<p>I'm pretty sure I already know the answer to this question, this thread is just to appease my parents. They think that if I get units (credits, whatever) for the research that I do at school, it'll no longer be considered an activity, it will now be a class, and medical schools won't consider it research experience. This is as absurd as it sounds, right?</p>
<p>why don’t you ask your school’s pre-med advisor instead of a bunch of internet strangers, but i think you’re right (at least I sure counted my research for credit as research experience)</p>
<p>Your parents are wrong. Research for credit (including honors thesis stuff) is “Research”. You have a better chance of convincing your parents about that with an assurance from your pre-health advisor, than our words here.</p>
<p>Research is research. Sometimes it will come as volunteering, as a paid research assistant, or for credit. The idea that they wouldn’t count it just because it is for credit doesn’t make sense to me.</p>
<p>The only place it makes a difference is your college. Most colleges say that you can either get credit or get paid but not both. </p>
<p>If you do a poster or present/write a paper, it can never get discounted as not being research.</p>
<p>A second thought that supports your parents’ view.</p>
<p>All credits on transcripts are considered to hold a certain weight. So if you take 3 credits of research, it is expected that you have spent 9 hours a week on it. If you normally spent 15-20 hours in reality, it can get discounted because your transcript gave you credit for 3 which implies 9.</p>
<p>Many seem to believe that taking too many research for credits is considered as padding your GPAs unless maybe you are an MD/PhD applicant where the research is more emphasized.</p>
<p>The students know it, and likely the college knows it as well (thus, most recognized colleges prohibit the students to take too many credits for research. After all, the research is what a graduate student does everyday; it is not the main focus of an UG student.) </p>
<p>Also, the professor who gives you grades for the research is not considered as an instructor. He or she can not be considered as one of the instructors who write your LORs. (At least 2 or 3 such LORs are required, I think.) He can be an “additional” LOR writer though. The reason is that he does not give you a test and can not evaluate you against other test takers in the same class.</p>
<p>It is somewhat like an independent study in high school. The grade is really not the same as the grade that you receive in, say, a chemstry class in which you really need to take tests and to be evaluated against peer students. It does not carry as much weight.</p>
<p>Many students tried to use this to pad their GPA or increase their odds of getting As.</p>
<p>I believe that D. got something, not sure, 1 credit or whatever. What getting credit has to do with the Med. School though? I am confused. D. did not need to pad her GPA anyhow, she had straight As.</p>
<p>She was in research for 3 years during school year. It really was not her most time consuming EC at all, she loved it.</p>
<p>Thanks for the help. All research for credit at my school is P/NP so it can’t be used to pad a GPA…also I was told your PI can only be counted as a primary LOR if you take the class for credit.</p>
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<p>I actually do not know whether this is “safe” or not for sure.</p>
<p>Norcalguy (a long time CC contributor if you do not know him) once posted that, if you take the research class for credit or grade, he is still not considered as an instructor because he does not give you an exam and evaluate you against other classmate in the tests he gives. The med school requests LORs (those required ones, not the optional ones) from INSTRICTORs. His point is that a professor is not neceesarily an instructor. Only when you take a "traditional class with midterm/finals) from him, he is cosnidered as an instructor by the med school.</p>
<p>In other word, the research (and its related credit or grade) is the icing on the cake, not the cake itself.</p>
<p>DS’s premed advisor at his school asked DS NOT to count his PI’s LOR as one of the reuired LORs by the instructors. It is likely that the premed committee at his school (which has “pumped out” well too many med school applicants year after year) knows the rule better than most of the premeds.</p>
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Like texaspg posted (or at least implied) in his post above, taking the research credits may reduce the need for the student to take the same number of traditional/regular classes which curves the grades for the students. It is not fair for other students who take more of the regular classes. Its reasoning is the same as the following: Many top schools do not allow a students with AP credits to take fewer classes each semester. As such, the AP credits only allow you to take more advanced classes in lieu of the more introductory classes, i.e., the AP credits are used for the placement purpose only, not for the students to have the advantage of taking fewer regular classes each semester.This is done in order to be fair for all students, comming in with more or fewer AP credits. Actually, at many top schools, having APs essentially do not give the students anything other than enabling the students to take more advanced classes (useful for those who want to get BS/MS in 4 UG years though.)</p>
<p>I should also point out that (this is especially true at a research university) if you join a high profile research project and the PI is not particularly “kind” to the UG students, it could consume more time than you could spend on the research. It could hurt your grade or your relation with the PI, whose LOR is required for applying to some top research med schools if you has a PI. Each year, many students at top college got burned by this when the PI expects them to contribute, say, 50 or even 70 percents of their time.</p>
<p>I get what you’re saying, my first instinct was also not to consider them as an instructor, but I called and asked Boston University’s med school (who only want instructor LORs) and they said if it was on my transcript then it counts…though it probably varies by school. I only really care because here at Berkeley it’s really difficult to get to know many science professors since their classes are so huge.</p>