Chance in hell.

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I had the privilege of being accepted into one of the top 20 pharmacy schools in the country. However, my youthfulness and minor addiction to an online video game squandered my hopes and dreams of becoming a pharmacist. The first year consisted of me failing 3 classes in my spring semester. The first by not turning in a paper. the 2nd by ending a long term relationship and the third was general laziness and skipping class to play games. I appealed my release from school and was given a second chance to repeat the semester, only to fall right back into my bad habits.

Three years later, I'm regretting every minute, every hour I wasted on that stupid game, and how it ruined my life. I joined the Air Force Reserves for discipline - something I was lacking in my younger days and am now focused and reinvigorated about my passion for pharmacy. Along the past few years, my Uncle died as well, almost in my hands from 3 hornet stings ( two to the throat and one to the back of the leg). As I was giving CPR on the floor of the lack house, my mind scrambled for any knowledge I retained from pharmacy school. I remembered family members mentioning a hornets nest down stairs, and immediately noticed the his throat swelling up like a grape fruit. Finally, I screamed for an epi-pen or benadryl, as tears rolled down my face. He died 3 days later and I was left wishing there was more I could do at the hospital to help out. It was then I realized I wasn't ready to give up on my dream.

Over the past year, I have slowly been trying to rebuild the wake of destruction that was left by my immature, unmotivated self. I've begun teaching pharmacy technician classes at a small institute, just to get back into the swing of things.Having been a tech for almost 7 years at a pharmacy, I felt I had a lot of knowledge to pass on about the real life circumstances that arise in the pharmacy. So far, I have had a great time sharing my experiences with others and instilling quality work and pride in new technicians entering the field.

My question is, realistically, what are my chances of getting into another pharmacy school? Undergrad consisted of a B.S in Biology with a minor in chem. Biochemistry, immunology, physiology, bacteriology, o-chem were all passed with A's in the class. Overall, my GPA was around 3.3I believe. My pcat's rocked with 88, 92, 95 in the three main core categories, math, life sciences and chemistry. Employment consisted as a medical technician in an Alzheimer's and dementia unit, 7 years as a church custodian, multiple years as a pharmacy tech and a couple miscellaneous extra curricular activities.

I know it may be a long shot, but to me it's still something I want to fight for no matter how hard it may be. Any advice would be extremely grateful.

Originally Posted by eakmen

I had the privilege of being accepted into one of the top 20 pharmacy schools in the country. However, my youthfulness and minor addiction to an online video game squandered my hopes and dreams of becoming a pharmacist. The first year consisted of me failing 3 classes in my spring semester. The first by not turning in a paper. the 2nd by ending a long term relationship and the third was general laziness and skipping class to play games. I appealed my release from school and was given a second chance to repeat the semester, only to fall right back into my bad habits.

Three years later, I'm regretting every minute, every hour I wasted on that stupid game, and how it ruined my life. I joined the Air Force Reserves for discipline - something I was lacking in my younger days and am now focused and reinvigorated about my passion for pharmacy. Along the past few years, my Uncle died as well, almost in my hands from 3 hornet stings ( two to the throat and one to the back of the leg). As I was giving CPR on the floor of the lack house, my mind scrambled for any knowledge I retained from pharmacy school. I remembered family members mentioning a hornets nest down stairs, and immediately noticed the his throat swelling up like a grape fruit. Finally, I screamed for an epi-pen or benadryl, as tears rolled down my face. He died 3 days later and I was left wishing there was more I could do at the hospital to help out. It was then I realized I wasn't ready to give up on my dream.

Over the past year, I have slowly been trying to rebuild the wake of destruction that was left by my immature, unmotivated self. I've begun teaching pharmacy technician classes at a small institute, just to get back into the swing of things.Having been a tech for almost 7 years at a pharmacy, I felt I had a lot of knowledge to pass on about the real life circumstances that arise in the pharmacy. So far, I have had a great time sharing my experiences with others and instilling quality work and pride in new technicians entering the field.

