Is Being an SI Helpful for Medical School?

Becoming a Supplemental Instruction leader, commonly called an SI leader, can be an excellent experience for a premed student because it combines teaching, mentoring, leadership, academic involvement, service to other students, and often paid employment within one position. It is not clinical experience, and it will not replace shadowing, patient care, community service, or research, but it can add a valuable dimension to your medical school application that many other undergraduate activities do not provide.

An SI position gives you the opportunity to show that you can take difficult material, understand it deeply, explain it clearly, and help someone else work through their confusion without simply giving them the answer. Those skills translate well to medicine, where physicians regularly educate patients, teach students, explain complicated decisions, mentor younger trainees, and work with people who may approach the same problem very differently.

I was not personally an SI leader during college, but I had several friends who were, and they consistently felt that the experience improved their teaching skills while giving them more opportunities to work directly with a particular professor. That repeated interaction was especially valuable when they later needed letters of recommendation because the professor had seen much more than a final grade. The professor had watched them prepare sessions, communicate with struggling students, accept feedback, and take responsibility for helping a course run successfully.

I also personally attended SI sessions during my premedical coursework, and I thought they were extremely helpful. My understanding of difficult topics improved, and I believe that improvement translated into better grades. Because I experienced how valuable a good SI leader could be from the student side, I think this is a particularly meaningful position for someone who genuinely wants to help other students succeed.

For a broader explanation of how students can use these academic resources effectively, read my guide to office hours, SI, and tutoring for premed students.

What Is a Supplemental Instruction Leader?

Supplemental Instruction is a structured form of peer-assisted learning that places a trained student leader within a course that has traditionally been challenging for students. The SI leader has usually already completed the course successfully, attends the lectures again, communicates with the professor, prepares collaborative activities, and leads regularly scheduled study sessions outside of class.

The Supplemental Instruction model was originally developed at the University of Missouri–Kansas City in 1973. UMKC describes SI as a non-remedial program that targets historically difficult courses rather than labeling particular students as deficient. The sessions combine course content with reasoning, study strategies, and collaborative problem-solving. You can learn more through the International Center for Supplemental Instruction at UMKC.

That distinction is important because SI is not supposed to be another lecture. A strong SI leader does not stand at the front of the room and repeat everything the professor already said. Instead, the leader creates opportunities for students to retrieve information, work through practice problems, compare different approaches, explain concepts to one another, and identify the point where their reasoning begins to break down.

Depending on the university and course, an SI leader may be responsible for attending every lecture, meeting periodically with the professor, preparing lesson plans, leading two or three sessions each week, tracking attendance, attending staff meetings, and completing training in active-learning and group-facilitation strategies. Programs at institutions such as Kennesaw State University and Georgia State University describe SI leaders as course-integrated peer educators rather than ordinary drop-in tutors.

What Is the Difference Between an SI Leader, Tutor, and Teaching Assistant?

These roles overlap, but they are not necessarily interchangeable.

Position	Typical Role
Supplemental Instruction leader	Attends or follows one specific course, works with the instructor, and facilitates recurring group sessions connected to the course schedule.
Tutor	Usually helps individual students or small groups with a subject, course, or particular assignment and may work with several different instructors.
Teaching assistant	Works under a professor and may lead laboratories, grade assignments, hold office hours, teach discussion sections, or assist with course administration.
Peer mentor	Focuses more broadly on adjustment, study habits, campus resources, motivation, and navigating college rather than one specific course.

One role is not automatically better for medical school than another. What matters is what you actually did, how long you remained involved, what responsibilities you accepted, how you affected other people, and what you learned from the experience. However, SI can be especially useful because it often combines the structured faculty relationship of a teaching assistant position with the direct peer support and mentoring found in tutoring.

Is Being an SI Leader Helpful for Medical School?

Yes, being an SI leader can be very helpful for medical school, especially when the experience is sustained over multiple semesters and you can describe specific ways that you helped students learn.

Medical schools are not simply looking for applicants who collected the greatest number of titles. They are trying to understand whether you communicate well, follow through on commitments, collaborate with others, recognize what another person needs, respond appropriately to feedback, and contribute to the people around you.

The AAMC Premed Competencies include areas such as oral communication, interpersonal skills, reliability and dependability, service orientation, teamwork and collaboration, and understanding others. An SI position can provide meaningful examples of several of these competencies, although holding the title alone does not automatically prove that you developed them.

