Working in Medical School

[SKM]

For those who have worked through medical school

 

1) Is it possible, and what kind of sacrifices does it entail

2) What kind of jobs gave you the flexibility to work plus pursue your studies simultaneously

3) Does it get harder to keep the job over time?

 

Thanks

[rmorelan]

For those who have worked through medical school

 

1) Is it possible, and what kind of sacrifices does it entail

2) What kind of jobs gave you the flexibility to work plus pursue your studies simultaneously

3) Does it get harder to keep the job over time?

 

Thanks

 

some thoughts:

 

1) possible but unlikely - you are just too busy, and if you don't spend your time studying and advancing towards getting the specialty you want you may end up earning a few thousand but loosing the prize at the end.

 

2) Probably research jobs I would think (and at least those are connected somehow to also your education)

 

3) Yes, I would say basically impossible once clerkship starts for instance. Your schedule is not your own for most of the last 2 years of most medical school programs.

[schmitty]

I am planning on working in med school. I manage a large research lab and will be continuing with some of my responsibilities (mostly from home) during med school. I don't get any grants or help because I am married and so this extra income will help a LOT to keep the debt down. I will probably stop teaching high school in the evenings. However, I have applied for some TA positions, but those usually don't take up THAT much time, depending on the course.

 

Also, my employment will mostly be research based and lead to some more publications and thus it could be useful for my future residency candidacy.

[future_doc]

some thoughts:

 

1) possible but unlikely - you are just too busy, and if you don't spend your time studying and advancing towards getting the specialty you want you may end up earning a few thousand but loosing the prize at the end.

 

Working is not recommended in med school. The apparent short term gain is entirely illusory. And the debt is manageable. In my view, it is just not worth it.

[rmorelan]

I am planning on working in med school. I manage a large research lab and will be continuing with some of my responsibilities (mostly from home) during med school. I don't get any grants or help because I am married and so this extra income will help a LOT to keep the debt down. I will probably stop teaching high school in the evenings. However, I have applied for some TA positions, but those usually don't take up THAT much time, depending on the course.

 

Also, my employment will mostly be research based and lead to some more publications and thus it could be useful for my future residency candidacy.

 

That is probably the main situation I would work in school - it lines up with other important goals

[Lonney]

One of my friend worked full time during pre-clerkship

[simpy]

For those who have worked through medical school

 

1) Is it possible, and what kind of sacrifices does it entail

2) What kind of jobs gave you the flexibility to work plus pursue your studies simultaneously

3) Does it get harder to keep the job over time?

 

Thanks

 

I worked as a Don (Residence Advisor or whatever) during my first year of med school. The free room and board really helped cut down on debt.

 

1) Biggest sacrifices were probably social. I had a great floor though and only the first week (frosh week) was ridiculously busy - was up on call every morning until like 5AM. After that workload wasn't bad.

 

2) Was a great job for flexibility. There's always the potential for a crisis that takes a night away, but I stayed on top of my work and it was never a problem.

 

3) I could have easily done it during second year, just chose not to because my floor was so great and I left the job on a high note.

[Real Beef]

Said this before but if you are not making $25+/hr it is simply not worth it. I worked first year and was able to get some decent cash but I dont recommend working if you can avoid it. I found it really stressful at times but am glad that I did but that is due to my spending habits. I would feel guilty using a line of credit for the stupid purchases I do ... subwoofer, electronics and so on so I feel like lessening my debt but being sound of mind in treating myself with my 'own' money rather than borrowed money is worth it for me.

 

However if you bust your butt and make $20k over the school year ... what is that? Like less than 1 months income as an MD? Probably not worth busting your butt for. Better to become a better clinician.

 

Beef

[SKM]

Thanks so much for the advice! After reading all of this, I definitely have changed my mind about working through school.

