黑料不打烊

As a new sophomore, I have learned from College Vine live-streams and my personal counselors that extracurricular are a crucial part of making yourself more presentable and better rounded to colleges. The extracurricular vary from school to school but I highly recommend Science Olympiad or the Biology Olympiad. From personal experience, I see that someone who participates in this club gets more that they ask for in the sense that they go in wanting to learn about say Biology, and come out having a deep understanding of that and a multitude of other topics, from engineering to chemistry. At least at my school, there also exists specialty clubs for biology including Neuroscience club, biology Olympiad, and so much more. A quick google search can introduce you biology clubs in your area as well. Also, doing personal research and then moving forward to take tests like the Biology Olympiad and scoring high is incredibly impressive to colleges.

I hoped this helped!

Personally, I鈥檇 try to get involved with research, even if the school you鈥檙e applying to doesn鈥檛 ask for it. ESPECIALLY for biology, there are ample opportunities for research because many medical journals are available to read, and if you are really dedicated to a project a subscription like DeepDyve can be a lifesaver when it comes to saving on journal fees. It鈥檚 not a cheap subscription, but with journal fees coming to ~$30 per article, you end up saving a lot if you need to cross-reference studies for a project.

I鈥檓 working on the beginning stages of a meta-analysis right now, and though it鈥檚 challenging, it鈥檚 fun and has helped me get a better handle on applications of a topic I鈥檓 interested in in the real world.

Alternatively, if you鈥檙e from somewhere that has Science Olympiad or an equivalent program, it鈥檚 a super fun group and they have some relevant topics.

I just realized I don鈥檛 know what year you鈥檙e in, either鈥攊f you鈥檙e an underclassman, I would recommend going more the club/science fair route as research and internships in STEM often (but not always) necessitate higher-level coursework to have the foundation for understanding the project.

Hope this helped, let me know if you have questions!