For example, you may need to explain a biochemical pathway in three different ways before it finally connects with a student. You may need to facilitate a group in which one person dominates the conversation while another is afraid to participate. You may create a review activity that does not work as well as expected, accept feedback from the professor or SI coordinator, and design a better one for the following week.

Those experiences give you much more to discuss than simply saying you are a strong student. They show that you can use your academic abilities in service of someone else.

Why Does Being an SI Leader Look Good on AMCAS?

An SI position can look good on AMCAS because it brings several valuable areas together within one experience.

It Shows Teaching and Communication Skills

Knowing an answer and teaching someone how to reach that answer are very different abilities. When you lead SI, you have to organize your thoughts, identify the learner’s misunderstanding, and adjust your explanation based on the person in front of you.

That is highly relevant to medicine. Physicians routinely explain diagnoses, medications, procedures, risks, lifestyle changes, and follow-up instructions to patients with very different educational backgrounds and levels of health literacy. An SI leader begins practicing the larger skill of making complicated information understandable without speaking down to the learner.

It Demonstrates Mentoring

Although SI is primarily an academic role, a good SI leader often becomes a mentor as well. Students may ask how you prepared for the course, how you recovered from a difficult examination, which study strategies helped you, or how you approached the premed curriculum.

You are not responsible for solving every academic or personal problem a student brings to you, but you can listen, encourage them, model effective habits, and direct them toward appropriate campus resources. This can give you meaningful examples of helping someone grow over time rather than completing a one-time act of service.

Students hoping to build other meaningful mentoring relationships can also read my guide on how to find a mentor as a premed.

It Shows Leadership Without Requiring a Formal Officer Title

Many students think leadership only means becoming the president of an organization. Leadership can also involve guiding a group, creating an inclusive environment, taking responsibility for preparation, responding when a plan is not working, and helping other people accomplish a shared goal.

An SI leader may not manage a large organization, but they are still responsible for the direction and quality of each session. That gives them repeated opportunities to practice facilitation, organization, decision-making, and accountability.

It Shows Service to Other Students

SI is usually paid, so it should not automatically be described as volunteer service. However, the role can still demonstrate a service-oriented mindset because its central purpose is helping other students learn and succeed.

The strongest description does not simply say, “I served students.” It shows what that service looked like. Perhaps you held an additional review because students were struggling with a particular unit, created a new set of practice problems, helped quieter students become more comfortable participating, or learned to recognize when someone needed a different explanation rather than more repetition.

The AAMC describes service orientation as a desire to help others while remaining attentive to their needs and feelings. SI can provide evidence of that quality when your actions consistently place student learning ahead of your desire to appear knowledgeable. The AAMC provides additional guidance on demonstrating service orientation as a premed.

It Shows That You Can Engage in an Academic Role

Medical school and academic medicine depend heavily on peer teaching. Medical students teach one another, senior students teach junior students, residents teach medical students, fellows teach residents, and attending physicians teach nearly everyone around them.

Working as an SI leader gives you an early opportunity to see whether you enjoy that part of academic life. It can also help you explain an interest in eventually becoming a physician who teaches and mentors students in addition to caring for patients.

My friends who served as SI leaders felt that this was one of the less obvious benefits of the position. It allowed them to show academically oriented medical schools that they were already interested in the kinds of teaching and mentoring responsibilities that academic physicians frequently accept.

What AMCAS Category Should You Use for an SI Leader?

For most SI leaders, the most appropriate AMCAS experience type will be Teaching/Tutoring/Teaching Assistant because that category best reflects the primary purpose of the position.

The AMCAS application includes Teaching/Tutoring/Teaching Assistant as an experience type. Applicants may enter up to 15 Work and Activities experiences, write a 700-character description for each, and designate up to three as most meaningful, which provides additional space for reflection.

Even though an SI position may involve leadership and paid employment, AMCAS only allows you to choose one experience type for the entry. The best approach is generally to select the category that describes the primary function of the activity rather than trying to squeeze every benefit into the category name.

You could reasonably use Paid Employment – Not Medical/Clinical when employment and financial responsibility are central to the story you want to tell. For example, you may have worked as an SI leader to help cover tuition and living expenses while maintaining a demanding science schedule. My Paid Employment – Not Medical/Clinical AMCAS guide explains how to provide that context.