[NutritionRunner]

If I get in (unlikely at this point, but you never know), I do plan on continuing to teach fitness classes when I can, at least during pre-clerkship. I figure it will help keep me healthy and fit, which always helps my studies, and provide a bit of pocket change as well. I know it won't be realistic to continue teaching a class once clerkship starts, but until then, why not? If I wasn't teaching, I would still be trying to go to the gym or go for a run when I could.

[schmitty]

If I get in (unlikely at this point, but you never know), I do plan on continuing to teach fitness classes when I can, at least during pre-clerkship. I figure it will help keep me healthy and fit, which always helps my studies, and provide a bit of pocket change as well. I know it won't be realistic to continue teaching a class once clerkship starts, but until then, why not? If I wasn't teaching, I would still be trying to go to the gym or go for a run when I could.

 

Makes sense :-)

 

For me it makes sense because as I said, I will get more publication which I'm sure will look good for CARMS, but also I will make approximately $30K/year which, since I don't get any aid, will help keep my LOC to tuition-only while allowing my wife and I to not live like students again.

[rmorelan]

If I get in (unlikely at this point, but you never know), I do plan on continuing to teach fitness classes when I can, at least during pre-clerkship. I figure it will help keep me healthy and fit, which always helps my studies, and provide a bit of pocket change as well. I know it won't be realistic to continue teaching a class once clerkship starts, but until then, why not? If I wasn't teaching, I would still be trying to go to the gym or go for a run when I could.

 

again that makes complete sense - because there are secondary considerations. I guess my point is earning money at the sort of jobs you can usually get for the sake of making money alone is just not really all that logical. I have already seen people who probably would have had a better shot at specialties they wanted and ultimately did not get those specialties who were distracted in various ways and in a few cases money was the cause. That is a terrible result in my mind.

[schmitty]

again that makes complete sense - because there are secondary considerations. I guess my point is earning money at the sort of jobs you can usually get for the sake of making money alone is just not really all that logical. I have already seen people who probably would have had a better shot at specialties they wanted and ultimately did not get those specialties who were distracted in various ways and in a few cases money was the cause. That is a terrible result in my mind.

 

Yeah I would agree. If I didn't have the opportunity to make decent money during school doing something that would further my CV, no way I would be trying to get a job at Starbucks or anything.

[aaronjw]

Said this before but if you are not making $25+/hr it is simply not worth it. I worked first year and was able to get some decent cash but I dont recommend working if you can avoid it. I found it really stressful at times but am glad that I did but that is due to my spending habits. I would feel guilty using a line of credit for the stupid purchases I do ... subwoofer, electronics and so on so I feel like lessening my debt but being sound of mind in treating myself with my 'own' money rather than borrowed money is worth it for me.

 

However if you bust your butt and make $20k over the school year ... what is that? Like less than 1 months income as an MD? Probably not worth busting your butt for. Better to become a better clinician.

 

Beef

 

 

This.

 

/thread

[igeorgex]

I wound up getting paid for some research I was going to do anyway so that was nice. If you're interested in a field, contact someone with lots of grant money about potential projects. A) they want to publish and will help you do that they might wind up paying you a bit!

[MonkeyDLuffy]

Would you consider tutoring for 4 hours a week as an activity which would further a CaRMS applicant's CV? I am currently a tutor for chemistry (hired by the department to tutor 1st and 2nd years) at my university for 4 hours a week. It pays me a decent amount of money ($30/hr), so that extra pocket money is nice.

[NLengr]

Would you consider tutoring for 4 hours a week as an activity which would further a CaRMS applicant's CV? I am currently a tutor for chemistry (hired by the department to tutor 1st and 2nd years) at my university for 4 hours a week. It pays me a decent amount of money ($30/hr), so that extra pocket money is nice.

 

Won't matter for CaRMS. Nobody will really care about it.

 

CaRMS is 90%:

1. Work Ethic

2. Likeability

3. Knowledge

 

Plus, the who you know/connection factor.

