My chances at med school? I don't have many EC's, will be junior at college next fall

Pre-Med & Medical School Pre-Med Topics
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<p>Right now I go to community college and took one year of calculus, one year of gen chem, and general english/social science classes. I will be transferring to university next fall and will be a junior. The thing is, I go to community college as a part of an early college high school program, meaning, I go to community college instead of junior and senior year of high school. (And it's free for me). </p>

<p>So I will be getting my high school diploma and associates degree this June. I will be a junior at a state school in the fall. My college GPA is a 3.45, hopefully I will raise it to a 3.5 by end of this spring term. And this is my community college GPA, just from community college classes.</p>

<p>The problem is, I don't have many EC's. I worked as a computer lab assistant for a year (still working there, it's at my CC), where I monitor the computer lab and help people use computers. I am also working this term as a computer tutor where I can help people with their computer information systems homework. And no, I'm not a computer science major, never intended to be. My goal is medicine. </p>

<p>I don't have any volunteer experience which really sucks. </p>

<p>What can I do next year to get more volunteer/leadership/research experience? I really want to get into laboratory research in biology and/or chemistry. But I don't know how to ask for it at the university! How do I get into a research internship for the school year? </p>

<p>I will definitely apply for research internships at OHSU next spring, for the summer after my junior year. </p>

<p>I also want to get some leadership experience next year, such as maybe starting a club or something? What do you think?</p>

<p>Basically, what are my chances of getting into med school when I graduate with my bachelors degree in two years? Will medical school look down on the fact that I'll be 19 years old when starting medical school? </p>

<p>Any advice is helpful, I want to be as competitive as I can. Thanks.</p>

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<p>If I’m reading correctly, you’re lacking any kind of clinical experience. Plus no hospital volunteering, no physician shadowing, no clinical or lab research, no community service. That’s a HUGE negative for any applicant. That plus you’ll be 2-3 years younger than the typical applicant–another negative in the eyes of medical schools.</p>

<p>Right now–your chances for admission look very poor.</p>

<p>I would strongly suggest you consider postponing applying to medical school for at least another year. Perhaps consider taking an additional year or two complete college. It will give you time to improve your GPA, improve your ECs, get lab and clinical experience and gain additional maturity.</p>

<p>Applying to medical school is exhausting and expensive undertaking. You really only want to do it once and do it right. (Re-applicants have a higher bar to jump when it comes to getting their application considered than do first time applicants.)</p>

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<p>Would getting some shadowing experience this school year help? I’ll probably have to put off volunteering until the fall, but I might be able to get some shadowing experience by the end of June.</p>

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<p>How much is “some”? </p>

<p>An hour or two won’t help. You’ll need more in the range of 20-100 hours before you apply. Enough to convince a admissions committee that you fully understand what difficulties and responsibilities a physician’s career entails.</p>

<p>When you get to whichever college you’ll be attending in the fall, please visit with the health professions advising office. The advisor(s) will be able to help you understand what kinds of unwritten expectations that med schools have for applicants. And there are a great many expectations…</p>

<p>GPA and MCAT will only get your application through the first round of screening. Your ECs are what get you invited for interviews. Med school adcomms place a great deal of value on ECs.</p>

<p><a href=“https://www.aamc.org/download/261106/data[/url]”>https://www.aamc.org/download/261106/data&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>^This is a survey of med school admissions directors and how they rank the importance of various factors when both offering interview invitations and admission to applicants.</p>

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<p>Additionally, consider that at time of application you would like to have two years of university grades on your transcript. For that reason, attending two years of community college, one year of university, and then applying is generally not recommended, especially since your grades are not stellar.</p>

<p>Delaying by one year (that is, applying after senior year) allows you to be a more reasonable age at time of application, to have two years of university grades, and a year of work experience and other EC’s at time of interview.</p>

