WAMC/School List (ORM, 521/3.92) AZ Resident with Strong WA Ties (Really)

[RunnerDad]

Hello, wise SDN people. Posting this WAMC on my kid’s behalf based on his research of MSAR, admit.org, and individual school websites.

1. GPA: cGPA 3.92; sGPA 3.87; B.S. Kinesiology – expected May 2024
   (4.00 cGPA and sGPA for the final three years)
2. MCAT: 521
3. Residence: AZ, with strong ties to WA (born, raised, graduated high school there; grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins still live there). Has lived with parents in AZ since 2021.
4. Type: ORM, Traditional (1 gap year upcoming)
5. Undergrad: Large public university, non-elite. Freshman year at community college in WA, where they were born and raised, before moving down to AZ in summer 2021 to join the rest of the family (parents moved here in 2020 for career reasons).
6. Clinical experience: 1,100 hrs. 825 hours as medical scribe for nationally top-ranked brain and spine clinic (neurosurgery and PM&R), attending all pre-op and post-op clinical patient exams with physicians, accurately transcribing physician notes and orders for treatment into electronic medical record. 275 hours as physical therapy tech, working directly with patients on exercises in accordance with DPT directives and notating patient progress during therapy.
7. Research experience and productivity: 590 hrs. 320 hours neurology research on a study of “The Effects of Reactive Step Training on Muscle Onset in Patients with Parkinson’s Disease vs. Multiple Sclerosis”; honors thesis paper (co-author), submitting for possible publication. 570 hours kinesiology research on a study of “Biomechanical Analysis of the Lower Extremities During a Baseball Swing;” independent research presentation.
8. Shadowing experience and specialties represented: 50 hours shadowing PM&R procedures, orthopedic surgery, and emergency medicine.
9. Non-clinical volunteering (650 total hrs.): 400 hours (two years) as a hospital front desk volunteer, greeting patients and visitors and providing directions and personally escorting to clinics and inpatient departments; 250 hours (two years) serving developmentally disabled youth as a buddy and teammate with Miracle Kids baseball leagues and camps in the urban Phoenix area.
10. Leadership: 1 semester as TA for Anatomy & Physiology. Upcoming summer 2024: 40 hours as summer overnight camp counselor for developmentally disabled children.
11. Other extracurricular activities and gap year plans: 2 years collegiate club baseball. During gap year, will continue as clinical scribe (1,000-1,250 future hours), and in non-clinical volunteering with Miracle Kids (about 125 more hours).
12. Relevant honors or awards: Honors College scholarship recipient; Dean’s List (6 semesters).
13. Something else that may be important: Has endured and overcome an extremely rare elbow condition stemming from an ulnar fracture that occurred when he was eight years old. Initial surgery was believed successful, but we discovered four years later that the injury did not properly heal, which resulted in a “fishtail” deformity of the limb and joint, total cell death in the growth plate, and a permanent 30-40% loss of function in his left elbow. At the time the condition was diagnosed, there was only one published article in any U.S. medical journal (thank you, Harvard) that identified and explained the condition. He was treated by five orthopedic surgeons over the course of four years, including two follow-up surgeries and hundreds of hours of physical therapy. It prevented him from pursuing intercollegiate baseball and will continue to hinder participation in some types of left-arm strength training throughout his life, but otherwise does not impact strength and dexterity in his everyday functioning. He intends to describe this experience not to engender pity or as a “sob story,” but rather to explain how it gained him insight into the impact medical science and physicians can have on an individual’s functional quality of life and contributed to his desire to study and practice medicine especially in the areas of orthopedics and physical medicine and rehabilitation. (Thoughts on this approach and/or alternatives?).

Below is his preliminary school list, which he hopes to narrow to 30 or less. As of now, it’s 40.

Questions:

• Based on the above, is it necessary for an applicant with his profile and narrative to focus on service-oriented schools, or can “leaning” in that direction, but with a genuine research interest, make a somewhat more balanced school list all right?
• Are there schools below that he should definitely avoid, based on how the profile aligns with the schools’ mission as you understand it? (The schools’ websites are not always very clear on how service vs. research focused they are, so would appreciate your guidance.)
• Finally, with more schools moving to a shortened pre-clinical classroom curriculum, are there strong reasons or advantages to sticking with schools that have a more traditional curriculum?

Reach
Harvard
Johns Hopkins
U. Penn—Perelman
Columbia
Stanford
UC San Francisco
Vanderbilt
Washington University in St. Louis
Weill Cornell
NYU—Grossman
Yale
Mayo (AZ – IS)

Target
Northwestern
Michigan
Pittsburgh
Icahn-Sinai
UCLA
Chicago—Pritzker
Emory
Case Western Reserve
UCSD (acknowledging IS bias, but they do take 20-25% OOS – is this just a donation, or a legit shot?)
Virginia
Einstein
Brown
BU
Hofstra

Undershoot
U. of Arizona—Phoenix (IS)
U. of Arizona—Tucson (IS)
Univ. of Washington (Not really an undershoot, given that it admits 0.5% of OOR applicants; but purely stats-wise)
Colorado
Boston University
USC
Jefferson-Kimmel
Tufts
Georgetown
Dartmouth
Miami
Saint Louis University
Virginia Commonwealth
Creighton (AZ) (IS)

Many thanks for any insights and feedback that I can pass along.