The Leadership – Not Listed Elsewhere category may become more appropriate if you advance into a head SI leader, program coordinator, trainer, or supervisory position in which your main responsibility is managing or developing other leaders. A standard SI leader should not automatically use the leadership category simply because the word “leader” appears in the job title.

You can read my complete AMCAS Work and Activities guide for help selecting categories and writing the rest of your entries.

Example SI Leader AMCAS Description

Here is an example you could adapt to your own experience:

Selected as a Supplemental Instruction Leader for General Chemistry after earning an A in the course. I attended lectures, met regularly with the professor, and designed two collaborative sessions each week using practice problems, retrieval activities, and exam reflection. Rather than re-lecturing, I asked students to explain their reasoning and helped them identify where their problem-solving broke down. Supporting students with different levels of preparation strengthened my ability to communicate complex ideas, listen patiently, and adapt my teaching to individual needs.

Your description should reflect what you actually did. Do not claim that you raised students’ grades unless the program collected data that allows you to support that statement. When formal outcome data are unavailable, you can describe attendance, student feedback, improvements you observed in participation, resources you created, or changes you made after receiving feedback.

Is a Science SI Position Best for Premed Students?

If you have several equally good options, I think a science-related SI position is usually the strongest fit for a premed student. Biology, general chemistry, organic chemistry, physics, biochemistry, anatomy, physiology, statistics, and other challenging prerequisite courses connect naturally with the academic foundation you are building for medical school.

Leading SI for one of these courses can reinforce foundational material that may reappear on the MCAT or in later coursework. It can also give you a closer working relationship with a science professor who may eventually be able to write a detailed academic letter of recommendation.

However, science is not the only subject that can make an SI position valuable. Psychology, sociology, economics, mathematics, writing, and other courses can still help you develop communication, teaching, patience, and group-facilitation skills. A course you mastered and genuinely enjoy teaching may produce a much more meaningful experience than a science course you chose only because you believed it would look impressive.

The best subject is generally one in which you earned a strong grade, understand the material well, communicate comfortably with the professor, and feel motivated to help the students taking it after you. When all other factors are equal, I would lean toward a science course for a premed student, but I would not turn down an excellent teaching opportunity in another subject solely because it is not a traditional prerequisite.

Can Being an SI Leader Help You Get a Better Letter of Recommendation?

One of the greatest potential benefits of becoming an SI leader is the opportunity to build a deeper relationship with the professor teaching the course.

A student may earn an A in a large science lecture without ever having a meaningful conversation with the professor. When application season arrives, that professor may be able to confirm that the student performed well, but they may know very little about the student’s communication, reliability, character, response to feedback, or ability to work with other people.

An SI leader may interact with the professor throughout an entire semester. Depending on the program, you might attend the lectures again, discuss which topics are causing difficulty, review your session plans, receive feedback, and provide general observations about where students are becoming confused.

Those interactions give the professor more opportunities to observe how you think and work. The AAMC guidelines for medical school evaluation letters ask writers to explain how long they have known the applicant, in what capacity they interacted, and whether their observations were direct or indirect. A course-integrated SI role can provide the kind of sustained, direct interaction that makes a letter more detailed.

This does not mean that every professor connected to an SI course will automatically write a strong recommendation. Some SI programs are managed primarily by an academic-success coordinator, and the professor may have relatively little contact with the individual leaders. You should pay attention to who actually observes your work.

When the professor does meet with you regularly, use those meetings well. Arrive prepared, ask thoughtful questions about the course, respond professionally to feedback, and follow through on your responsibilities. Near the end of the experience, you can ask whether the professor feels they know you well enough to write a strong and honest letter of recommendation.

My guide on how to get a good letter of recommendation explains why time, direct observation, consistency, and genuine relationships matter more than simply requesting a letter from the person with the most impressive title.

My Experience With Friends Who Became SI Leaders

I was not personally an SI leader, so I do not want to pretend that I experienced the position firsthand. However, I had friends who became SI leaders, and they felt that the experience helped them develop much stronger teaching skills.