My question is, realistically, what are my chances of getting into another pharmacy school? Undergrad consisted of a B.S in Biology with a minor in chem. Biochemistry, immunology, physiology, bacteriology, o-chem were all passed with A's in the class. Overall, my GPA was around 3.3I believe. My pcat's rocked with 88, 92, 95 in the three main core categories, math, life sciences and chemistry. Employment consisted as a medical technician in an Alzheimer's and dementia unit, 7 years as a church custodian, multiple years as a pharmacy tech and a couple miscellaneous extra curricular activities.

I know it may be a long shot, but to me it's still something I want to fight for no matter how hard it may be. Any advice would be extremely grateful.

many new pharmacy schools have recently opened. You got a good shot if you can pay. look into the job situation and make an educated choice

Originally Posted by eakmen

I had the privilege of being accepted into one of the top 20 pharmacy schools in the country. However, my youthfulness and minor addiction to an online video game squandered my hopes and dreams of becoming a pharmacist. The first year consisted of me failing 3 classes in my spring semester. The first by not turning in a paper. the 2nd by ending a long term relationship and the third was general laziness and skipping class to play games. I appealed my release from school and was given a second chance to repeat the semester, only to fall right back into my bad habits.

Three years later, I'm regretting every minute, every hour I wasted on that stupid game, and how it ruined my life. I joined the Air Force Reserves for discipline - something I was lacking in my younger days and am now focused and reinvigorated about my passion for pharmacy. Along the past few years, my Uncle died as well, almost in my hands from 3 hornet stings ( two to the throat and one to the back of the leg). As I was giving CPR on the floor of the lack house, my mind scrambled for any knowledge I retained from pharmacy school. I remembered family members mentioning a hornets nest down stairs, and immediately noticed the his throat swelling up like a grape fruit. Finally, I screamed for an epi-pen or benadryl, as tears rolled down my face. He died 3 days later and I was left wishing there was more I could do at the hospital to help out. It was then I realized I wasn't ready to give up on my dream.

Over the past year, I have slowly been trying to rebuild the wake of destruction that was left by my immature, unmotivated self. I've begun teaching pharmacy technician classes at a small institute, just to get back into the swing of things.Having been a tech for almost 7 years at a pharmacy, I felt I had a lot of knowledge to pass on about the real life circumstances that arise in the pharmacy. So far, I have had a great time sharing my experiences with others and instilling quality work and pride in new technicians entering the field.

My question is, realistically, what are my chances of getting into another pharmacy school? Undergrad consisted of a B.S in Biology with a minor in chem. Biochemistry, immunology, physiology, bacteriology, o-chem were all passed with A's in the class. Overall, my GPA was around 3.3I believe. My pcat's rocked with 88, 92, 95 in the three main core categories, math, life sciences and chemistry. Employment consisted as a medical technician in an Alzheimer's and dementia unit, 7 years as a church custodian, multiple years as a pharmacy tech and a couple miscellaneous extra curricular activities.

I know it may be a long shot, but to me it's still something I want to fight for no matter how hard it may be. Any advice would be extremely grateful.

Pharmacist supply and demand being the way it is, it's probably better not to go after it. If you wanna stay in the field, go for PA, NP, med school?

Which video game by the way? I hate to say it though, but I don't think video game addiction is an excuse. I played World of Warcraft through pharmacy school, and I was one of the top assassination rogues in my realm, PvP and PvE and all that stuff and I did alright. And I'm about to start playing hardcore Diablo 3 when it comes out next week, even though I should be studying for the boards.

Originally Posted by Sparda29

Pharmacist supply and demand being the way it is, it's probably better not to go after it. If you wanna stay in the field, go for PA, NP, med school?

Which video game by the way? I hate to say it though, but I don't think video game addiction is an excuse. I played World of Warcraft through pharmacy school, and I was one of the top assassination rogues in my realm, PvP and PvE and all that stuff and I did alright. And I'm about to start playing hardcore Diablo 3 when it comes out next week, even though I should be studying for the boards.

Sparda....you're not helping. Don't forget to tell the OP that because you played video games the night before exams, your grades suck.

