 So, this video is going to tell you how to become an anesthesiologist step by step. I want to give you guys tips on how to do well in undergrad to set yourself up for medical school admission and then after that how do you prepare yourself during medical school to do well during your exams and then getting from med school into residency, the interview process. So, I'm here with this video to help you set your 2020 goals for success in your career path toward medicine. Tip number one, coming from someone who really did experience all of the ups and downs of you know doing well and not in undergrad, I have some pretty strong advice for you guys out there. Hopefully this will motivate you coming this new semester on how to do well and be better. As an undergrad and especially a pre-med, you really want to focus on your pre-med coursework and doing the best you possibly can in those subject areas. As I mentioned in another video, you do want to use the advantage of a study group working together with other people to help motivate you in this time and also just to help you do better in your courses. Studying with others, bouncing your ideas off of each other, practicing for exams, doing questions together will really help you. Find opportunities to do research as well as an undergrad and also boost up your non-academic repertoire. So, any extracurricular activities, doing some volunteer work or even getting a job outside of your studies will really help you look more well rounded in the application process and will increase your odds of getting in. Lastly, you really want to find your pre-med advisor early. So, this person is a gold mind. They'll help you figure out the best schools for you and increase your chances of getting into medical school by providing you advice on how to interview better and what the schools are looking for so that you can build up your application early on. So, as an undergrad, you want to focus on doing the best in your pre-med courses, especially all of the courses that are important for doing well in the MCAT, like biology, course, organic chemistry, physics, etc. So for me and in my studies, really struggling with these courses, I found it very helpful to get into a study group early on and the people in the study group who were also in the pre-med track really helped to motivate me. I went to City College, it was a City University College. I focused on my academics mixing with extracurriculars so I worked all throughout college every year and in the summertime I had a job as well as attended courses so you want to make yourself appear as a mature individual, an adult learner, someone who can manage more than one thing at a time. So that really comes off as a great characteristic when you're interviewing and applying for medical school. Your pre-med advisor is your best friend. My pre-med advisor at City College, Lolita Woodhill, was really helpful. Even after I had graduated and went into the workforce, I still reached out to her years afterward to figure out my best path and best way of going about applying to medical school. So she was truly instrumental, helped me a lot and I'm forever grateful to her for all the advisement that she provided. Step two, while you're in medical school, you want to be happy, you got in but then you want to quickly and immediately focus on doing well on step one. Step one is crucial. No matter what others say, your other courses and along the way what you're learning is important for you to become a well-rounded and knowledgeable doctor but what you have to demonstrate is that you did well on a standardized test and that might be really tricky for many but it is what it is and step one is that test. So for me, knowing my history of really struggling with tests and not being the best test taker, I knew going in the door that that was my goal and I focused on that. I took the goal by the horns, that was my main drive all throughout my first two years in med school. So I quickly found people who were great to study with and we developed a nice regimen study plan and agenda of day-to-day things to do to get us ready for step one. So for me that was making sure that I studied daily and whatever topics were being covered in the classroom I made sure to read about them that night. So you have to be pretty disciplined and this is just really challenging and it's tough but I want to motivate you guys to do that this year just to make it a daily activity to read. So that's going to really promote your learning as a gradual process so that you can be prepared when it comes time to really buckle down. You want to make sure that you create a daily agenda or list of things to do and when you accomplish them you'll feel successful and those small victories and successes will lead to bigger successes when it comes time for you to do all on your exams. So on your daily basis you want to be sticking to a plan and a regimen. For me when I was working in the education field as a teacher before going to medical school I had to be very structured and have a daily list of things to do so that I could be on top of my profession. And that's something that really taught me discipline that translated into me doing well in medical school. So learning how to stick to a daily plan and also using that later on when it was time to study helped me to be as good as I could be a student. So that's something that you want to set as a goal for yourself for this year so that you can be better prepared for the responsibilities that you're going to have after medical school and residency when life gets real. During your clinical years as a medical student take the time to find an elective in anesthesia and while you're on that elective and of course performing well you want to ask for your letters of recommendation. Those letters from an anesthesiologist really weigh heavily on your application so you want to make sure that you get them as early as possible and after you've performed as well as you could on that rotation. Next you want to really focus on step two. Step two though it doesn't really weigh as heavily as step one in many instances it's a test score. People are looking at it and so you want to make sure that it's as good as you can get. So that's your second focus while you're doing your electives is to do very well on that exam. Lastly a lot of people ask me about research. I personally didn't do any research after undergrad. I did some research before applying to medical school and I think that actually really helped my application but if you're looking to figure out whether or not research will help you get into residency or not it's something that could boost your application for sure but it won't break your application. So don't stress out if you're not able to find yourself in a research project as a medical student what you really want to do is do well clinically and if you can get into a poster presentation or the like another academic demonstration you can really use that as a substitute. So don't really stress about that. And then lastly you want to make sure that you have some opportunity to be well rounded like a real world work experience or any other life experiences that will help you to be a more well rounded applicant will really help you along the way. Step three residency interviews so as an application reviewer and interviewer at my medical school I can tell you the things that will hurt you and the things that would really help you on interview day. So firstly you want to keep in mind you're talking to anesthesiologists and people who know what it takes to get into the field and to be successful. Most of us are pretty normal people pretty affable we're confident but we are not arrogant so that's what you want to portray on your interview day. Someone who's confident but humble knows their limitations knows when to ask for help want to be a normal person we're looking for people that are going to be easy to work with and that we know are going to be mature and honest individuals. So just keep that in mind when you're speaking on interview day and don't be nervous we're all normal people we've been where you've been and we understand that it's a stressful experience so just relax and be yourself be confident. Honesty and maturity are really highly valued so just remember those things. And then pay attention on your interview day to the things that are being told to you about the program the details the nuances you want to really make sure that you're making an informed decision about where you're going to be working for the next four to five years if you decide to stay for fellowship. So pay attention to those things ask a lot of questions on your interview day and make sure that you do get contact information from residents or anyone else that you may meet along the way if you have any additional questions before the match. Keep all those details in mind make notes so that when you're creating your rank list you have all the information that you need. So that will do it for the tips I really hope you guys have a great 2020 and that your focus and study goals are coming together you're making your plans and you're getting ready for a successful year and career in anesthesia. So next time see you guys in the next video.