-Director of Admissions, Care Extenders Premedical Internship - 1 year, 900 Applications reviewed (200 hours)
-$5K fellowship to research bioinformatics and e-recordkeeping on the Med/Surgical floor of a community hospital
-Head Copy Editor, School Newspaper - 'Grammar Maven' (200+ hrs)
-University Honors Program
-Designed my own interdisciplinary Major
-Numerous awards and scholarships
-Close relationships with all of my LOR writers
**Advice**
--Pursue what you are passionate about, not what you think will look good!! If you lack passion, it will show in your commitment and in your LOR's. Don't be afraid to quit something you don't truly love in the pursuit of what you enjoy, even if its not medically related. Schools want to see that you can get passionate about something, not that you can jump through the typical hoops. Also, atypical activities make you stand out in the memory of those who review your file... if you can be that 'student government' guy or that 'design your own major' guy then your chances of being remembered are much better. So yeah, that's my little rant.
--If you go to a less well-known small liberal arts school you are in no way at a disadvantage. Capitalize on the fact that you have greater access to leadership opportunities and make a name for yourself!
--Prioritize the order and speed with which you return Secondaries. At schools you're really enthusiastic about, drop everything in your life and do the most amazing job you've ever done. At schools for which you have less enthusiasm, get it done well with due haste but don't pull out all of the stops... save that energy for the ones you're really into. The reality of secondaries is that you will get dumped on all at once, and you'll need to complete them in some sensible order. In my case, the schools I didn't get interviews at (or got a late interview at=UCLA) had much longer return times on the secondary. Georgetown was a month, UCLA was a month, Michigan was 3 weeks. On the flip side, Northwestern, OHSU, and SF/Berkeley-JMP were all 3 day returns where I worked for 4-6 hours/day perfecting the secondary. It seemed to work ok. The ironic thing of course is that UCSF doesn't even require an essay and that's where I ended up... so it goes.
// Applications //
Application Cycle One: 2007
Undergraduate college: Loyola Marymount University
Undergraduate Area of study: Computing and Information Science
Total MCAT SCORE: 520
MCAT Section Scores:
B/B 130,
C/P 129,
CARS 132
Overall GPA: 3.96
Science GPA: 3.96
Summary of Application Experience
I was complete everywhere by the first week of September.
