Taking a Year Off
The term “time off” is frequently used when a student decides to delay his/her application for a year or more before going to a health professions school. But the term is a poor one since most applicants are not really taking “time off.” Rather, what you do during that year or more between your undergraduate years and going on to medical, dental, veterinary school or other graduate program, is important to your application. Your choices will be driven primarily by what you are trying to achieve.
We like to use the term “gap year.” For example, if you have only recently decided to pursue a career in the health professions, you will likely be taking the courses required for application. You should also be arranging to get experience in a health care setting. See the section on Preparing for specific advice in this area. If you need to take the course work, you might consider completing it through a post baccalaureate program. For information, please see these links:
Syracuse University has a post-bac page that is well organized into the different types of post-bac programs.
If you need to improve your academic credentials, you will likely need to take additional course work. This may be done by enrolling in a non-degree (often called continued education) program or you might choose to complete a master’s degree. Be sure that if you need to improve your grades in science courses that your master’s program includes science courses. You also may choose to enroll in one of the prehealth postbaccalaureate programs that are available at many institutions. For information on those programs, see the link above.
If you are not in need of further course work, there are other interesting options. In recent years, our applicants have participated in serious service work (Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, Jesuit Volunteer Corps, Teach for America, etc.), taught elementary, middle, or high school (may require teacher certification or education courses), worked in a research laboratory, worked in a clinical research program, worked or volunteered as an EMT.
To help you with your search, here are some links:
Service
AmeriCorps
Peace Corps
Jesuit Volunteer Corps
Research
IRTA (NIH Intramural Research and Training Award)
Some potential applicants put applying to health professions school on hold to pursue a dream. We have had students use their talents and skills to pursue professional sports, acting, writing, visual arts, and the performing arts, to name a few. Some of them eventually return to health care, some do not.