Graduating college early?

twogirls
Wed, 20 Mar 2024 14:02:57 +0000

Volunteering in a food pantry or standing at a supermarket educating customers about HIV are certainly admirable and important activities.

Let me share what my daughter did- she was premed but realized after graduation what she really wanted to do. The purpose of my post is to share what other “high stats” premeds have achieved:

She spent 2 years during undergrad working with refugee families. She visited a family of refugee status… once a week for 2 years… and helped them navigate school, parent teacher conferences, the US medical system, paper work, doctors etc. The family did not speak English.

She joined a program after graduation and spent 2-3 years teaching in a Title 1 school. She developed lesson plans that reflected student cultures, advocated for students who were transitioning, advocated for students with special needs, helped families find mental health resources, helped organize a town hall meeting following an event that rattled the school community, raised money for a STEM lab etc. She also learned from her mistakes and was able to reflect on them- for example - when showing a video about climate change…one of the students raised his hand and asked why none of the kids in the video looked like him. She acknowledged her mistake and learned from it.

It was these experiences that helped her with the grueling interviews she had when she interviewed for school (solving problems, handling differences, challenging situations, reflecting on mistakes etc).

And my kid is NOT unique… at all. These experiences… these gap years… provided her with the experiences she needed- not just for med school apps (she changed her mind), but for grad school interviews.

I do not know what you mean by “colorful.” Her experiences, her work… was very hard.