After a year-long process, nothing feels better than getting your first acceptance. Seeing that long-awaited email in your inbox, clicking the link, and bracing yourself for the wave of emotions that inevitably follow – your acceptances (and rejections) may very well be some of your life-defining moments. Here at UpLIFT, we are extremely happy that one of our very own has already received an acceptance to his dream medical school! For our second applicant perspective this year, we’re sitting down with Fawaz to hear about his somewhat non-traditional application experience and the way he feels now on the other side of it.

You know the drill – tell us about yourself and why you decided to go to medical
school.

Hey everyone! My name is Fawaz, I’m currently a senior at the University of Pennsylvania. I was born and raised in a small town in FL. At Penn, I’m majoring in Neuroscience, and minoring in Healthcare Management and Comparative Literature. Outside of school, I spend most of my free time at the gym, teaching/volunteering in West Philadelphia, watching soccer, reading, or cooking. Oh – and I’m jamming to Rap, R&B, and Desi music like 24/7.

I have a lot of things I want to do with my life – I want to help people while they are at their lowest, I want to connect with people, I want to pursue my passions for science and biology, I want to be a teacher, and I want to have an impact on the communities that raised me and made me who I am. Medicine is the only career where I can take all of them together and do something that will genuinely make me happy.

On top of that, I really just want a career that has a human touch. As much as I’ve loved working in a lab, I couldn’t do it without those moments that you only get through clinical experiences. I can look back on several extremely emotional moments I’ve had with patients suffering from something more simple like an arm fracture, to others dealing with systematic lack of access to adequate healthcare. In each one, I remember the smiles, the tears, the hugs, and I know I don’t want to ever stop having moments as beautiful as those.

Did COVID throw a wrench in your application plans? If so, how did you cope with the changes? How do you think the pandemic impacted your application, if at all?

My biggest issue became my research project. I had started to plan the whole thing and was getting it ready to go over the summer, but when the pandemic hit my lab closed down. Even when it reopened, there was very limited work I could do virtually. So instead of research, I ended up devoting myself to other things, namely working on public health in West Philly through my clubs. Overall, I consider myself lucky to not have been affected too badly – I’d already taken the MCAT, and put a lot of good time into my research, so I didn’t lose too much.

Tell us a little about your application experience. For instance, did you apply straight through or take some gap years? How many schools did you apply to? Etc.

My application process was very different from most applicants. I applied straight-through to Perelman’s Early Decision Program. So one school! It was a lot less stressful than the more traditional process a lot of my friends went through. I still filled out AMCAS, but only had the one secondary to complete, and only the one interview. As far as med-school application stress goes, mine was definitely on the lower end!

Since applying early decision is a generally unknown route to get into medical school, tell us about this process.

As far as I know, the early decision process is really unique to every school. The timeline generally looks something like this: you submit your AMCAS and secondary application to your one school sometime by early-mid August, you interview late August/early September, and then you hear back towards the end of September. Having it all done so early sounds great right? Yea… well here’s the catch. If you get
rejected, you’ve got very little time to send out your applications to a bunch of other schools, get secondaries, fill them out, and then send them back. Even worse is that since the process is rolling at most schools, you’ve missed the prime time to apply. Some schools are nice about how they do their ED program, they’ll have you send them your resume early on so that they can give you the green light to apply ED – meaning you’re a likely acceptance. With other schools, it’s really just shooting your shot like regular apps.

Here’s the advice that I’d give anyone applying/thinking about applying ED. The first thing you should do is try and find someone who has ED’d to your school of choice. Since it’s sort of an informal and minimally regulated process, school’s are very unique in how they do it and they won’t provide you with much information. If you find someone who has done it, you can get a lot of insider info on the process that can help inform your decision. Next ask yourself 2 really really important questions. Why am I applying ED to this specific school? This is key, this reason should be prominent in your secondary and should be prominent in your interview. Think about what this school can give you that few others can. Secondly, ask yourself: am I okay with the fact that if I get rejected, my chances of getting accepted to any school become significantly more slim? This is really the killer question that I think stops a lot of people from applying ED. At the end of the day, be real with yourself, and really really think through these before you apply.

How did you decide to apply early decision? Did you have any mentors who helped you make this decision?

I didn’t know about the program till one of my best friends at Penn decided to apply. I remember when he first told me about it, I said “Bro… that’s not the move…” And here we are, a year and a half later, I’ve now completed the entire process and I’m in my dream school… Make of that what you will hahaha, but he’s a very persuasive guy to say the least. Applying ED for me came down to the fact that Perelman really is my dream school. As a Penn pre-med, I spent a lot of time there through clubs, research, etc. Every time I went, I was left in awe. The administration, the community, the resources… there’s literally nothing to complain about. Every med student I talked to would tell me the same thing: Perelman is one big happy family where you all work together to achieve your goals. I don’t regret my decision one bit!

How does it feel now that you have been accepted and made your matriculation decision?

It feels a bit… unreal to be honest. It’s funny, I remember when I first came to Penn, med school seemed like this impossible abstract concept that was far far in the distance. I can still remember the first night I spent in Hill College House like it was yesterday. And now, after what feels like a few brief moments later, I’m in an amazing med school. So “unreal” is very accurate. But at the same time, it’s super validating. All those late nights and hours spent studying while my friends were out, all the mistakes and fumbling my way through my earliest extracurricular experiences, all the times I questioned what I was doing or whether I was cut out for the work – in the end, it feels like all those times where I sat myself down and found the motivation to move forward were really worth it, and I couldn’t be more happy. If you’re out there right now going through the same things I was, just know that if you push through and put in the work, it’s all gonna be for the best in the end. You got this!

What are you most excited for in medical school? How about most nervous for?

I think being a med student opens a lot of doors that were closed to undergrads. For example, I worked in this community clinic where my clinical capabilities as an undergrad were very limited relative to what med students were allowed to do. So sometimes I feel like undergrads miss out on a lot of the direct, raw human experiences that drive us to medicine (not to say you can’t get them!). As a med student, I’m excited to be on the other side and get to take on greater responsibility in clinical settings. I guess I’d say I’m nervous about balancing school work and social life. I know med school can be grueling, but even then I’m looking forward to figuring it out!

Do you have any advice for current and future applicants?

Try out as many things as you can! And then once you find your interests, really really stick with them and make them as meaningful as possible. Figure out who you are, and think about shaping your application around that. Are you interested in academic medicine? Focus on research in your undergraduate years, and make sure to make it a prominent part of your application. Do you want to do policy work? Make sure to take policy classes, and look at doing internships involved in public health – they should be the most meaningful and prominent experiences to you. If you want admissions committees to really remember you, paint them a beautiful portrait of who you are not only through describing your experiences, but also by talking about how you plan to utilize the lessons you’ve learned in your future. And to everyone out there applying right now, I wish you the best! I look forward to changing the world together!!!

On behalf of the entire UpLIFT team, congratulations, Fawaz! And to all our prospective applicants, we hope Fawaz’s story gives you something to look forward to at the end of this grueling process that is applying to medical school. You will get through it, and we are rooting for you!