Guest Spencer Posted August 12, 2003 Report Share Posted August 12, 2003 Hi Everyone...my name is Spencer and I am a Gr.11 student in a high school just north of Toronto, it has come to my attention that there are many students interested in a career in medicine and would like to learn more about it...everyone at my school knows im like med-student wannabe and i am frequently consulted by many of my fellow classmates with regards to the many aspects of medical school (application, curriculum etc...), I have therefore proposed to start a pre-med society at my school, I know it seems somewhat premature, but hopefully I can help my fellow student body become aware of medicine and all its related paraphrenalia...the one problem is, as high school students, we are not equipped with the knowledge to do mock MCATs nor do we have the experience necessary to conduct mock Medical School Interviews as many univerisity pre-med societies do...my question is...what can we do as a high school society to further our knowledge of a career in medicine other than having Q&A sessions?? anything you can give me will be greatly appreciated! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ian Wong Posted August 12, 2003 Report Share Posted August 12, 2003 as high school students, we are not equipped with the knowledge to do mock MCATs nor do we have the experience necessary to conduct mock Medical School Interviews as many univerisity pre-med societies do...my question is...what can we do as a high school society to further our knowledge of a career in medicine other than having Q&A sessions??Heya, I think that Q&A sessions would be a great area to explore for high school students. I'll be completely honest, and state that I don't think having mock med-school interviews and mock MCAT test-sessions is really time-appropriate. I think those are the kinds of things much better addressed in undergrad as you get closer to a med school application; high school is just way too early to tackle that kind of stuff. If you can contact a number of local doctors to give short talks in the evenings about their career, and the pathway they took to get their, I think that'd be extremely valuable. It's also something that even med students find extremely valuable, as we all learn from the experiences of those who have gone before us. Something which might prove to be interesting (assuming you have the energy/group diversity to make it work), would be to have discussions on various ethical problems in medicine. It'd have to be pretty informal, and might raise some heated arguments, but you'd definitely learn a lot about other points of view talking about things like: under which cerciumstances would you consider abortion/euthanasia acceptable, the ethics of giving a liver transplant to a chronic alcoholic, what to do if a 14-year old girl comes into your office and asks you for birth control pills, should doctors be allowed to strike/refuse to see or treat patients who smoke or drink, what would you do if you found out a local doctor was abusing illicit drugs, etc. Something else that would be VERY useful for many of your classmates, and certainly students in grades below yours, would be to make up a list of high school pre-requisite courses for the various degrees in universities around your area (ie. Ontario in your case). I saw too many people in university who hadn't taken Physics in high school (who really wants to, after all), but were taken aback when they realised that first year university Physics was required for their Biology degree, and for the MCAT. Those people had to work an awful lot harder, and often had worse marks simply due to a heavier workload, than those university students who had taken Physics in high school. If you can generate a list of places locally where high school students could volunteer in a health-care setting (ie. find out who to contact in the volunteer department of your local hospital), that would also be really helpful for your group. Perhaps most importantly, keep things simple at first. Try to do one or two of the above really well, and if they work out, then branch into more areas. It's otherwise really easy to get sidetracked, or to spread yourself too thin. Best of luck! Ian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest aneliz Posted August 12, 2003 Report Share Posted August 12, 2003 I think Ian has given you some fabulous suggestions. I agree with him that it is probably pretty early to be doing mock MCAT's and interviews, but I don't think that it is too early to have a 'pre-med group'. You may also be able to find some med students that would be wiling to come in and speak to your group about what its like to be a med student, how they got there, challenges in undergrad, etc. You might try contacting a guidance teacher to help you set this up...they often have a good idea of what some grads of your high school are up to and may even be in contact with some of them. I think that Ian's idea of getting doctors to come in and speak about there careers is great too. See if you can get a variety of different specialties to come in (this isn't necessarily hard to do....you may be able to use parents or parents' friends, etc) I would also suggest that you have any other health professionals that you can get to come speak to your group as well...nurses, physiotherapists, dentist, chiropractor, dietician, paramedic, respiratory therapist, etc. Often people that are interested in working in health care are not even aware of these careers at the high school level. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Spencer Posted August 12, 2003 Report Share Posted August 12, 2003 I wanna thank you Ian and aneliz...not only for your insightful comments and recommendations but for being supportive of my cause as well, i know a lot of other people would have just dismissed it as being trivial...thx again Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest V Posted August 13, 2003 Report Share Posted August 13, 2003 The points above are gold. I wanted to add my 2 cents (maybe a penny and a half if i could). One thing you dont want to do is to set your sights too focused right now. Its nice to want to persue a career in medicine, but the harsh reality is that there are only limited spots available. Also, along the path, many people change their minds because they find out that a) they dont really enjoy the human body the lifestyle c) the time committment that it requires to get where you want to go. It is extremely important that you express that to your fellow club members. Expanding yourself by researching other fields is equally important, as it will only make your decision to enter medicine that much stronger once you choose to do so. I also think asking one or two medical students to come to your high school would be great. Depending on where you were, im sure there would be volunteers in your respective area. Also, how about holding a general career night, where you showcase 4-5 careers: medicine, law, business, etc.... that might be interesting as well. Being keen on medicine is one thing, being to keen on it is another. Make sure your eyes are not focused along one path as it may hurt you down the road. With that said, volunteering at a doctor's office or hospital are great opportunities to get a first hand experience of what it may be like to begin a career in the health sciences. Without it, you are only getting heresay and being influenced by the stories of others and the media. I guess this adds up to 3/4 of a cent, but whose counting. Best of luck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ibraheem Posted August 21, 2003 Report Share Posted August 21, 2003 Spencer, dude I am just like ya, i am also going in gr. 11 and i am really interested in medicine, i have made my own site on these topics at premed.c0m.cn .... its all about going through high school to university to med/dent school.... take a look @ it and encourage other to join, this place is really great too, but i think the topics that are talked about here are for mainly the ppl who are in Med / Dent school or are in university{year3/4}, but my board it focused around high school and on wards... so take a look and post back... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Spencer Posted August 21, 2003 Report Share Posted August 21, 2003 Hey Ibraheem...u got a great site for out there for the high school pre-meds like us, LOL...great resources, its like u got the entire 3000 page AP bio textbook stored in that site under the AP BIO section...and i know what u mean when u say that this board is more focused on med students or to-be-med-students in 2 or 3 years...maybe i shall relocate my posts over to your boards... ...i'd be happy to help u develop that site in anyway although my HTML skills have become obsolete since the days of Gr.9 business class...my e-mail is banana_hammock@msn.com...and i have MSN Messenger...so add me if u do have MSN as well :b Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ibraheem Posted August 29, 2003 Report Share Posted August 29, 2003 hey we had one lunch hour this school year, during lunch the med student from DAL came to our school...... his name was like C... Wilson.... or something like that, and he showed up a copule of overheads, about what it take, an such and general topics that i already knew about... its want too bad but a club that is held after every week, you might run out of topics, it is a GOOD idea to start a pre-med society in Uni but i dont its not that great in high school...... :hat Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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