Emil Chuck 
Heidi Fuchs is the Assistant Dean for Admissions and Enrollment Management at Touro College of … Read more
Your success in any application cycle depends on how well you match a school’s metrics … Read more
Barbra Roller, Ph.D. (she/her), is the Assistant Dean for Academic Affairs at the Florida International … Read more
Happy new year, and for many of you, happy new semester! This article is for … Read more
Are you ready to start the application process? One commonly overlooked part of the process … Read more
Dr. Steven Chang (he/him/his) is the Director of Admissions at the University of Detroit Mercy … Read more
In Part 1, I introduced you to some of the results from the 2022 SJT … Read more
What are students encountering as they take situational judgment tests? This is the first of … Read more
Most rural Americans face significant challenges accessing healthcare. There are major shortages of physicians, dentists, … Read more
As a health professions advisor and admissions professional, I have found myself connecting with the … Read more
The cost of attending medical school, and other health professional programs, has increased dramatically over … Read more
I often use the “marathon” metaphor when it comes to the timeline from preparing your … Read more
Undergraduate and post-baccalaureate educational institutions want their students to succeed, so they invest in advising … Read more
Area Health Education Centers, or AHECs, consist of around 300 locations that address primary care … Read more
Health professional programs conduct interviews to predict professionalism in applicants. COVID-19 has changed the way … Read more
Being a serious candidate for medical school, or any health professional school, means recognizing that … Read more
For future pre-health professional students, developing competencies and communicating them to admissions committees will be critical for success.
Professionalism: the conduct, aims, or qualities that characterize a profession or a professional person.
If you ever give this answer to anyone who asks you what professionalism is, then remember to cite Merriam-Webster [http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/professionalism].
(Part of this article is based on another article I have published: “Competency-based holistic evaluation of prehealth applicants” (The Advisor [NAAHP publication] 29(2): 30-36, 2009).)
If you’ve ever tried applying for a job for the government, you will often be asked by USAJobs.gov to self-assess your competency development as follows:
A – Lacks education, training or experience in performing this task
B – Has education/training in performing task, not yet performed on job
C – Performed this task on the job while monitored by supervisor or manager
D – Independently performed this task with minimal supervision or oversight
E – Supervised performance/trained others/consulted as expert for this task
Did you ever like carnival mirrors? It’s often funny to see how these mirrors exaggerate various body parts to make you look like you have a short body (dwarfism) or an enlarged head (megaloencephaly).
The distorted view is often as entertaining as the game of comparison obsessively played by many prehealth applicants. Way too often we measure ourselves by the schools we attend, the grades we made, the research we’ve performed, the clinical experiences we’ve had, the trips we’ve taken, and the clubs we’ve joined. While often there may be some who enjoy one-upping others in their achievements, the echo chamber effect often makes it hard for individuals to really see the impression they make to others in the admissions process, and it really is this difference that can doom applicants.