advice

May 09 2019

Two surprising things that medical schools really care about

Medical schools care about alot of things. They have many expectations of those who apply to their programs. They want a high GPA, good MCAT, shadowing hours, volunteering, unique experiences that make you a good candidate, letters of recommendation. These are the things that most pre-meds know about. There are however many other things that medical schools value in a candidate which they don’t put onto their website. Knowing the things that medical schools value in their candidates is what can tip the odds into your favor when applying against other strong applicants. You can leverage this information to your advantage in your medical school applications and you should. During my first year of medical school I realized two things that I wish I knew before applying that could have made my application even more competitive! I want to share that with you all.

1. You have the ability to be self-sustaining and can cope with stress

This was made surprisingly important during our orientation of medical school and through out the year by faculty. During orientation we went over about the realities of physician burnout and how medicine can be stressful. We also went over various coping strategies and self-care methods to know for at least an hour! They also spent an incredible amount of time talking about all the services the school offers for students for their well-being. Then throughout the year we had several mandatory wellness sessions that included activities such as teaching us how to cook simple meals and talking about the importance of mental health. This includes taking proper measures to ensure you have health coverage, whether through insurance or savings (HSA Future Value Calculator). So it can go without saying that they really care that their students are healthy and happy! How can you use this to your advantage as a pre-med? Simple. Make sure that you emphasize in your application and during your interview numerous ways that you cope with stress in healthy/positive ways. This could be things like running, meditating, reading books, playing sports, etc. You want this to be authentic though, you should have more to say than I like to run. Maybe mention that you have ran a few marathons. This will be more memorable and impactful than just saying you like to run. As a side note, remember you always want to try and find ways to be unique and stick out in a good way to the admissions team! Besides showing that you have ways to cope with stress you also want to emphasize that you are self-sufficient and can take care of yourself. This can be done via certain activities such as cooking or if you lived abroad before. Ultimately just try to find authentic ways you can show the medical team that you have what it takes to handle the stress load of medical schools because that’s what they want to know.

2. You can help your classmates be successful

This goes along with the last point which is that medical schools want to know that their students can handle the stress load of medical school. The medical schools are investing alot of time and resources into turning you into a doctor! They want to make sure that everyone they accept will succeed and become a doctor. They don’t want students who will give up and quit out, that represents a loss of time and resources on their behalf and makes them look bad. You must remember this when applying! They want all of their future students to succeed. That is why they require such high GPAs, MCATs, volunteering, shadowing, letters of reccomendation, etc. It is because they want to be assured that their students can succeed. This is why having the ability to help your classmates succeed is something that medical schools want in an applicant. Often times the success of students lies not just in themselves but in having great classmates who will help eachother out. Showing to medical schools that you will be a student who is group-oriented and is a team player will make them feel you are a good addition to the class and can provide some benefit to the other students.Knowing this will help you fine-tune your application to making the medical schools want you! If you can not only show that you can handle medical school and succeed but also show that you can help support your classmates do it then that makes you really appealing in the eyes of the medical school! You can show this through activities such as being a tutor, being a peer mentor, serving a leadership position in some club at school, and even if you have done alot of team sports (soccer, basketball, etc.). These activities help provide the image of someone who is team oriented and knows how to work well with others.

Alright so keep these tips in mind when you are deciding on what extra-curricular activities to choose as a pre-med and what you want to emphasize on your application! Think like the medical school and know what their agenda is. If you know what they want then you will be able to turn yourself into a stronger applicant! Its the small things like this that add up and make you get that spot in your dream medical school!

Check out this video I made on the topic! Youtube video

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Apr 12 2019

Studying advice: The rule of four passes

The Rule of four passes

As you all might know I have a lot of articles about studying advice. That’s because I believe there is a science to effective studying and anyone can improve their grades if they learn how to be an effective studier. I am constantly evaluating my methods of studying and realizing what works well and what doesn’t. It is important that we learn to be efficient with our studying methods and utilize methods that have been shown to work. You need to constantly be refining your study methods and making it more efficient for you. During my first year of medical school, I have realized yet another component to this “science of effective studying”. Something I call the rule of four passes.

