Applying to medical school is hard. Not only do they look closely at your academic preparation, through your grades and MCAT scores, they care a lot about what you’ve done outside the classroom as well. We’ve written before about medical school’s requirements for your extracurriculars, but we’re returning to the subject today to explore a very specific question: how many hours do you need to spend on these extracurriculars? There are no actual rules for this that admissions officers check; instead they simply have expectations of how much time you will have devoted to your extracurriculars. We’re going to explore these generally, and look at the requirements that top 20 medical schools have for successful applicants.
We’ll also explore why these requirements exist, and some caveats to these guidelines. Let’s jump right in!
Extracurricular Hour Requirements for Pre Med Applicants
Here are the four main extracurriculars that medical schools look for, and the hour requirements for each:
| Category | Target Hours | Purpose |
| Clinical Experience | >500 hours | Direct patient interaction in hospitals, clinics, hospice, etc. Demonstrated “suitability for the profession” i.e. medical settings and compassion |
| Physician Shadowing | 50-100 hours (usually 6-7 physicians) | Observation of physicians across specialties; confirms interest in medicine and exposure to medical decision-making |
| Research | 500+ hours | Demonstrates scientific curiosity and analytical thinking; highly valued above other categories at research-heavy med schools |
| Community service/Volunteering | 300+ hours | Nonclinical service to underserved populations or local communities. Demonstrates altruism and a commitment to service |
Note that these hour requirements are over the course of four years of undergrad, or beyond if you are taking a gap year. Note that the more gap years you take, the more they will expect to see; medical schools expect you to make full use of the time you have.
These are the general recommendations for the number of hours you spend. Top 20 medical schools expect even more from applicants, as you might expect. Here are the recommended hour requirements for these schools:
| Category | Hours |
| Clinical Experience | 500+ |
| Physician Shadowing | 100-150+ |
| Research | 500-1000+ |
| Community service/volunteering | 300-600 |
Caveats to These Hour Requirements
As with all recommended rules, there is a degree of nuance to these hour requirements. The first, and possibly most important, is that quality tends to be more important than quantity. What this means specifically is that spending a significant amount of time on one high quality research project or volunteering opportunity is better than spreading yourself across four or five different ones.
In part, this is because showing you can commit yourself to a single opportunity over a significant duration is good evidence you will be able to do the same again, and medical school is a significant time commitment. Working at something for a long time also gives you a chance to increase your involvement and responsibilities, and gain a more detailed understanding of what you are doing. Working in a lab for a year may see you doing some techniques; working there for four and you will have some expanded responsibilities.
The next caveat is that shadowing should be spread across six or seven different physicians, and across multiple different specialties. This should be done so that you have a sense of which specialities in medicine you wish to pursue, and can speak to that. Finally, you should focus your shadowing on the kind of medical school you are applying to, allopathic or osteopathic.
You should begin your involvements early in your college career, ideally as soon as you are setting foot on campus, but no later than spring of your freshman year. You can theoretically hit these hour requirements in a year or two, but this both risks burnout, and greatly lessens your ability to show long-term commitment. Medical schools prefer to see you start early, and then carry on throughout your undergraduate career.
Finally, you should look for leadership roles in your involvements if possible. You can’t be president of every club of course, but you should look to take on responsibilities, and actively seek to improve the organizations you are part of. What this looks like will depend on the activity, but you should show a clear pattern of leadership.
Hour Requirements and You
These requirements may seem daunting, and difficult to approach. They are extensive, and will require consistent and concerted effort on your part to achieve. Thus, we recommend that when you are making your plan for your time in college, you look not just at what courses you will take, but which extracurriculars you will involve yourself in.
Colleges generally have a specific pre med advising office, to help students who intend to apply to medical school stay on track, and to connect them with opportunities (as an example, here’s Harvard’s). You should use this to find opportunities on and around campus for clinical experiences and shadowing, and to get a sense of pre med student groups on campus.
You should also begin delving into research opportunities on campus now, to see which ones fit your interests. Note that these do not need to be directly related to medicine (though they certainly can be), but should be in the sciences. Most labs on campus will take on undergraduate students, but these spots are often first-come, first served. If you see an opportunity you are particularly interested in, you can even reach out to the professor before you have even arrived on campus, to express your interest and see if you can contribute.
Final Thoughts
Applying to medical school is always a challenge, especially since some of the requirements are simply assumed, rather than fully stated. Medical schools want you to have involved yourself in these extracurriculars, and do express that, but the exact amount of time they want is left vague, unless you happen to know ahead of time what they’re looking for.
An insider’s perspective is always helpful when it comes to preparing for and applying to medical school, and that’s exactly what working with Ivy Scholars gives you. Our mentors have a long experience helping students apply to medical schools, and know exactly what admissions wants to see from you. Schedule a free consultation today to learn how we can make your life easier; we’re always happy to hear from you.
