<p>I absolutely love playing the piano but sadly I haven't been able to play for over a year (Piano was destroyed by parents =(, family issues etc.). I was playing at a grade 1 level after a few months of practice from scratch but now I think I'm back to that scratch level. I know the basics so I should be able to progress quickly. </p>
<p>Anyway, It's too late to really help me now for my undergraduate admissions but I am wondering how much learning the piano will help me with graduate school admissions? I want to go into med school so I will be applying around my Junior year of college. I will have about 4 years of practice until that point (piano practice) and I plan or practicing as much as I am now (1-2 hours a day). I hope to get to at least between grades 5-7 by the time I have to apply for med school. I am wondering if this will help me get in or if it only matters if I am playing at a grade 8 level by admissions time (unlikely, I mean it's grade 8 for crying out loud!). I am not doing this only for school as I really want to learn how to play beautiful music but I think it would be a plus to know if getting between a grade of 5 to a grade of 6 (or 7 if I turn out to be really good) in about 4 years will help me get into med school. This will help me find that boost (if it's true) whenever I feel overworked or tired.</p>
<p>I may be able to send in one of those music supplements as even at grade 5 the music given is great and seemingly difficult to people who don't play music.</p>
<p>You can say that you enjoy playing piano, and it might help with admissions and help them get to know you, but I doubt that a med school will admit you just because you play piano.</p>
<p>For med school, it’s just your hobby – something about your overall “story” but no med school will give you an advantage b/c you play in instrument.</p>
<p>I am not sure I understand your post…are you in high school or in college? </p>
<p>If you are in high school, or just beginning college, realize that a lot of students who initially plan on going to med school change their minds. Sometimes they discover an interest they did not even know they had. Sometimes they discover that they cannot compete academically against the other med school hopefuls.</p>
<p>What med school admission committees really care about are your grades…both your overall GPA and your science GPA, and your MCAT score, and also, your medical related ECs…(volunteering, shadowing, researching, internships etc),and of course, your letters of recommendation.</p>
<p>They won’t care about whether or how well you play the piano as that has no bearing on your ability to do well in med school and become a competent doctor.</p>
<p>But the fact that it is not important to med schools does not mean that you should not learn to play piano if it would give you pleasure…it could be a great stress reliever. And it could be a nice thing to talk about at med school interviews.</p>
<p>Out of curiousity…are you self-taught? And why did your parents destroy your piano?</p>
<p>I am in High school going into my senior year and I know what you mean and have already considered it all. I meant for this post to kind of say if I have all that, will the piano make a considerable difference. I understand that an amazing GPA is required and that everything else you mentioned is equally important and I was just wondering if playing the Piano in addition to all that would help. Also the reason you put forth in the first paragraph is the very reason I am not applying to a BS/MD program as I may very well change my mind. I want to learn the piano just as a personal accomplishment and as, like you said, a stress reliever. I am mostly self-taught alhough I was able to finally start lessons a few weeks before blah blah blah happened. And I would rather not go into why my parents destroyed my piano but it was a family issue not concerning me and my poor piano (digital but still costing a pretty penny) was caught in the cross fire. It was a victim of circumstance. Mainly I was just wondering if with everything you mentioned above, would the abiity to play the piano aid my resume a great deal?</p>
<p>No. It won’t aid your resume much. As others have said, it’s nice to show some that you have an interest in something in your life besides medicine - but that’s purely on the margin. You can just as easily show an interest in cooking, yoga, kite-flying or anything else that gives you pleasure…it’s not always about achievement.</p>