So what is the rule of four passes? Essentially it takes at least four complete passes through your lecture material/powerpoint from start to finish to be able to retain it for the exam. This means that just looking at a lecture or powerpoint once or twice is usually not enough to learn the material well enough for an exam. This depends a lot also on the density of the material. This is especially true when you are in medical school and you have lecture powerpoints that are 130 slides of dense material. You won’t be able to retain the information by just going through it once or twice. It will take at least four passes through it to really retain it. Also I have found an effective way to do these four passes to get the most out of it. So lets talk about what you should do starting with your first pass through the material to the last one.

First pass:

So by the first pass I mean the first time you are sitting down and going through your lecture material/powerpoint. So essentially the main goal of your first pass is to simply get used to the material and get acquainted with it. It is not about focusing on the details or writing notes. Simply read your lecture material with the focus of just trying to understand what’s going on. Think of it like getting your bearings. You want to understand the big picture and what the lecture is all about. If there are things you don’t understand, look them up and research them. Other than that its just simply about getting used to the material.

Second pass:

The objective of the second pass is two things: Understanding the material more deeply and taking notes on your lecture material. So as you are going through your powerpoint/lecture material for the second time you want to be going slower and aiming for understanding the material more deeply. As you are going through the material you will now be taking notes, underlining and highlighting the important information.

Here are some examples of how I take notes on my slides:

Notice how I am trying to identify the things that are most important. These notes will help me during my third pass to focus on the highest yield information.

Third pass:

The objective of the third pass is to really memorize all of the important facts and information from the lecture you will need for your exam. Now that you have gone through the material twice and become well acquainted with it, you want to really focus on understanding it fully and memorizing what matters. This pass is about understanding the nitty-gritty details. Your notes and highlights from the second pass should be helpful here as it will identify what is important to focus on. Make sure you take it slower this time and really focus on understanding your material and memorizing all key information.

Fourth pass:

Essentially the fourth pass is a self-review of the all of the lecture information. Now that you have gone through the material three times you should understand the material very well and have memorized all the key information. Start at the beginning of the lecture material again and go through each slide and quiz yourself as you go through it. You want to quiz yourself on everything you can in the lecture. Make sure you understand all the things you could be tested on. Quizzing yourself as you go through the material will allow you to assess how well you know the material and if there is anything you need to work on.

Thats the four passes! You don’t have to do all four passes all at once. You want to take breaks between each pass through the material. This gives you time to absorb the information and let your brain to take it in. Its fine to even do the passes across multiple days if you want, I would personally recommend that. You can do more than four passes obviously if you want as four is the minimum I believe it takes you to be ready for your exam. If you are to do more passes through the material I would recommend focusing on quizzing yourself on the information and identifying areas to focus on. The rule of four passes really lets you know that you can’t cram for an exam and expect to do well. Doing well on exams and getting high grades has alot to do with multiple repetitions of going through information, similiar to the concept of spaced repetition I talk about in this article. I hope that you all are excited to add another tool to your study toolkit! This is a great concept to understand which will help you do better on all your exams!

Tell us what you think by leaving a comment down below! For more pre-med tips and advice, make sure to subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on Facebook, twitter, youtube, and pinterest!

Apr 15 2018

5 Tips Every Pre-Med Needs To Hear Now

The process of applying to medical school is long and complicated. It requires pre-med students to use their undergraduate years wisely to build up a good application. As a pre-med it is important to know what to focus your time on and to have a game plan on how to accomplish what you need to. After applying to medical school, these are my 5 most important tips I can give to pre-medical students.

1.GPA and MCAT are not everything. Don’t underestimate the value of your extracurriculars

Many pre-med students fall into the trap of thinking that their MCAT and GPA are the only factors that matter to whether they get accepted into medical school. This is definitely not the case! Your GPA and MCAT are certainly important but they are not everything. Your extracurricular can be even more important to some schools than your GPA or MCAT. This will be especially obvious when you are filling out your primary and secondary applications. Medical schools care about your shadowing, research, and volunteering! If you don’t have a good list of activities you have done, you will have a very hard time impressing any medical school even with a good GPA or MCAT. Remember, GPA and MCAT are just one component of your medical application. Don’t get so caught up in them that you forget to do your extracurricular activities! In fact, if you have a bad GPA or low MCAT score, your extracurricular activities can be what still give you a chance at getting accepted!

2. Start early on building your “pre-med resume”

What I mean by “pre-med resume” is your list of activities and extracurriculars that you can write about on your primary and secondary applications. You should begin working on building up your pre-medical resume as soon as possible. It is much easier to get in a variety of volunteering, extracurricular activities, and shadowing in when you have 3-4 years before applying than if you waited till the last year. My advice is START EARLY on building your pre-medical resume. Start looking for physicians to shadow as soon as possible and getting those volunteer hours in. It looks better to medical schools as well if you have a long history of volunteering than if you just tried to grind it out over a month or two. Another advantage of starting early is that you will have more time to build relationships that can lead to quality letters of recommendation.

