MiamiDAP

"I found that I had ample time, during my first 2 years of med school (preclinical at my school), to pursue non-medical interests. "
-Not the case with my D. at all. No time whatsoever. it does not mean that she does not participate, she does in more than most others. But she has no time to even call us while walking home from classes. She usually goes over material in hear while walking. Her good breaks are doing dishes (no dish washer) and doing laundry. She participates in musical, tutoring of HS kids in her area, interviews Med. School applicants, president of religious organization, she went abroad after first year, she visits her UG and us back home, but it is nowhere near what she was doing during school year at UG.

MiamiDAP

"Once med school starts it's not the end of your life"
-I would say opposite, it is, Based on D's experience. Her school does NOT "cram the 2 preclinical years into 1 year" . But her 3rd year starts in March of second year and she has only one summer off (after first year) - which are probably the case with most Med. schools anyway. There is no denying, academics is very rigorous, especially amount of memorization. There is not much conceptual material, which would make it somewhat easier.

somemom

DD is in clinical years now, she would say she had more time years 1&2 than now, but she did not realise it at the time
Yes, she did play on some rec level sports teams and rock climb in med school, but not to the level she had in undergrad.

kristin5792

The schools represented on this thread are a top state school, an Ivy, a private in the NE, a private in the midwest, (my) state med school, and whatever yours is. Two of us are students and the others are parents of current students.

I'm currently a second year at a state med school in the midwest. I didn't mean in med school you have zero time to yourself; just that, compared to senior year of undergrad when I had nothing required except to fill my time with fun classes, it's significantly less. Another thing that's interesting to me is that (at least at my school) med school makes it very clear that they own your time, and if they tell you to be there, you're there. Come in on a Saturday to learn ophtho exam? Done. Get here at 6am to round on patients? Done. Stay until 8pm for other required things? You betcha. While most of my schedule is predictable (I probably only have 1 thing at a time outside normal school hours a week), I find that required things preclude having a predictable schedule for hobbies or for having as much free time as I did in undergrad.

At the same time, I probably lump a lot more things into "med school" than I did into undergrad. For example, in undergrad, I had classes and extracurriculars and free time--so time spent "doing school" was kind of minimal. But in med school, my extracurricular involvement is hard to separate because it's all related to school--things like hosting kids who are interviewing, or taking on leadership roles at our free clinic, or meeting with various faculty about research projects, or mentoring premeds, or going to interest group meetings, etc. So, I lump all of those activities into med school and thus conclude that I have substantially less time for fun stuff and free time than I did in undergrad.

I guess the point I was trying to make is that an open senior year would be a great time to explore all those interests because you will have nothing BUT time during that year; and while you can find time to do things you like during med school, at least in my experience you have to be a lot more choosy with your free time because there's not as much of it and it's not as predictable.

i_wanna_be_Brown

As always, agree with Kristin. By no means do I mean my life is over now but it's much more focused.

In college I was a double major in science and humanities, a division 1 athlete, heavily involved in Greek life, and a Kaplan tutor. I usually only opened a book the week of a test and was only in class for about 2 hours a day.

In med school I'm in class more like 4-6 hours a day (sometimes 8 as a second year), studying for hours almost everyday, and outside of class I'm involved in student government and admissions. So just like Kristin, my extracurricular activities are far more school related, and my coursework is entirely medical.

Did my life end with med school? No. Did my opportunities to do things wholly unrelated to medicine end when I started med school? Not quite but pretty close.

TatinG

Keep in mind that at this point it's all about getting in to med school, a good med school.

Other considerations are secondary.

And she does have a life. As I said, she's learned surfing. She has a lot of friends and social activities.

Bartleby007

I think y'all had a different undergraduate experience than I had. In college, I did a lot of research (10-15 hours/week), took a challenging course load, and was involved in a handful of extracurriculars. Academically, college was far more challenging than med school ever was. Med school was predominantly rote memorization -- in that respect, more like high school than college. The difficult thing about the 3rd-year of med school was the time crunch (long hours during medicine and surgical rotations, in particular). When you're getting up early to round on your patients (sometimes in the neighborhood of 4am), it ain't pretty. That being said, the first two years...and the fourth year...were very manageable. Then again, that's just how it was at my med school. It may also have something to do with my academic preparation prior to med school. YMMV.

We all make time for the things that matter to us. If I wanted to talk to my parents, I always had time to do that. During my first two years of med school, if I wanted to go on an early morning or late-night dive or run, I was generally able to do it (provided that I didn't have to take a test that morning). For the record, in the first two years of med school, I heard lots of whining from several of my med school classmates about the lack of time they had to themselves outside of studying. The whining stopped once we hit 3rd year for a couple of reasons: (1) they realized how much free time they actually had in the preclinical years and (2) they were too busy to whine. :-)

To get back on topic...
I absolutely agree that a fourth year in college would give the OP's daughter more time to "explore" academically...and non-academically. It may also give her more time to mature and/or gain life experience that would be helpful in her future medical career. Arguably, the older students in my med school class -- those who had taken one or more years off prior to med school -- made the best doctors. (But that's just my opinion.) That being said, there are advantages to rushing through school as quickly as possible (start "adult life" sooner, begin paying off educational loans, have a family, etc.). As long as the OP's daughter makes an informed decision, she can't go wrong.

