Pre-Med, Pre-Health Clubs, anyone?

[destined_wind]

There are a ton of these types of clubs at my school. I would really like to join them all, but each of them have around a 30 to 50 usd yearly membership fee... I don't think I can afford these clubs (at least not more than 3). So, do these clubs even help or aid me, both in terms of being counted as a particularly positive EC and being just useful in general? I attended a few of the clubs and some of them seem like they are like disorganized... So, should I join them or not?

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[rCubed]

look carefully into what each one of these clubs does. if u find one in which you can participate in many activities, go ahead and join, and just be really involved with it. there's no need to join as many as possible. remember, its quality over quantity

also, if u feel that these pre-med clubs don't really do anything ur too interested in, go ahead and skip out on them. find another organization which is better suited.

i ended up not joining any of the pre-med clubs on my campus cuz i didn't think they did anything worthwhile. i joined an organization later on which was involved with massive amounts of community service, something i was more into at the time.

 

[DocileMD]

I agree with the above post.
The "pre-health honor society" at my school is a joke, i was under the impression that they were an organization devoted to community service until I attended one [very lame] meeting and found out that they are merely an intermediary between some 60 students in the club and a couple local health professionals that give the same speeches each year; mainly on topics that one could learn about simply by reading online documents.
What a waste I think, so many students at their disposal yet the committe does nothing to utilise them...almost makes me want to join and get elected to make some changes and become proactive.
Needless to say, I didn't and won't go back anytime soon..
Instead, I found an outreach program consisting of a handful of students that are trained as "school health clinicians" and we go out to a local underpriviledged elementary school and act as the school nurse since they don't have a nurse otherwise....very rewarding and the kids are great...this is also something that can help to set one apart from the large number of applicants that only worked with these bland clubs..

Hope this helps.

 

[jlee9531]

i didnt join any.
any information i needed i got off my friends applying to med school and sdn.

money is too rare for me to give it to an organization that wouldnt have helped me much anyway.

med school fairs were always free when they came to my school and that was helpful.......

so yeah........information is always out there. why pay for it when you dont have to.

 

[calebho501]

Originally posted by destined_wind
There are a ton of these types of clubs at my school. I would really like to join them all, but each of them have around a 30 to 50 usd yearly membership fee... I

Med Schools are not usually impressed pre-health type of clubs as "Extra-curricular Activities", unless it's associated with significant amount of exposure to clinical or volunteering experience. If you have to pay that much just to join, look for other organizations instead.

 

[logos]

The one here (OSU) is only $20 and there are tons of people in it...I thought it was worth joining (my first year here...transfer). They have biweekly ethics discoussion meetings and bi weekly general meetings...so that there is either one meeting or another every week...they schedule several social events per month...although i dont think i'll go to those...or all of the ethics discussions...

I also learned about the volunteer oportunity I am going to persue at their meeting.....Its not a volunteer organization....but they sure do try to make everyone aware of what organizations are looking for volunteers....

I think its worth it so far....btw....its Alpha Epsilon Delta.....which is at a lot of schools...

 

[mlw03]

IF AND ONLY IF you would be active and actually do something in the club, then join. otherwise, just send your money to me instead. if it's just something to put on paper, schools will be able to tell, and i think that looks worse than not joining at all. i was a member for two years at my school's pre-med clubs, and they were a waste of time/money, so i stopped wasting my money each semester. and no school i've interviewed at so far has had any problem with that when i explained how i wasn't getting anything out of the club, so i sought clinical and volunteer experiences on my own.

 

[destined_wind]

Thanks to everyone here that replied. Yeah, we have AED at our school too, I might join that and AMSA... They actually just give you basic info and they don't do that many services (compared to clubs like Circle K)... I am not really a big community service guy anyways... Yeah, I might just join one or two and save my money for school. Besides... I am saving up for something good (namely Creative Megaworks 550s... hehehe...)