Welcome, 56-minute member (as I start to respond)!
You have two fine choices there. Given we are well into May, clearly you have choices to make, and soon.
I am a fan of reverse engineering. Months ago, last year, and earlier, when you were doing your deep-dive research into USAFA.edu and USMA.edu, reading everything you could about USMA and USAFA programs and Officer career paths, what conclusion did you come to as to which officer paths you could see yourself doing? (In case you did not get one of the tiny handful of medical school opportunities available.) From your research, which Service mission and culture appealed to you most? If you had gotten direct appointment offers, which would you have chosen? What attracted you to apply for some SAs and not others when you did your detailed comparative analysis? These are all rhetorical questions, designed to point you toward the analysis you did early on, and how that may have evolved since you started the application process.
Presumably you also prepared alternative plans such as AFROTC and AROTC. If those were your two choices, which would you choose, based on your research and thinking to date, if the goal is to commission in a specific Service with an interest in a suitable number of career paths?
(Rhetorical.)
There are many threads here on SAF about medical school. The military gets the majority of its MDs from civilian colleges and medical schools. Have you researched the Army HPSP and AF HPSP scholarships? The military medical school at USUHS (get your commission and go to medical school)?
You have two golden tickets. If you complete either USMAPS or the Falcon prep satisfactorily, you will likely be in the Class of 2026, at one of two service academies designed to produce warriors. Is that what you want? You have to look at the the prep path and SA as waypoints, and not THE goal. The goal is a commission in a service where you see yourself fitting, and assigned to an officer career path of interest. Figure that part out, and your decision is made.
Way down the road, there are opportunities to request transfer to other officer career paths, but only a few stellar performers get to do that. Alternately, you can go into a non-medical field, serve your active duty obligation, serve another 36 months, separate, earn your full Post 9/11 GI Bill educational benefit, send yourself to medical school, and go on to a civilian medical career or apply to come back into a service (age limits are flexible for in-demand specialties). I had a Navy friend who retired at 20 years, used her GI Bill to go to vet school, and she’s happily practicing large animal medicine in a Western state, just to illustrate that benefit and the opportunity to shift career gears. You will not be teetering at grave’s edge in your 40’s, and can start entirely new careers. Ditto getting out in your late 20’s.