Teaching a topic forced them to understand it at a deeper level. It is relatively easy to recognize the correct answer when you are studying alone, but it is much harder to explain why that answer is correct, identify why someone chose a different one, and help that person reconstruct the reasoning without simply completing the problem for them.

My friends also had more frequent contact with the professor teaching the course. They were not merely former students whose names appeared in an old gradebook. They became part of the academic support structure surrounding the class.

I thought that created the potential for much stronger letters of recommendation because the professor knew them in more than one setting. The professor could comment on their performance as a student, but also on their preparation, communication, dependability, teaching ability, and willingness to support their peers.

The position also gave them a credible way to talk about future teaching and mentoring. Academic medical centers want physicians who are willing to contribute to the education of students and trainees, and an SI experience can help an applicant show that this interest began before medical school rather than appearing suddenly in an interview.

How SI Sessions Helped Me as a Premed Student

Although I did not lead SI sessions, I attended them, and I personally found them very useful during difficult courses.

There were topics that I could understand while reading the notes but struggled to apply when I faced a new question. SI gave me an opportunity to work through those gaps before the exam rather than discovering them while the exam clock was running.

The sessions also exposed me to questions from other students. Sometimes another person would ask about a detail I had overlooked or explain a problem using an approach that made more sense to me than the one I had been using. That additional perspective improved my understanding of key topics, and I believe the sessions contributed to better grades.

Research on SI generally supports the idea that consistent participation can benefit students, although results vary by course and implementation. One NIH-hosted study of Supplemental Instruction in introductory STEM courses found that frequent participation was associated with higher course performance and lower rates of receiving a D, failing, or withdrawing.

Because SI helped me, I think becoming a leader is a great opportunity for someone who wants to make a real impact on other students. You may help a student stay in a difficult science sequence, recover after a discouraging exam, find a study method that finally works, or gain enough confidence to continue pursuing a career they had begun to doubt.

That impact is much more meaningful than simply adding another line to a résumé.

How Do You Become an SI Leader?

The exact process differs by university, but most programs look for students who previously performed very well in the course, maintain a solid overall GPA, communicate effectively, and can attend the course lectures and scheduled training.

Perform Well in the Course

Many programs require an A, A-minus, or at least a strong B in the course you hope to support. Kennesaw State requires an A in the supported course and a minimum 3.0 institutional GPA, while Georgia State generally requires an A-minus or better and a 3.0 overall GPA. Other institutions use slightly different thresholds.

A strong grade helps demonstrate content knowledge, but the program will also want to know whether you can communicate patiently and facilitate learning. The student with the highest exam average is not always the student who will create the best learning environment.

Build a Relationship With the Professor

Some SI programs prefer or require a professor’s recommendation or nomination. Austin Community College encourages prospective leaders to ask their professor for a nomination, while other universities may require a formal faculty recommendation.

Participating in class, attending office hours, and demonstrating a genuine interest in the material can help the professor recognize that you might be a good candidate. You do not need to force the relationship or repeatedly ask about future employment while you are still taking the course. Focus on learning the material and being an engaged, dependable student.

Search Your Academic-Success Center

SI programs are commonly housed within an academic-success center, learning commons, tutoring center, student-success office, or individual academic department. Search your university website for phrases such as “Supplemental Instruction leader,” “SI leader application,” “peer educator,” “learning assistant,” or “peer-led study group.”

Applications may open before the following semester begins, so it is worth asking about the timeline while you are still enrolled in the course.

Prepare for an Interview or Teaching Demonstration

The interview may focus on your communication style rather than asking you to recite difficult course facts. You may be asked how you would respond to a student who demands the answer, how you would encourage participation, how you would manage a disruptive student, or how you would explain a complicated concept in a simpler way.

A useful way to prepare is to choose one topic from the course and practice explaining it without relying on specialized terminology. You should also be ready to describe a time you helped a classmate, accepted constructive feedback, or changed your approach when someone did not understand your first explanation.

Complete Training

New SI leaders commonly complete training in facilitation, active learning, lesson planning, communication, and program expectations. Some programs also require ongoing professional-development meetings, peer observations, and regular meetings with the program coordinator.

This training is one of the reasons SI can be more valuable than casually helping friends before examinations. You are learning an organized approach to supporting students rather than relying entirely on your natural teaching style.

How Much Do SI Leaders Get Paid?