6

<p>The average now of most MS1 students is 24-and many of these candidates have taken a year or two off to gain some life experience before applying to medical school. There are numerous opportunities to shadow doctors and gain experience but it does take some persistence and a sense of knowing who you are and what you want to accomplish. Each medical school has a culture that fits the particular candidate they are looking for and seats in each class are prized. I worked very hard at my internship during the summer of my junior year to establish a relationship with the particular doctor I was working for in his lab. As he got a chance to see me interact with his lab staff of researchers he saw that I was serious about my commitment to go into the medical field and it was he who offered as a Section Chief in a large university affiliated hospital and medical school to personally write one of my recommendations. You cannot dismiss life experiences-after college I spent a year in a nursing home working as an aide doing many many menial tasks for patients-this gave me an insight into another aspect of medicine that was invaluable to discuss during my medical school interviews. I was very fortunate to be accepted to my state university med school whose culture was a great fit for me. Don’t underestimate what a year or two away from college can do to enhance your resume and hopefully your eventual acceptance. The advice my pre-med adviser gave in college was, “Walk on water and have someone see you do it.” I still value that advice as one of the concepts that helped me along during his very long journey in medicine that will take a life time to gain knowledge that will help me care for my patients.</p>

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<p>Aberdeen, I find your posts refreshingly positive.</p>

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<p>Thanks WayOutWestMom for posting that link. I’m trying to determine the significance of getting involved in research.</p>

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<p>Bcaha–note that research isn’t listed in the survey results because the admission directors weren’t asked about whether having research experience is considered.</p>

<p>That said, different schools value different ECs in applicants. You need to look at the mission of the particular school. Some schools want to produce primary care physicians for a region; others want to produce the next generation of academic physicians. A school from the first category will have different expectations for applicants than will a school from from the second.</p>

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<p>Students who are doing an Early Start type of HS/CC program who want to apply to med school, should almost plan on going to university for at least 3 years (applying during after that 3rd year).</p>

<p>right now, you’re about 18. If you were to apply after 2 years at your univ, you’d only be 20. that’s very young and (I think) med schools would be afraid of maturity.</p>

<p>When one of my son’s schools listed the age range of their accepted students the youngest was 21. My son was 21 when accepted, but he’ll have just turned 22 when he matriculates at his SOM. </p>

<p>Besides, you need to the time to:</p>

<p>Improve your cGPA and your sGPa.</p>

<p>Get some meaningful ECs, shadowing, and research.</p>

<p>Get to know some univ profs to get great LORs and (hopefully) get some research opps with them.</p>

<p>SOMs do not look down on kids who do Early Start programs, but don’t graduate 2 years later. </p>

<p>By taking 3 years at your univ, you can really balance your schedule with harder and easier classes in order to get all A’s. You can also include some classes for interest or classes that might make you look more attractive (for instance, Spanish). During 2 of my son’s SOM interviews, his fluency in Spanish came up. Son also took a Medical Spanish class. I think all was a “help”.</p>

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<p>I just believe that my journey into medicine has been predicated by numerous life experiences that have shaped my ability to care for others. I was diagnosed with cancer (ALL) as a junior in high school and it was a daunting experience for me to keep up with my course work, graduate, and find a way to get into a college that would be able to help me reach my life long goal of studying to become a doctor. I certainly used the experience of recovery over a period of three and a half years to view illness from a very different perspective. My outcome was fortunate-and I have continued to use the experience and my view of life as what “you can do”-as opposed to “what you cannot do.” I was able to understand that patients are part of families and the dynamic everyone encounters has a lot to do with how everyone views wellness. That is why I noted that it is important to take some time off after undergraduate studies-to determine if medicine is the field you really want to go into. And again-it’s all about balance.</p>

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<p>Streampaw- having a kid who graduated from university at a young age and another kid who is in med school, I would advise you to not apply to medical school any sooner than the summer you graduate. You need time to establish relationships with professors to get good letters, you need to show two years of solid marks in a 4 year university. You need to have volunteer time and shadowing time.</p>

<p>In addition to all this, you need to experience life yourself, you need to have some fun, explore hobbies and interests. Many students take a gap year, you might do well in pursuing that.</p>