Originally Posted by rxlea

Sparda....you're not helping. Don't forget to tell the OP that because you played video games the night before exams, your grades suck.

That's where he got his +3 switchblade of vagrant stabbing.

I did the same mistake. P2 year was hell for me because I played video game too much. I blamed Final Fantasy XI Online leveling grind; MMORPG is too addicting and time consuming. I thought it was going to be a walk in the park like undergrad and P1, oh I thought wrong lol... so after realizing this, I sold my character for $4000 to some Asian kid in Canada using Western Union and chit. I did the calculation, I spend like 200 days total playing the game and got 0.8cents/hour. It was a cheap entertainment $13/month if you don't want to go out bar/club/movies. Hell, no more MMO for me for life... After all that my GPA was back to +3.5 during P3 and P4 >_>

Like other people have said, why would you even WANT to go to pharmacy school right now? The field is oversaturated, and you're going to be in school for 6 or 7 years, have to do a residency (and don't kid yourself, it will be a requirement by the time you graduate) and probably won't be able to find a job anyway and will be saddled with debt.

The point everyone is missing is Pharmacy is his passion.Atleast it seems from his post.
eakmen you can get in to pharmacy school again.You know the current job situation and you know it can get worse.
A person should not give up on his or her dreams.

Originally Posted by Sparda29

Pharmacist supply and demand being the way it is, it's probably better not to go after it. If you wanna stay in the field, go for PA, NP, med school?

Which video game by the way? I hate to say it though, but I don't think video game addiction is an excuse. I played World of Warcraft through pharmacy school, and I was one of the top assassination rogues in my realm, PvP and PvE and all that stuff and I did alright. And I'm about to start playing hardcore Diablo 3 when it comes out next week, even though I should be studying for the boards.

It actually was World of Warcraft. WotLK had just come out and instead of studying at night, I would come home and play WoW for 4-5 hours at a time for the entire week. Staying up to 1 or 2 am playing games, when I had class at 8 a.m., usually meant I skipped a class or two in the morning because I was so tired.

Ironically, I passed all the difficult classes ( Med chem, biopharmaceutics, pharmacokinetics,), but failed a special populations series on Geriatrics, another class by not turning in a research paper and then skills lab.

Thanks for the advice everyone.

^ Are you getting Guild Wars 2? I already pre-purchased. Best thing about it is the little time commitment required to jump into the fun!

I too played WoW all throughout pharmacy school. Analyzing my /played time I was averaging about 40 hours per week. No excuse for failing out.

Pretty good personal statement, but isn't there a different forum for that?

But seriously, you've gotta set aside time for gaming and time for school. I've got LoL loading as I type this, and Diablo comes out the 2nd day of rotations. Don't deprive yourself of things you enjoy, but don't let it consume your life either. Unless you're a pro gamer with sponsors, which is next to impossible.

Originally Posted by Ackj

Pretty good personal statement, but isn't there a different forum for that?

I'm also a WoW player. I used to be a Warrior class leader in a raiding guild during the early Wrath of the Lich King days. I'm not nearly as involved these days.

I couldn't even survive through undergraduate school while playing WoW. It's one of the main reasons why my GPA is so low. I had to cut way back on my playtime to juggle school and work, but I remember when I was working 20 hours a week and going to school full-time and still trying to squeeze in PvE raiding (this was during the Burning Crusade era, if anyone knows what I'm talking about).

The result? I took 4 classes with 2 C's and 2 D's. These classes were not terribly hard, either - I believe the classes were Intro to American Politics, COM 111, Intro to Sociology, and Graphic Design (was thinking of becoming a web/graphic designer back then).

If you can play WoW hardcore and still make good grades, good for you. You must be smarter than I am, because I have to study a lot to do good in anything. But part of growing up is making necessary sacrifices, and when I stopped playing computer games so much I became a near-4.0 GPA student. But there's no way in hell I'm going to be raiding in WoW in pharmacy school. I may not even play Diablo 3, though God knows I want to.

