OP- training someone in medicine is an extremely labor intensive and expensive process. So a college evaluating a teenager for a program which will spit out a physician in 8 years needs to check a LOT of boxes.
1- Academic rigor and high performance
2- Hands on experience with actual sick people- not a statistical analysis of advanced diabetes in the homeless (which is fantastic experience, but isn’t the same as realizing- close up- that some of the people you will be seeing as a doctor or even a med student have gross, smelly, horrible conditions and you can’t be grossed out if you are going to get an accurate medical history).
3-Demonstrated maturity- a BS/MD program is not for emotional late-bloomers
4- Evidence of ability in math and science, coupled with the readiness to work really, really hard at mastering these subjects even if they don’t come naturally. So having your AP Chem teacher talk about how motivated you were and how hard you worked to turn your first semester B into an A is great-- you don’t need to be brilliant at everything.
Don’t get caught up in the “8 AP’s are better than 7” game. 8 AP’s are great if you do well in all of them and have paced yourself appropriately and have left time to explore what being a physician really means AND being an actual person (eat, sleep, exercise).
But you don’t need to kill yourself in HS to become a doctor. Plenty of people do a normal 4 year college, major in music or philosophy or history while taking the med school pre-req’s, and that’s perfectly acceptable. Especially if it will expose you to other career paths you don’t know much about, and might prefer to medicine.
Do you know what biostatisticians do? Very cool field. And does not require getting thrown up on every day during your ER rotation…