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Wednesday, 04 November 2009 07:49 |
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Travel and lodging make up the bulk of the costs when getting into medical school. Here are some ideas for saving money on lodging for medical school.

- Hostels: If the medical school is located in a large metropolitan city, then there most likely will be travel hostels. Although many will be travelers on holiday, you can still book a night or two at a hostel instead of paying top dollar for living at a hotel.
- Student Hosts: When you are offered an interview, ask if there are any student hosts for interviewing applicants. Many medical schools will have such a program where you can stay a night at a first or second year medical student. Not only will you get a roof over your head, you will get a chance to learn more about the medical school before the day of the interview. The next day when you interview, it will seem as if you did a lot of background research on the school.
- Schedule back to back interviews: Many schools will try to accommodate your interview schedule especially if you are studying overseas at the time you are applying. Just ask nicely if you can schedule your interview to a closer date and the admissions office may be willing to reschedule your interview.
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Last Updated on Wednesday, 04 November 2009 08:07 |
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Friday, 30 October 2009 02:45 |
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It is better to see an applicant have a long term commitment to a clinical, research, or community service experience than to have many short 2-3 month experiences. What better way to show that you are a focused and committed individual than by doing something for 2-3 years instead of just 2-3 months.
In addition, long term experiences give you an opportunity to increase your responsibilities in that organization or to make deeper discoveries in your research. For instance, many schools have free clinics staffed by volunteer physicians and prehealth undergraduates. If you stay long enough in the clinic, you can advance your volunteer position to one that takes patient histories to one that helps manage the student run pharmacy or manage the staffing of the clinic. Don't forget, admission committees are also looking for leaders and people who can demonstrate team work. |
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Last Updated on Friday, 30 October 2009 08:01 |
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Saturday, 31 October 2009 10:00 |
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Medical schools are going to give you an education but what will you give to the medical school in return? Think of previous jobs (i.e. full time EMT, firefighter, etc). cultural background (i.e. grew up most of life in Latin America), economic hardships (i.e. grew up in impoverished town in Central California Valley), unique skills (i.e. concert pianist, etc.), or unique college experiences (i.e. started a health outreach clinic, student body government president, NCAA swimmer) that could help the incoming class.
Previous Jobs: Were you a firefighter, full time EMT, healthcare management consultant, etc. ? These previous jobs add unique dimension to your incoming class. You would be able to provide a different perspective to the incoming class. For example, in health care policy debates, you can provide the point of view of a the insurance company if you've had previous job experience as a healthcare management consultant.
Cultural Background: Growing up in a foreign country would give you an interesting background that would contribute to the incoming medical class. If you grew up in the United States, you could still have been very involved in your culture by participating in a cultural dance group back in undergrad, etc.
Economic Hardships: If you are talking about economic hardships, talk about the challenges you overcame and how these challenges affected your decision to enter medicine, such as the lack of accessible health care in your area. Don't make this a sob story about you. Don't try to elicit sympathy from the admissions committe.
Unique skills: I'm amazed how many of my classmates are extremely good musicians (some even perform at the university symphony level) or competed at collegiate level swimming. Think of what unique skill sets you have that would contribute to your class.
We don't want just smart medical students, we want smart medical students that have additional skills or backgrounds that would enrich the experiences for their classmates and future colleagues.
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Last Updated on Saturday, 31 October 2009 17:00 |
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