I maintain that med school admission committees don't view graduating in 3 years as positive or negative.

kristin5792

You must have gone to an awesome undergrad--you're the first person I've heard of who thought college was far more academically challenging than med school was! It's nice to see the variation. I can't imagine an undergrad that's considerably more academically challenging than med school! Heck, undergrad was practically a breeze for me, save for a handful of quite difficult classes, and I absolutely loved having plenty of free time to grow up and learn about myself and get heavily involved with my community, student organizations, leadership, research, clinical work, job etc etc while building relationships with friends, family, and mentors.

It's cool that the end result was the same--both accepted. Guess it really proves the point that if you're doing things the best way for you, and in the process build a strong profile for med school, you'll get there one way or another.

Bartleby007

@kristin5792: Many different paths...

I went to Harvard for undergrad. I can't say enough good things about the school -- academic opportunities, exposure to the arts, advising, interesting fellow students, etc.

Over the years, I've talked with medical buddies who majored in different disciplines (bio, classics, psych, English, economics, etc.), attended different colleges (East Coast schools, UCs, Stanford, etc.), and matriculated at various med schools. We agree that the preclinical years of med school were very manageable for those of us who majored in a "hard" science in college. (I majored in biochemistry.) For the most part, 4th year was a breeze, particularly after 3rd year, which was painful/fascinating/exhausting at times.

Good luck with the rest of school. You have so much to look forward to. You're really going to enjoy the clinical years!

TatinG

Well, she's going to mature and gain life experiences either way. The choice is not in going to med school a year earlier. It's whether to take a minor and spend the fourth year in college or graduate in three and spend the gap year doing something else.

MiamiDAP

"Academically, college was far more challenging than med school ever was. Med school was predominantly rote memorization "
- I never understand this type of claims, First there is the statement about how easy Med. School is, then the statement of rote memorization. Not easy for everybody, most find rote memorization is absolutely the hardest part of any academics and others ("math" type of people, who never tried and never needed to memorize anything in their lives and ended up in engineering and IT) find memorization is close to impossible. That is what my D. claims is a very hard part, amount of memorization. I personally cannot remember what I did 30 min. ago have no idea how to put in your head that much.
So to me first saying that it is easy and proceed saying that it is memorization is a huge contradiction.

somemom

Bartle- maybe I missed it, but where are you now in the process? Resident?

Oh, Bartle's comments were a catalyst for me to recall some MS1 first term stories. As I have said before DD has a diagnosed learning disability such that she got extra time in HS on timed tests (AP/SAT, too). I noticed in HS that when they got to the more difficult stuff there was a lot of whining from classmates, not her, the busy work of studying had always been a challenge for her. Same at UG and then in her MS1 year many of her friends really struggled at first, class had always been easy for them, studying had been easy. All of a sudden there was more info than they could process their old way. There was terror, there was gnashing of teeth, there were tears, there were failed exams & even failed classes. By the end of that term most of them had figured out their best way to study.

DD never had that problem and I recall specifically that she went away for a weekend before one of her first major exams, some friends from far away were going to be nearby so she went with them. DD did some serious soul searching before taking the weekend off (since her roommate studied from breakfast until bedtime including flashcards on the cereal boxes) wondering if she (DD) was slacking, but really what had happened is that due to her LD she had been over faced with more work than she could easily handle as a kid, she figured out her ways to study and that carried her through UG and med school.

So, yes, she did have an easier time than many classmates in term 1 of MS1 as she did not go through that struggle to learn an new study style. Maybe Bartleby honed his skills in undergrad and found MS1 easier to deal with due to that knowledge.

MiamiDAP

....I cannot say that UG was a breeze for my D. at all. Very very challenging, but Med. School is much, much more than that. However, she ended up with straight As in UG, but she had very few easy classes. Chemistry was one of them and she ended up to be offerred SI position, but that was an exception and she still prefers anything connected to chemistry, kidneys were one of her favorite at Med. School, she said that nobody else liked it though.

Bartleby007

A "minor" means very little to a med school admissions committee.

On the other hand, if your daughter were to do something worthwhile and medically-related during a "gap year," the committee would certainly take notice.

I'm reading between the lines here...but I'm going to predict that your daughter's decision will be greatly influenced by how she performs on the MCAT next year:

• High score: apply to med school next year and graduate from college in 3 years

• "Average" score: study and re-take MCAT; will probably apply to med school in the summer after her junior year and graduate college in 4 years

• Low score: study and re-take MCAT (perhaps multiple times); may consider taking some time off before med school

@somemom: I'm out of school now (no residency)...doing research.

@MiamiDAP: Where did your daughter do her undergrad? What was her major?
For the record, I don't see there being a big contradiction at all between saying something is easy...and in the next breath saying that it was pretty much rote memorization.

somemom

Memorization is not necessarily hard, I have heard it is learning how to memorize the sheer quantity they throw at you in med school is hard. And it takes time, lots of time, more than some students were accustomed to using for studies.