SI is often a paid campus position, which is another major advantage for premed students. You can develop a meaningful application experience while earning money that may help cover food, transportation, tuition, application expenses, or everyday living costs.

The amount varies substantially by institution, location, experience, and local minimum-wage requirements. Based on published university and college pages, the examples I found ranged from approximately $10 to $23 per hour, with many positions falling around $13 to $18 per hour.

Institution	Published SI Leader Pay
Indiana University East	$10.15 per hour
Kennesaw State University	$11.25 per hour
Purdue University	Starting at $13.25 per hour
Western Carolina University	$14 to $16 per hour
Iowa State University	$15 per hour
University of Michigan–Dearborn	$15 to $17 per hour
University of Arizona	Starting at $15.90 per hour
Santa Monica College	$17.81 per hour
University of Missouri–St. Louis	$18 per hour, with higher rates for some head SI leaders
Austin Community College	$23 per hour

These rates can change, so students should check the current employment posting at their own institution rather than assuming that a rate listed by another university will apply to them.

You should also look closely at which hours are paid. Some institutions compensate leaders not only for the sessions themselves but also for attending lectures, preparing activities, completing training, and meeting with professors or staff. Santa Monica College, for example, states that its leaders are paid for lecture attendance, sessions, preparation, meetings, and training.

Many SI leaders work approximately eight to fifteen hours per week. Purdue University lists a typical commitment of ten to fifteen hours, while other institutions estimate approximately ten to twelve hours each week.

That can make SI a helpful middle ground for a premed who needs income but cannot manage a full-time job during a demanding semester. However, you should still protect your own grades. An application activity that causes your science GPA to fall is unlikely to provide a worthwhile tradeoff.

Does Being Paid Make the Experience Less Meaningful?

No. Being paid does not make teaching, mentoring, or service less meaningful.

Medical schools understand that students need income, and many applicants cannot afford to spend every available hour in unpaid activities. A paid SI position still requires preparation, reliability, communication, and a commitment to helping other students.

You should report the activity honestly and select the AMCAS category that best represents its main purpose. You do not need to disguise a paid position as volunteering or apologize for earning money. In fact, balancing employment with a challenging course load can demonstrate maturity and financial responsibility.

The meaning comes from what you contributed and learned, not from whether the university issued a paycheck.

What Are the Potential Downsides of Becoming an SI Leader?

The greatest drawback is the time commitment. Attending the course again, preparing activities, completing training, meeting with the professor, and leading several sessions can take more time than students initially expect.

You should review the schedule before accepting the position, particularly if you are also preparing for the MCAT, completing clinical shifts, conducting research, or taking several demanding laboratory courses.

There is also a risk of becoming overly focused on creating perfect materials. Your role is to facilitate learning, not rewrite the professor’s entire course. Spending five hours creating a polished slideshow for a one-hour session may not be sustainable when a simpler set of well-designed practice problems would accomplish the same purpose.

Finally, the role can become frustrating when attendance is inconsistent or students expect you to provide answers without participating. Learning to manage those situations is part of the experience, but it requires patience and clear boundaries.

How to Make Your SI Experience More Valuable for Medical School

The experience becomes much stronger when you remain involved long enough to grow beyond the basic responsibilities. Returning for additional semesters may allow you to support a second course, train new leaders, become a head SI leader, help improve the program, or develop new resources.

You should also keep a simple record of your work. Save anonymized information such as the number of sessions you led, approximate attendance, activities you created, training you completed, and general feedback you received. Never retain private student information or individual grades unless the program specifically authorizes you to handle them.

Reflect on moments that reveal growth. Perhaps you initially spoke too much during sessions and gradually learned to let students work through uncertainty. Maybe a student told you they finally understood a concept after several weeks of struggling. You may have redesigned your sessions after noticing that quieter students were rarely participating.

Those specific moments will become much more useful in AMCAS descriptions and interviews than broad statements about gaining leadership and communication skills.

Does SI Replace Clinical Experience or Community Service?

No. SI is generally an academic teaching role rather than clinical experience.

Even when you lead SI for anatomy, physiology, or another health-related course, you are not interacting with patients or observing the practice of medicine. You will still need meaningful clinical exposure to understand what caring for patients actually involves.

