RE: what to do during a gap year between undergrad and med school.
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get a full time job. There are clinical and research positions that many med school hopefuls do during their gap year. But the job doesn’t have to medically or clinically related.
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work part time; volunteer part time to improve your ECs
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volunteer full time to improve your ECs
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AmeriCorp, Peace Corp, Teach for America, any NGO
D2 worked for 2 years as a program manager for a neuro-psychiatry research group at a med school. Her fellow med students did all of the following: taught middle or high school; worked as a nutrition and diabetes educator with the Indian Health Service; worked as a medical scribe for a primary care group; worked as a medical assistant for a primary car doctor; worked the front office for a medical practice; worked as an animal care technician in a research lab at the VA; worked as a BME at a National Laboratory; worked as a MCAT tutor while volunteering with a science enrichment program for middle school girls; worked as a community organizer for a public health organization; NIH research fellow; full time on-site organizer in central Africa for an international NGO; military service. Plus a wide assortment of hourly wage jobs.