unbelievably talented, you’ll probably need phenomenal essays explaining why you’re going into medicine instead of the many other paths available to you.
Multiple LORs from well known physicians that have worked closely with you all stating that you are the most outstanding student they have ever encountered and that they plan on using you as their future personal physician.
Absolutely amazing interview experience. In other words the people who talk to you for 30 mins should be absolutely in love with you by the end of it and feel the same way as your LOR writers.</p>
<p>Now, obviously plenty of people are admitted to Harvard with less than that - but I assume you’re asking about things that make it extremely likely you’ll get in - not simply the bare minimum that is capable of getting in (what floridagator described).</p>
<p>Enjoy.</p>
<p>OP - The people who seem to stand out are those who made the cut for Rhodes, Fullbright, Churchills etc. I met someone about 4 years ago who had just completed his Churchill’s scholarship, was part of Rice/Baylor but got into Harvard during the off year and was going there instead.</p>
<p>The college you go to also makes some impact. As Raycmr mentioned, many of the Ivies fill their seats with students from other Ivies or top 20 schools. The current Stanford freshman med class has 40% of students from just 4 schools - Harvard, Yale, MIT and Stanford.</p>
<p>Check out the colleges MD/PhDs attended.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.hms.harvard.edu/md_phd/downloads/Spring%20Grad%20Book.pdf[/url]”>http://www.hms.harvard.edu/md_phd/downloads/Spring%20Grad%20Book.pdf</a></p>
<p>I would add to IWBB, it would also help to save humanity from AIDS and malaria. Only in case, if you are interested in Med. School at all after you accomplish that. My guess that you would be awash in millions of $$$ if you do, so HMS may not look as attractive any more.<br>
Get acceptance to top 20 is NOT a big deal at all. My D. has done it. She did not have MCAT 45, she did not have a single publication. She applied only to 8 Med. Schools. She did not apply to the very top schools at all though.
She has spent lots of time with her friends in HS and UG, very outgoing person. This is her main strengh now. She was told by several people in charge and some patients that she has a talent in bedside manners and connecting to others in general. There is no talent here, it is a skill that you can only develop if you are seeking to be with different type of individuals.
As I said, have fun, spend time with your friends, look for them in different area of you various activities, this may pay off big time later.</p>
<p>Phoenix – I’m a doc and I know dozens who’ve graduated from Harvard, Yale and Stanford medical schools. Some were from elite undergrad schools but most weren’t. Their secret? I don’t think they even know. All of them save one are great, but none of them are really that “special”. In medicine, prestige is not what it is in undergrad or in many other fields of endeavor in the US. Look at the bios of the heads of dept of surgery at Harvard, Yale, Hopkins and Stanford. Their positions are extremely prestigious. Their alma maters ( undergrad and med) are not – certainly not by the standards of this website. Harvard undergrad and med make the average person gasp in awe. It makes doctors yawn. I have a kid at Harvard.</p>
<p>^undergrad or med?</p>
<p>UG. And it’s great; she’s extremely happy to be there and does well. We are so glad she likes her school and is doing well and we feel very fortunate to be able to provide the experience. But she knows, or at least we have told her several times, that it is not a promise of success or happiness. She’s there, like everyone else who’s there, because she kicked a** between the ages of 14-17. I mean that’s great, but so what? It’s meaningless unless you keep doing it, and it seems to us that it get’s harder and harder to do it as you get older and older. Sometimes those kids who were lost in high school or even indifferent college students find their calling a little later than the HS uber achievers.</p>
<p>There are people being admitted from everywhere when you look at every member of the admitted class. When you consider that there are hundreds (thousands?) of colleges out there, you have to wonder why a large percentage of admitted class is filled with students from elite colleges. It might come down to the same traits that got your daughter into Harvard, i.e., they try to excel also in college. I was reading profiles of top graduates this year from Harvard and one of them deferred her admission to med school to continue working on her business.</p>
<p>[Harvard</a> class of 2013: stellar seniors | Harvard Magazine May-Jun 2013](<a href=“http://harvardmagazine.com/2013/05/senior-standouts]Harvard”>http://harvardmagazine.com/2013/05/senior-standouts)</p>
<p>OTOH the American colleges produce competent doctors, wherever they study.</p>
<p>…very ggod pints, starsky. In the same type of logic, mine also kicked a** between the ages of 14-17 and continued in UG and still continue Med. School where everybody "kick a** " with progerrisvely more impressive results. She graduated #1 from the most regorous private HS in our area…and had not deisre whatsoever to apply to ANY Ivy / Elite, graduated as a top pre-med from her UG with several special recognitions…and again with no desire to apply to the very top Med. School…but ended up at the one of her dreams way back in HS. No, she never cared for prestige, but currently in the same class with many from Harvard and others of similar prestige and good number having advanced degrees.<br>