 

The rest is window dressing. Of the window dressing, EC's like tutoring are pretty low in importance.

 

The $30/hr is pretty sweet for tutoring though.

[inthesticks]

30 bones an hour to tutor?? sign me up

[MonkeyDLuffy]

Won't matter for CaRMS. Nobody will really care about it.

 

CaRMS is 90%:

1. Work Ethic

2. Likeability

3. Knowledge

 

Plus, the who you know/connection factor.

 

The rest is window dressing. Of the window dressing, EC's like tutoring are pretty low in importance.

 

The $30/hr is pretty sweet for tutoring though.

 

Thank you so much! Yeah it is a pretty sweet pay, which is why I don't really want to give it up. Would you say 4hrs/week is manageable?

[Real Beef]

4 hours a week wont even dent your studies. I am talking about 15-20 hours a week being a killer .... you'll be fine.

[schmitty]

4 hours a week wont even dent your studies. I am talking about 15-20 hours a week being a killer .... you'll be fine.

 

Yeah, I'll be working around 10-15 hours a week :-(

[jackemlton]

Working in a medical school having both merit and demerits such as while dealing with any kind of medical problems we are getting a better experience to deal with such kind of problems and also we can gain medical knowledge No doubt working pressure will be there and we have to facing these problems in every professions but I think in medical terms we are facing more working pressure.

[Real Beef]

Yeah, I'll be working around 10-15 hours a week :-(

 

The trick will be to see whether this amount of work will effect your medical studies. If you find you do not have a deep enough understanding of the material as your class mates and your exams/tests come back with marks well below the class average I would re-examine your work schedule. Hopefully the work schedule is not set in stone and you can adjust based upon your med school performance. I was able to maintain above class average marks except for one theme in which I was a bit below. So I was pleased with my balancing act though again as previously mentioned it was ++ stressful at times.

 

I will continue to work this school year at closer to 8-9 hours a week rather than the 15+hrs/wk that I did this past year. This should make it more tolerable.

 

Beef

[schmitty]

The trick will be to see whether this amount of work will effect your medical studies. If you find you do not have a deep enough understanding of the material as your class mates and your exams/tests come back with marks well below the class average I would re-examine your work schedule. Hopefully the work schedule is not set in stone and you can adjust based upon your med school performance. I was able to maintain above class average marks except for one theme in which I was a bit below. So I was pleased with my balancing act though again as previously mentioned it was ++ stressful at times.

 

I will continue to work this school year at closer to 8-9 hours a week rather than the 15+hrs/wk that I did this past year. This should make it more tolerable.

 

Beef

 

Yeah, it is somewhat flexible. Though there workload will be at least 10 hours per week, the good part is that most of it can be done whenever I have time (mostly from home) and I can not work one week and make it up later, etc. Hopefully this won't be problem... Though I do plan on quitting my tutoring job (which sucks since it pays $35/hr :-() because I think it'll be too much.

[medisforme]

One of my friend worked full time during pre-clerkship

 

I do not see how that is possible unless they are some super genius with a photographic memory and only need minimal time to study - even then I don't see how the hours add up. From my experience at UBC - we are in school/clinical/practicum from 8 - 4ish most weekdays. So your friend would either have to work from 5ish - 1am every weekday or else 5ish - 1am for 3 weekdays and then 8 hours/day on weekends - totally insane.

 

Personally, I found the workload in year 1 med bordering ovewhelming and while I ended up getting decent marks on my exams I couldn't imagine working during the semester. I definitely cherish my free time during the school year and would not want to swap that for work.

On the flip side, I am basically putting in full time work hours all summer to make some money back. I earn extremely good money as an RN but my total summer earnings will still only be a small percentage of the debt I have already accumulated.

I agree with others who have said it is really not worth it to put in too many employment hours to keep the debt down as it can be paid off relatively quickly (from what I have read - I have not talked to any physicians about this) once one is practiing medicine and making a good income.