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[Mr.Smile12]

Connect with the admissions team at UWashington and Washington State about your childhood history and residency consideration.

Of course, the populations are different. Why would you prefer to work with the populations in the Northwest vs. Arizona Southwest? Different Native American groups and traditions. Ethnicity representation will also be very different, as will the politics.

 

[Faha]

I suggest these schools from your list:
Reach
Harvard
Johns Hopkins
U. Penn—Perelman
Columbia
Stanford
UC San Francisco
Vanderbilt
Washington University in St. Louis (almost a guaranteed interview with those stats)
Weill Cornell
NYU—Grossman
Yale
Mayo (AZ – IS)

Target
Northwestern
Michigan
Pittsburgh
Icahn-Sinai
Chicago—Pritzker
Emory
Case Western Reserve
Virginia
Einstein
Brown
BU
Hofstra

Undershoot
U. of Arizona—Phoenix (IS)
U. of Arizona—Tucson (IS)
Univ. of Washington (Not really an undershoot, given that it admits 0.5% of OOR applicants; but purely stats-wise)
Colorado
Boston University
Jefferson-Kimmel
Tufts
Georgetown
Dartmouth
Miami
Creighton (AZ) (IS)

 

[tompremed]

Without much leadership experience, Harvard is really a donation (seems you need to be at least a premed club president for a public school graduate, or a URM with these stats to be interviewed by HMS). No connection to CA, UCSF is also a donation. Recommend removing both from consideration.

 

[KaiBuzz]

I also attended high school in WA and then the family moved to AZ. Unlike Oregon, WA does not consider high school attendance as a strong tie especially if you are no longer residents.

 

[RunnerDad]

Connect with the admissions team at UWashington and Washington State about your childhood history and residency consideration.

Of course, the populations are different. Why would you prefer to work with the populations in the Northwest vs. Arizona Southwest? Different Native American groups and traditions. Ethnicity representation will also be very different, as will the politics.

Thank you, great questions/suggestions. WSU isn't under consideration because its predominant mission is to educate and train physicians to work in mainly rural areas that are underserved, which is not my student's intent. His non-clinical volunteering experience hasn't focused on Native American/American Indian populations in particular, but on a different population of underserved (disabled kids; plus hospital visitors and patients that represent many different ethnicities as well as disabled persons). He will contact UW for more facts informing the residency consideration for sure.

 

[RunnerDad]

I also attended high school in WA and then the family moved to AZ. Unlike Oregon, WA does not consider high school attendance as a strong tie especially if you are no longer residents.

Thanks, I definitely think he needs more clarity on this from the UW Admissions Office. The MD Admissions website says that consideration as an Out of Region (OOR) candidate can be established by the following (blue text added, to indicate this student's background):

(1) Ties to one or more of the WWAMI states. *Ties to WWAMI include:

• Member of a federally recognized tribe whose traditional and customary tribal boundaries include portions of the states of Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, and/or Idaho
• Born in Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, or Idaho
• Graduated from high school in Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, or Idaho
• Have family members who currently live in Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, and/or Idaho
• Currently live and/or have lived in Washington . . . FOR AT LEAST ONE YEAR
• Active military member who is stationed in Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana, or Idaho
• Participated in pre-medical enrichment program either in WWAMI (e.g. SHPEP or SMDEP) or sponsored by a WWAMI Partner Institution (e.g. AI/AN Medical School Applicant Workshop)
• An option to indicate another tie is available when you apply.

(2) AND at least one of the following:

• Service record with underserved communities
• From an economically or educationally disadvantaged background

I surmise based on your experience that my student's ability to receive a secondary from UW comes down to whether there is internal policy or practice that more restrictively defines "family members" as immediate family members or parents (vs. grandparents etc.), and/or whether he meets a sufficient number of the delineated illustrations to qualify. Or perhaps the school uses a more restrictive definition of "underserved" than AAMC provides (i.e., ethnicity based, as opposed to including disabled populations). Lots of questions to ask. Thank you!

 

[RunnerDad]

I suggest these schools from your list:
Reach
Harvard
Johns Hopkins
U. Penn—Perelman
Columbia
Stanford
UC San Francisco
Vanderbilt
Washington University in St. Louis (almost a guaranteed interview with those stats)
Weill Cornell
NYU—Grossman
Yale
Mayo (AZ – IS)

Target
Northwestern
Michigan
Pittsburgh
Icahn-Sinai
Chicago—Pritzker
Emory
Case Western Reserve
Virginia
Einstein
Brown
BU
Hofstra

Undershoot
U. of Arizona—Phoenix (IS)
U. of Arizona—Tucson (IS)
Univ. of Washington (Not really an undershoot, given that it admits 0.5% of OOR applicants; but purely stats-wise)
Colorado
Boston University
Jefferson-Kimmel
Tufts
Georgetown
Dartmouth
Miami
Creighton (AZ) (IS)

Thank you! Is UCLA an ill fit based on mission, IS bias (with entering class roughly 33% OOS), or potential yield protection?

 

[Faha]

Thank you! Is UCLA an ill fit based on mission, IS bias (with entering class roughly 33% OOS), or potential yield protection?

That 33% includes those who attended UCLA as an undergraduate or graduate student, former residents, URM, legacies, etc.