Is my D. at any disadvantage because she went to public state UG and is in the class with many from Elite UGs? Not according to her grades (so far), Step 1 score or any other feedback that she has received. Her great advantages as I have mentioned before are top communication skills and Foreign languages.<br>
Frnaklym I am not promoting one way or another. It is important to be where you feel happy. If it is Harvard, then go there, if it is osmewhere else, then go somewhere else. The idea is the same for both UG and Med. School.</p>
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<p>Several of my classmates and I would comment that we attended public high schools, public colleges, public medical schools, but we were at Johns Hopkins residency with a bunch of residents who went elite all of the way. Were we at a disadvantage? No, we were way ahead with finances and debt we didn’t incur. That’s it. Knowing what I know now, would I have attended Johns Hopkins or Harvard for medical school instead of my state school? Absolutely not!!! I continue to refer to special clinical cases I saw during med school because of the location that gives me a big advantage to this day. If you get in to HMS and it fits your goals, go for it.</p>
<p>Maybe it is more the case with females (I never believed that genders are the same. After raising a S. and a D. and having GrandS and GrandD., I am convinced that males and females belong to the different species), my D’s primary concern has always been her fit into specific student body. Currently after going thru several rotations she has also found (which was a prediction all along) that different specialties attract different personalities and as always, she feels that she just does not belong in some environments. She realizes that she had gone only to one place and it could be different from place to place within the same specialty. But she will not have a chance to check this out. So, she will have to use her experiences (as small as they are) to make her decision.<br>
Looking back, while finances were always on our mind and the goal was no loans or as low as possible, D. had chosen places that she felt that she belonged. It has been important for her and it has been working for her. But, after she has attemded the most expansive HS in our area (tuition Merit award was very helpful), she was on a full tuition Merit award at UG. It just happened that the public state that she fell in love (and still is) also offerred her a great financial package. Also looking back, it seems to me as a parent that choosing the right HS was the most crucial. This was also the most difficult decision, discussions lasted for 2 years and D. finally agreed to go to the one of her parents’s choice. She thanked us many times over for that.
Other decisions were much easier, we did not interfere, except telling her not to choose Med. School based on price tag primarily because we did not pay tution for her UG and felt that she desrves to forget about money at this point. She was ready to go to the cheapest on her list, but after our encouragements ended up at the most expansive. She likes it so far. No loans so far either, but we are ready for any events, so she is applying to fin. aid every year, then she declines them.</p>
<p>So basically, theres nothing like USAMO, USABO, USNCO, or any similar tests/competitions in undergraduate that would help boost my chances when I apply to med school if I did well on them?</p>
<p>No. If it were that easy, everyone would be doing it.</p>
<p>Having watched both of my children go thru the med school admission process. I have to say that from the outside the process appears to be “quirky” and “unpredictable” at best. Stats/test scores are just small part of the holistic admission process used at most schools.</p>
<p>I think that’s the case if you look at the individual school level - but if you look at the overall picture of who gets into any medical school vs. no medical schools it’s not that quirky or unpredictable.</p>
<p>^^I agree. I should have said on a micro-scale the process is a quirky and unpredictable, but not a macro-scale. (But I was more interested in getting dinner on the table than going back to fix my post.)</p>
<p>WOWM… Dinner being served and no virtual invites? 
</p>
<p>Hmmm… </p>
<p>When did you submit your application to attend dinner? </p>
<p>Was your application verified before the Nov. 1st dinner invitation request deadline? </p>
<p>Did you submit both a primary request and a secondary request that including answering a set essay questions explaining why you want to be invited to dinner and how you promise not to be a picky eater? </p>
<p>Did you pay your non-refundable dinner guest application fee? </p>
<p>Have you allowed time for the dinner guest selection committee to review your request and consider whether you’re the kind of entertaining dinner guest the household prefers?</p>
<p>If you did, have you checked your spam filter to see if your [possible] invitation got misdirected? </p>
<p>Otherwise, you can check the status of your dinner invitation using the your assigned dinner guest registration number and the 27 digit alphanumeric password emailed to you when you submitted your original dining request.</p>
<p>Thank you for your interest! ;)</p>
<p>ROFL WOWM… ya killing me!</p>
<p>Luckily for me, I have learned enough through you that those questions would have been pre-requisites for the inivtation, so I did follow the “unwritten guidelines” . </p>
<p>After paying the required secondary fee and no rejection was received. I knew immedidatly that my II was on its way and wala, there it was in SPAM. So thank you very much. I have now withdrawn from all real life dinner invites. </p>
<p>WOWMom,</p>
<p>Dinner on the table over CC? Time to re-evaluate your priorities.</p>