Summer after Freshman Year:  Physics, Physicians, and Mediterranean Vacations

Oh summer time...a much needed break from school, a time to put on those sexy bikinis and board shorts and frolic in the cool water, a perfect time to catch the winds and sail through sparkling seas, the sun’s welcome warmth lulling you into slumber, without a care in the world…wait a minute…oh sorry, I was having a daydream…back to coding this site.

As a pre-med student your summer will likely not resemble that, at least not in its entirety. However there’s no reason not to relax and take full advantage of your well-earned time off. In fact, my summers were actually pretty chill. Again it’s just a matter of time management because summer is also a great opportunity to get stuff done.  You want to show medical schools that you are “doing something”, rather than just being a bum for 3 months.  Preferably, you’ll engage in some health-related experiences, like shadowing a doctor, volunteering in a hospital, working in a clinic, doing a mission trip, etc. This is important for two reasons. The first is that until you spend a significant amount of time involved in the field you’re thinking of pursuing, you really don't know whether you like it or not. Unless you shadow a doctor, how will you know what it’s actually like to be a doctor day to day? The other reason is that med schools strongly recommend (meaning that it’s essentially required) that you to have a substantial number of these types of health-related experiences. And the reason med schools urge applicants to do these is because of the first reason I just gave you! It's your future career. Take an active interest and explore it.

So how did I spend my first college summer? I took Physics I and Physics II (both with labs), at a community college near my house. This lasted from the start of June to early August, about a month per class. One year of Physics is required of all pre-meds, and after speaking with several older students I found that it’s pretty common for people to take Physics over the summer. The benefit of taking a class during the summer is that since you don’t have a full course load to worry about, it’s fairly easy to make an “A”. It can also lighten your workload during the regular school year because you won’t be forced to take as many hours per semester since you got some out of the way during the summer. I didn’t take it over the summer at TCU (my actual university) because it’s a lot cheaper at a community college, and TCU was also much further from my parents’ house, where I was living for the summer.  The only downside of taking Physics at a community college was that when I transferred the credit back to TCU, the grades I made in the two classes didn’t count. The eight credit hours transferred perfectly fine, and my one year requirement of Physics was met. But the two “As” I made didn’t get added to my TCU GPA, which at the time could have greatly benefitted from eight credit hours of “As”. For this reason, a lot of my peers had elected to take the two Physics classes at another four-year university rather than a community college, because TCU’s transfer policy allowed you to transfer your credit and grades if you took the class at a four-year university.

Now if this grade-transfer issue has caused you to debate where to take summer classes, here’s one important detail to keep in mind: medical schools calculate your GPA independently of your university, and have a slightly different way of doing it. The first thing is that they take ALL of your course grades, regardless of whether they were taken at a community college or a four-year school, and use everything to calculate your GPA. So if you went to a school like TCU (or any four-year school) and did every summer at a different community college, the med schools would still combine all your grades regardless of the institution. They also don’t care about +/- (plus/minus) grading. TCU (and I’m sure quite a few other schools) give +/- grades. As I’m sure many of you can relate, getting a few “A-” grades really pissed me off. But for med school GPA calculation, an “A-” and an “A” are both counted as an “A”. This can quickly add up and significantly increase your GPA for med school if you had a bunch of “A-” grades, since they will all be raised. On the other hand, it can hurt if you had some “B+” grades, because those will be considered as just “Bs” (quite the double-edged sword). Due to this difference in GPA calculation, the two “As” I made in Physics still counted towards my GPA for med school. So don’t get scared and opt out of community college classes, because they can be much more suitable in terms of time (to avoid a long commute) and money (far cheaper).

During the two months that I took Physics, I also SHADOWED our family Internist about 3-4 times a week. After my routine annual appointment, I simply inquired if I could shadow him for the summer, and he happily agreed. This was my first real experience seeing what a doctor actually does day-to-day. I saw tons of patients with him, both in his private practice and while rounding in the hospital. I learned about all the nuances associated with EHR technology (electronic health records), realized what a pain dealing with insurance companies and reimbursement can be, and why every doctor must quickly familiarize themselves with the business side of healthcare if they want to do well in the private world. It was especially interesting to see from the doctor’s eyes, sorting through his years of accumulated knowledge to ascertain the causes of ailments, some quite obvious and others obscure. I also found that one of the most fulfilling aspects of being a doctor is the ability to impart knowledge. So many patients asked about things like what diabetes is, how cholesterol drugs work, what they could do to lose weight, and a myriad other questions. It seemed great to be able to provide information to people that actually wanted to learn.

Additionally, my Internist set me up to shadow two other doctors, a Cardiologist and an Ophthalmologist, which allowed me to get a feel for different specialties. I can without a doubt say that shadowing was an invaluable experience, giving me substantial insight into this profession that I wouldn’t otherwise have had. One of the reasons I did it was of course to look good on my med school apps, because the schools want to see your activities mirroring your proclaimed desire to enter the field. But even aside from that, without doing this I honestly could not have known what being a doctor meant. Just taking Biology classes and reading about medicine via books or blogs is not enough; you have to experience it yourself. I'd highly recommend that every pre-med shadow one doctor regularly for several weeks. This will highlight both the good and bad, because like anything else, medicine isn’t all smiles and miracle cures. There are times when it gets boring, moments that will get you down and depressed. If you want to do this you have to be willing to accept the whole package. And the only way you’ll know what it has to offer is by experiencing it. So go do it!

My family is big into traveling, so after my classes and shadowing finished, we took a trip to Turkey and Greece. It was an amazing vacation to two beautiful places with such storied histories, and a perfect way to relax and enjoy some family time before school started up again.

I now had one year in the books, and during it gleaned some valuable lessons. After my shadowing experiences I was motivated, ready to dedicate myself to pursuing this profession, and it was with this mindset that I entered my sophomore year.

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