A paid SI position also should not automatically be counted as volunteer community service. It may demonstrate service orientation, but applicants should continue looking for opportunities to contribute outside the classroom when possible.

Think of SI as one part of a balanced application. It can give you teaching, mentoring, employment, leadership, and faculty-relationship experience, but it should complement rather than replace your clinical, service, shadowing, research, and personal interests.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is being an SI leader good for medical school?

Yes. It can strengthen a medical school application by providing evidence of teaching, communication, mentoring, leadership, reliability, academic engagement, and service to other students. Its value depends much more on your actual responsibilities and reflections than on the title alone.

Does being an SI leader count as leadership?

It can demonstrate leadership, but Teaching/Tutoring/Teaching Assistant is usually the most accurate AMCAS category for a standard SI role. Leadership – Not Listed Elsewhere may fit better when you supervise other leaders, manage part of the program, train new staff, or hold a head SI position.

Is an SI leader considered a tutor?

An SI leader is a type of peer educator, but the role is usually more closely integrated with one particular course than traditional tutoring. SI leaders commonly attend lectures, communicate with the professor, and lead recurring group sessions aligned with the course schedule.

Is an SI leader a teaching assistant?

Not necessarily. A teaching assistant may grade assignments, teach laboratory sections, or hold formal office hours. An SI leader usually facilitates optional peer-learning sessions and should not grade students or introduce material that has not been taught.

Does being an SI leader count as clinical experience?

No. Teaching a science or health-related course does not become clinical experience unless the position includes genuine patient-facing responsibilities, which a traditional SI role does not.

What course is best for a premed SI leader?

A science prerequisite such as biology, chemistry, organic chemistry, physics, biochemistry, anatomy, physiology, or statistics often provides the most direct connection to a premed application. However, the best course is ultimately one you understand deeply, enjoy teaching, and completed successfully.

Can an SI professor write a science letter of recommendation?

Potentially, especially when the professor taught you in a science course and later supervised or worked closely with you as an SI leader. Letter requirements differ among medical schools, so applicants should verify each school’s definition of an acceptable science-faculty letter.

Should SI be one of my most meaningful AMCAS experiences?

It can be, but it does not need to be. Consider using the designation when you were involved for a substantial period, made a meaningful contribution, developed personally, and have a specific story explaining why the experience influenced you.

Can being an SI leader help with the MCAT?

Leading SI for biology, chemistry, physics, biochemistry, psychology, sociology, or statistics may reinforce foundational concepts that appear on the MCAT. However, teaching a college course is not a substitute for completing MCAT-specific content review and practice questions.

How many hours per week do SI leaders work?

Many university programs describe commitments of roughly eight to fifteen hours per week, including lecture attendance, preparation, meetings, training, and the sessions themselves. The exact schedule varies by course and institution.

Helpful Official Supplemental Instruction Resources

The International Center for Supplemental Instruction at UMKC provides background on the SI model and how trained peer leaders facilitate collaborative learning.

The UMKC Academic Support and Mentoring SI page explains how SI targets historically difficult courses while combining course content with reasoning and study skills.

The AAMC Premed Competencies outline qualities such as communication, service orientation, teamwork, reliability, and interpersonal skills.

The AAMC guidelines for medical school evaluation letters explain what letter writers are encouraged to address.

This NIH-hosted study of peer Supplemental Instruction in introductory STEM courses examines the association between SI attendance and student academic performance.

This ERIC study of peer tutors and SI leaders explores what student peer educators reported gaining from their roles, including learning, connection, and fulfillment.

Final Thoughts: Is Becoming an SI Leader Worth It for Premed Students?

For the right student, becoming an SI leader is absolutely worth considering. It can help you become a better teacher, strengthen your understanding of important course material, build a meaningful relationship with a professor, earn money during college, and make a direct difference in the lives of other students.

I was not an SI leader myself, but I watched friends benefit from the teaching experience and closer faculty relationships the position created. I also experienced the other side of SI as a student attending the sessions, and I thought they significantly improved my understanding of difficult topics and contributed to stronger academic performance.

That is why I view SI as more than another résumé-building activity. You have an opportunity to become the person who helps another student finally understand a concept, regain confidence after a difficult exam, or remain on a path they were considering leaving.

When the experience is approached with that mindset, the benefits to your AMCAS application become a natural reflection of the meaningful work you were already doing.