Hey all! I'm a first-time applicant to medical school, and I stand to be the very first doctor in my family. It's been 2 years since I graduated college and I'm really hoping I won't have to stall my application for this cycle. While my stats alone shouldn't preclude me from putting at least a few T20s on my list, I understand that my lack of non-clinical hours might hamstring my application. I'm abroad right now, but I'm set to begin volunteering in the arts as soon as I return.
I'd rather not take any of those goofy ahh SJTs, but a recent marathon of John Wayne movies is making me want to add some TMDSAS schools to my list (and by extension, Casper to my list of things to do...)
----------Demographics and SES ------------
Ethnicity/Race: White (Ukrainian/American)
SES Disadvantaged Status: Nah. Paid my way through 5 years of undergrad through my side hustles (crypto, side biz, art comms, flipping stuff during college) and jobs. Likely won't graduate with any medical school debt either.
Family BG: My father fled to Florida from the former USSR when it was in it's deth-throes (was a high-ranking naval officer on a nuclear sub, even he is shocked that he slipped through the cracks) and has what we assume to be the equivalent of a master's in electrical/mechanical engineering from the naval academy. He currently works doing high-level "tech stuff" for the Department of Defense and gave me a hobbyistic love of computers from a very young age. My mother has a bachelor's in business but has worked as an art teacher for the better part of the last ~ 15 years (heavily influenced my love and appreciation of the arts).
----------The Good Bits ------------
----------School List (in no particular order)------------
OHSU
JABSOM (went to high school in Hawaii)
Renaissance
Albert Einstein
UCSF
UCSD
Keck
Stanford
Brown Alpert
Emory
U.Mich
U.Pitt
Duke
Dartmouth
Icahn Mt. Sinai
I'd rather not take any of those goofy ahh SJTs, but a recent marathon of John Wayne movies is making me want to add some TMDSAS schools to my list (and by extension, Casper to my list of things to do...)
----------Demographics and SES ------------
Ethnicity/Race: White (Ukrainian/American)
SES Disadvantaged Status: Nah. Paid my way through 5 years of undergrad through my side hustles (crypto, side biz, art comms, flipping stuff during college) and jobs. Likely won't graduate with any medical school debt either.
Family BG: My father fled to Florida from the former USSR when it was in it's deth-throes (was a high-ranking naval officer on a nuclear sub, even he is shocked that he slipped through the cracks) and has what we assume to be the equivalent of a master's in electrical/mechanical engineering from the naval academy. He currently works doing high-level "tech stuff" for the Department of Defense and gave me a hobbyistic love of computers from a very young age. My mother has a bachelor's in business but has worked as an art teacher for the better part of the last ~ 15 years (heavily influenced my love and appreciation of the arts).
----------The Good Bits ------------
- cGPA and sGPA: 3.74 and 3.71 respectively. Biochemistry major (chem-heavy) and Biology minor.
- MCAT aggregate + section scores: 520 (131/127/132/130)
- State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US) OR, but with heavy CA ties
- Undergraduate institution or category UC school
- Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer)
- Scrub Technician in plastic surgery clinic ~500 hrs
- Volunteer in various positions at Kaiser Permanente - 300 hrs (most involved direct patient interaction pre-covid, last ~100 or so manning the welcome desk / running supplies in ER)
- Research experience and productivity
- ~300 volunteer and ~2200 paid hrs over 3 years in Govt/Institutional joint neurodegenerative disease lab
- ~30% mouse surgery (mostly stereotactic survival ops, some weeks doing terminal perfusion/tissue collection nearing study-specific time points)
- ~50% basic biochem wet lab (golgi-cox, flow-cyt, HRR, IF, IP, PCR, etc.)
- ~20% managing and babysitting other premeds (maybe leadership experience??)
- 3 pubs + 1 oral presentation at a national conference (w/ 1st author abstract)
- ~300 volunteer and ~2200 paid hrs over 3 years in Govt/Institutional joint neurodegenerative disease lab
- Shadowing experience and specialties represented
- ~25 hrs Pediatrics
- ~25 hrs Vascular Surgery
- ~50 hrs Interventional Radiology/NIR
- ~50 hrs Plastic Surgery (cosmetic) -> eventually turned into paid clinical
- Non-clinical volunteering: none... oopsies 🫠 Though I intend to begin with arts-related volunteering when I get back from Mexico. With my mother's help, I found an amazing group that helps immigrants tell their stories through the arts
- Non-clinical work experience (largely from my gap years)
- Worked as a single-project (~4 months) consultant for a large financial advisor. Helped with sourcing and vetting material for a "science/biotech newsletter" sent to clients of the firm
- Currently working as a consultant (~1 yr to date) for a tech company in an ongoing series of projects that may/may not be related to AI and the sciences (signed an NDA which is quite restrictive)
- Honors and awards
- idk, Dean's list most terms
- A gold star on an orgo midterm 🌟
- Extracurriculars, hobbies, etc.
- Experience with several programming languages: JS, Py, C++, ...Blueprint if visual scripting counts
- Small side-business building and selling computers (been doing this since high school)
- Fine Arts: Bunch of physical works sitting around the house, commission pieces over the years (3D modeling assets and illustrative work)
- Traveling: took ~3 months of 1st gap year to travel all over Europe, and walked the Camino de Santiago with my mom. several trips to Latin America and back to Europe with friends/family
----------School List (in no particular order)------------
OHSU
JABSOM (went to high school in Hawaii)
Renaissance
Albert Einstein
UCSF
UCSD
Keck
Stanford
Brown Alpert
Emory
U.Mich
U.Pitt
Duke
Dartmouth
Icahn Mt. Sinai