Ways to Make Medical Schools Want Your Body

My husband is a-freaking-mazing!!!  He interviewed with "The" Ohio State college of medicine today and ROCKED IT! I am bursting with pride over here for that Scottish stud! Applying to medical school is time consuming, expensive, grueling, and a whole bunch of work. Wow! It is a lot of work. A lot a lot a lot of work. Should you be contemplating such a feat here are a few steps you will need to take

1.  In elementary school, steal homework as a kindergartner because your five year old self is two years ahead of your classmates

2. Also in elementary school, be really competitive. When you see other kids going to the gifted program, do everything in your power to get into it too.

3. When you get into junior high and high school, continue to be academically competitive. As in, you not only need to be acing all of your classes, but you should probably be ranked first or second in every single class you are in. You should probably give the graduation speech too because you took high school, bent it over your knee and spanked it till it obeyed your every command.

4. Also, be competitive in athletics and maybe win a few wrestling state championships.

5. You also need to get involved in everything you can while in high school. Student council, multiple sports, service and joining the "I am a freaking super hero" club

6. When you get to college, you should probably be one of two or so freshman on campus that do so well academically, they actually earn all the scholarships the rest of the freshman lost during their "college is much harder than high school but who cares cause we can stay up all night long and eat ramen" phase.

7. Ace all the prerequisites to get into a competitive major and then continue to ace all your classes in your major

8. Ace all of those ridiculously challenging science perequisites for medical school

9. Ace every. single. class you take in college. If you don’t, be prepared to offer an amazing reason as to why you did NOT ace those classes to explain to those nazi medical schools that will scrutinize every single grade you got in college.

10. Be involved in a trillion service groups. Be an intern with the Volunteer Health Care Clinic. Volunteer at Headstart. Volunteer at the mental hospital. Volunteer at the American Fork hospital. Volunteer with community clean up. Volunteer until you spend more hours volunteering than attending classes

11. Also, you need to be involved in leadership activities. Why not volunteer to be the program director of Headstart?

12. You also really need to learn another language. Maybe you could live in Germany for two years and then minor in it and then obsessively love it for the rest of your life

13. You should also continue your streak of sportsmanship you started in Jr. High and get involved in intermural sports. You should probably do intermural tennis cause you probably look dang good in all white and you really, really should do Rugby. Cause that brunette girl that has been checking you out from day one will probably stalk you and force you to marry her when she finds out you play one of the toughest and most entertaining sports ever created. (You might be able to skip this one if you aren’t into stalkers) You might have time to do collegiate athletics, but probably not considering the above things you need to be doing.

14. You also need to be involved in research. Your pick. Neurological research might be right up your ally. Make sure you start doing research as early as your Freshman year though.

15. Hey, while you are over there acing all your classes, don’t forget to befriend your professors. Go to their office hours, offer to do research in their labs for them, eat dinner with their family. Just make sure at least six of your professors and you are B.F.F.’s so they can all write you amazing letters of recommendation. Added plus from point numero 15, you can form lasting relationships with some of the most interesting people aroundJ

16. You probably don’t have time to make money, but since you are already pretty freaking brilliant, why not make that work for you? Tutor for a little extra cash. Apply for any and all scholarships. Also, it might help to marry that crazy stalker girl so you can qualify for federal funding. It could help you out a lot as a poor college student. You never know, she might even grow on you and you could potentially enjoy being married for the sake of being married.

17. The MCAT. One of the most challenging graduate examinations out there. Buckle up sweetheart. This one is going to take roughly a year or more of dedicated studying. You will probably have to take a prep course on top of your 16 other credits of class. This will be expensive. You will also need to spend months before this wicked exam taking all the practice tests you can get your hands on. This will probably be one of the most stressful times of your life as so much of your potential as a physician rests on those four-five precious hours you will spend taking this one test. Use your study time wisely and you will triumph gloriously.

18. You are going to need to spend countless hours constructing a personal statement, filling out your primary application, getting letters of recommendation, and so forth. You might spend the majority of your summer break taking classes and filling out this endless paperwork documenting every breathing moment of your past ten years.

19. This one is a toughie, but you should probably try it out. Find a buried treasure chest. Or win a million dollars. Wait, maybe a billion might be a safer bet.  Most people know medical school is very expensive. What they don’t know, is that you are going to have to pay for that not so cheap primary application and every single secondary application you send out. Thinking about applying to 18 schools? You do the math. Roughly $80 per application. Also, any interview you fly out to will all be on your dime. You will need to buy the plane ticket, pay for transportation and lodging. You should probably develop a budget when you are in third grade and start to build your financial portfolio while you are at it.

20. Practice interview questions for a month before your interview. You probably are already pretty comfortable talking about yourself, but you need to perfect the balance between confidence and humility. Maybe ask that crazy stalker girl to grill you on questions over every meal, whenever you are in the car for longer than two minutes, and right before bed every night for the weeks leading up to your interview. You might even consider having that mildly intimidating pop-in-law ask you interview questions over that summer that you are applying.

21. Be attractive. Be really attractive, in fact. This will be an easy one for you cause you are probably already ridiculously handsome. It might also help to look like a Greek War God specifically. I hear those are always the types getting interviews and getting accepted to medical school.

22. This one could be the easiest or hardest on this list. Be a minority. You will automatically become more attractive to all medical schools because then they can snap pictures of you studying, load them on their website, and convince most people applying to their school that they are like a mini UN and they only have one white person attending their school. Doesn’t matter what minority you are, just be one. (Below picture might indicate there is more than one white person going to this school. Do not be decieved. The girl in the back with glasses is actually Hispanic)

I am SO impressed that Sel has done all of these steps and it is finally paying off! We will know November 27^th whether or not Ohio really does want our bodies. Sel and I fly to Philly next week for his other interview and he will be flying to Missouri the week after that for his third medical interview. GET IT!