Didn't realize there were so many gamers in Pharmacy School. Haha.

Originally Posted by DH1987

I'm also a WoW player. I used to be a Warrior class leader in a raiding guild during the early Wrath of the Lich King days. I'm not nearly as involved these days.

I couldn't even survive through undergraduate school while playing WoW. It's one of the main reasons why my GPA is so low. I had to cut way back on my playtime to juggle school and work, but I remember when I was working 20 hours a week and going to school full-time and still trying to squeeze in PvE raiding (this was during the Burning Crusade era, if anyone knows what I'm talking about).

The result? I took 4 classes with 2 C's and 2 D's. These classes were not terribly hard, either - I believe the classes were Intro to American Politics, COM 111, Intro to Sociology, and Graphic Design (was thinking of becoming a web/graphic designer back then).

If you can play WoW hardcore and still make good grades, good for you. You must be smarter than I am, because I have to study a lot to do good in anything. But part of growing up is making necessary sacrifices, and when I stopped playing computer games so much I became a near-4.0 GPA student. But there's no way in hell I'm going to be raiding in WoW in pharmacy school. I may not even play Diablo 3, though God knows I want to.

Didn't realize there were so many gamers in Pharmacy School. Haha.

Diablo 3 coming out in a few hours. Thank goodness I'm graduating on Thursday. Studying for NAPLEX/MJPE in rooo-ins.

lol you guys are nuts, I used to be a gamer until I entered pharmacy school. My best friend plays games all day and still gets a 4.0. Everytime I tell him to study pharmaceutics or therapeutics he is playing games... Dont know how you guys do it, but I can't.

Originally Posted by DH1987

Didn't realize there were so many gamers in Pharmacy School. Haha.

What you gotta realize is that the type of people who go to pharmacy school/med school, are nerds/geeks. And most nerds/geeks like video games.

Originally Posted by Sparda29

What you gotta realize is that the type of people who go to pharmacy school/med school, are nerds/geeks. And most nerds/geeks like video games.

This is true. I'm a Canadian studying for the November FPGEE right now, and I'm trying hard not to buy D3 lol. My other pharm friends went to the midnight releases last night. Craziness.

I played WoW and still had a 3.5 overall GPA by graduation. *shrug* I think if you know you can't handle MMORPGs with real-life responsibilities, you shouldn't play them.

I never like being average. My competitive gaming nature does not allow me to be the underdog. I was in 0.1% elite gamers with the best gear... To get to where I was, you need to put in at least 8 hours a day easy and that kind of commitment tends to kill your GPA no matter what

Originally Posted by Sparda29

Diablo 3 coming out in a few hours. Thank goodness I'm graduating on Thursday. Studying for NAPLEX/MJPE in rooo-ins.

Yep, I bit the bullet against my word and I'm playing it now, lol. Good luck on your NAPLEX, hope you don't play too much. xD

EDIT: Rofl, just looked at your avatar closely, I did not catch the Starcraft reference until just now.

To Glycerin: Don't know how you do it, man. Did you work during pharmacy school? And were you just a casual player or were you a top raider?

To Momus: I've been there too...well, sort of. I was a high ranking player in Warcraft 3 about 5 years ago, ranked 110th in the western US server. Honestly though, rankings were determined not just on your skill, but also how much you play. I dunno if you could really consider that the top 0.1%, but it was pretty safe to say the average person had no chance against me.

But I do remember trying to get good enough to beat professional gamers, and I gave up because it was turning into a job that I wasn't really getting paid for.

Originally Posted by Momus

I never like being average. My competitive gaming nature does not allow me to be the underdog. I was in 0.1% elite gamers with the best gear... To get to where I was, you need to put in at least 8 hours a day easy and that kind of commitment tends to kill your GPA no matter what

Used to play FFXI, luckily it was before pharmacy school. I was competitive just like you, putting in 6 hrs a day easy. Finally had an awakening, and enough was enough. Sold my character for more than $1k, and made a mental note to never to touch MMORPG ever again. Only the occasional Mass Effect and Skyrim for my gaming fix now.