3.Try to start finding opportunities that will present you with memorable experiences

Medical schools love to ask about memorable experiences that you have had that is related to medicine or motivated you to pursue medicine. There will be questions about this all over your secondary applications and during your interview. That is why it is important you seek out opportunities that other pre-med students probably aren’t doing. This could be things such as a volunteer trip to help serve people in an underserved area or country, volunteering for hospice, being involved in some non-profit organization, going on a trip to present your research at a conference, or even just something memorable from shadowing.

4.Learn about the school’s you plan on applying to

If you haven’t done this, do it right now. Knowing about the schools you are applying to will help you realize what the ideal applicant is for their school. If the school you are applying to values research a lot, you better make sure to get some research experience under your belt. You will have a big advantage by knowing what the schools you are applying to are looking for in applicants. This will help you tailor your application to the schools you are interested in applying to.

5. Plan out your pre-med years

Take the time to plan out your pre-med years ahead of you. Figure out what your goals are for your freshmen, sophmore, junior, and senior year as a pre-med. Come up with a game plan for how you are going to get in your shadowing, research, and volunteer hours. You also want to come up with a general timeline for when you want to take the MCAT and when you plan on actually applying for medical school. Take some time to create a document where you basically outline the way you want to allocate your time as a pre-med. This will help you stay organized and be on top of all your pre-med goals. Doing so will make your life much easier!

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Aug 07 2017

Something most Pre-Meds don’t do but should be doing!

Almost every university has one and it is there for your benefit. I am talking about your school’s AMSA or pre-med club. Most major universities and colleges have a club for pre-medical students. This club is intended to help keep you on the right track for getting into medical school and can be one of your greatest resources as an undergraduate pre-medical student. This is also an easy piece of advice to implement into your pre-medical strategy. Lets jump right into some of the benefits of joining your school’s pre-med club.

Benefits of joining a pre-med club:

1. Get valuable pre-med advice:
At your pre-med club you will be surrounded by other pre-meds, often ones that are closer to applying than you, who will be able to help answer any pre-med related questions you have. If you want pre-med advice, there is no better place to go than to your university’s pre-med club.

2. Meet like-minded people who will help keep you on track and motivate you to try harder:

This might be one of the most important reasons to join the pre-med club. Meeting like-minded people will greatly improve your own success. Simply by being around other people who share a common goal will motivate you to get more involved in pre-med related endeavors. We are the average of the five people we hang out with the most. So by spending more time with hard-working and high achieving pre-med students, you will in turn become a hard-working and high achieving pre-med over time. Spending time with other driven pre-meds will keep you on track.

3. Discover opportunities you wouldn’t have otherwise:

Your pre-med club will most likely have the connections to be able to get you opportunities that you need for your medical school application. This includes things such as volunteering, shadowing, and research. If you need help finding extracurricular activities, there is a good chance you will find them through your pre-med club.

4. Can lead to leadership roles and letters of recommendation:

Another great opportunity that can be provided by your local pre-med club is that it can lead to leadership roles and letters of recommendation. If you spend enough time with your pre-med club, there is the real possibility of landing yourself a leadership role in the club. This is something that will look nice your medial school application. Also many pre-med clubs have a science faculty member/teacher involved, so this can also lead to getting a nice recommendation letter!

So how do you find your university’s pre-med club? There are a few ways:

– Ask your pre-med advisor

– Do a quick google search

– Browse through the list of clubs and organizations on your university’s website

Once you find your school’s pre-med club, go to it as soon as possible! From the networking to all the opportunities it provides, being a part of your pre-med club can make a huge impact on the success you find as a pre-medical student. I hope this article helped to inspire you to find and join your school’s pre-med club if it has one. Search right now for it and schedule a time you will go there!

Tell us what you think by leaving a comment down below! And for more pre-med tips and advice, make sure to subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on Facebook, twitter, and pinterest!

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Feb 18 2017

Frequently Asked Questions by Pre-Meds

Check out our page where we answer some frequently asked questions that pre-meds have! There is also a link to a downloadable pdf!

This is a good place to start if you are a new pre-med! Check it out!