To Be...A Spartan MD

Second-year student and  content contributor  for the admissions office , Harminder Sandhu, is taking his experience as a current College of Human Medicine student from the page to behind the camera as he gears up to take over the college's official Instagram account . From his morning routine through class, clinics, and group study, Harminder will spend two days taking followers on an inside look of what it's really like to be a modern medical student. Follow the college's Instagram stories on Wednesday and Thursday (Feb. 20-21) as Harminder will be video streaming about his training and giving his thoughts on the benefits/challenges of medical school as well as the Shared Discovery Curriculum. Who knows? Maybe a guest or two may join. ;) Feel free to interact with Harminder in real-time and DM us your questions/comments. We'll see you then! For now, we'll let Harminder take it from here... Harminder Sandhu is a second-year  College of Human Medici...

Just a few months down the line in April, new guidelines will soon affect how applicants handle acceptances. The Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) is enacting new procedures that guide how an applicant chooses their preferred medical school. The Choose Your Medical School Tool is an online resource to help applicants make indications about where you may attend.  It's important to note, however, that while the AAMC has set the following deadlines, each medical school still may set their own policies and deadlines. As for the schools, the tool will assist in managing enrollment. Per the AMCAS , "Using the AMCAS Choose Your Medical School tool as directed by each school gives admissions offices a better idea how many seats they need to fill in their entering classes and helps other applicants receive timely notification about the outcome of their applications." "PLAN TO ENROLL" While the big decisions come down to April, the Choose Your Med...

With Shared Discovery only in its third year of implementation at the College of Human Medicine , the truth is that we in the Office of Admissions naturally still receive plenty of great questions about our relatively new, innovative curriculum. For this reason, we chose the SDC as our topic of discussion in this, the third installment of our Facebook Live Stream series. Francisco, from the admissions team, moderated the hour-long discussion and was joined by second-year students, George and Enrique, as well as first-year student, Maryssa. The panel touched on a variety of points regarding the curriculum, including the transition to a curriculum without lectures or constant testing. The students gave their own takes on how the curriculum, as a vehicle for medical training, has prepared them well for boards and offered some anecdotes about the great opportunities they've had with patients as part of real clinical teams. You can watch the whole discussion here: Don...

As medical students it is critical we zoom in and understand the science of medicine. It is critical we understand cellular processes, the mechanics of our body, and the chemical and physiological impacts our treatments have on a person. It is critical we achieve a deep understanding and respect for those things that make us tick and those changes and injuries that can make us sick. This deep-dive makes it all the more crucial for me to remind myself to zoom out, recognize and honor the human experience. This system can feel like it pulls you away from those very things that inspired you to become a physician. At times it can feel like those things that keep you rooted in serving your community are the things that drain you the most. Yet, what we chose to build our framework and what we choose to build our career from cannot be forgotten as we dig deep and study for the exams we must take. I just ended a two-week rotation on Palliative Care and I am grateful for the experienc...

“What are you majoring in at college, Elizabeth?” That question came from the mailman. It came from my hairstylist, my friends, my coworkers, and the lady-who-used-to-go-to-my-church-who-I-ran-into-at-the-grocery-store-after-ten-years. Fair enough. I was about to leave my quiet Ohio town to set off on a new adventure at Indiana University, and I counted myself lucky to have others sharing in my excitement. “Organ performance.” I had spent the last year practicing my tail off for college auditions, getting up at 6am to get an hour in before school each day. At the end of audition season, I was headed to my top-choice school, to study with my top-choice instructor, and spend the next four years learning how to be the best church organist possible. “Huh! So you want to be a doctor? A surgeon?” Mr. Runner, a family friend, was much more familiar with the organs of the body than the pipe organs of Europe. I had very fond memories of the summer that I spent shadowing in an orth...

At the inception of the National Medical Association (NMA), African American physicians were not allowed to join the American Medical Association (AMA), or its student organization, the American Medical Student Association (AMSA). The Student National Medical Association (SNMA) is the daughter organization of the NMA. “The Student National Medical Association, established in 1964, is the oldest and largest independent, student-run organization focused on the needs and concerns of black medical students in the United States.” Based on this knowledge, the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine SNMA chapter has worked hard to create and maintain community and medical student involvement in the lives of underrepresented and under-resourced members of the East Lansing and Grand Rapids communities. In the current medical climate, our chapter feels it is important to continue to be critical of the medical school pipeline and consistently help to strengthen and add to...

The path to medical school is rarely a straight one. Each journey is different and, more so today, prospective students can take various routes to matriculation. Sometimes, a winding road is more out of need than preference. But whether by choice or not, the path to medical school no longer has to be so...linear. In fact, medical schools are increasingly accepting of those coming from outside the traditional pre-med, B.S. route. As the admissions review process has become more holistic , schools are rounding out their entering classes more effectively, filling any gaps. Institutions like the College of Human Medicine (CHM) have become a bit more flexible about such paths. It's one reason why the college's Office of Admissions has moved on from requiring students meet one single list of more traditional prerequisites. Now, students are allowed the ability to select from several prerequisite models for which to have their applications reviewed. These model options allow...