Career-changer vs. Academic Enhancer for nontraditional applicant

[D-dimer500]

Hi All! I am a non-traditional applicant hoping to apply to medical school after a post-bacc. I feel I need to give a little background before I ask my question.

I have a degree in biochemistry and completed all my premed prerequisites over 15 years ago. I did 7+ years of clinical research at a School of Medicine in various departments (cardiothoracic surgery, cardiology, family and preventive medicine). Then I went to nursing school (I had kids). I have been a nurse for almost 10 years, and a Cardiovascular ICU/Code nurse for 6 of those years.

My overall and science GPA is not competitive, 2.8/3.0 (my priorities were different then), that's why I'll be enrolling in a Post-Bacc starting this fall. I applied to both the career-changer, and the academic enhancer post-bacc's and got into both. Since I completed my pre-requisites so long ago, and many medical schools are requiring that coursework for pre-requisites be completed within the last 5 years, I am favoring enrolling into the career-changer post-bacc, I would also be able to apply to more schools. Some of the schools I plan on applying to, however, do not have strict expiration dates for prerequisites; with my background, what would you recommend for an applicant like me? A career changer or an academic enhancer post-bacc? My reasoning for wanting to enroll in the career-changer is to retake all pre-med prerequisites again and hopefully get A's this time around, this would help me for the MCAT. The academic enhancer is an attractive choice too though because of the array of upper-division courses I can take, like immunology, virology, etc. I want to improve my science GPA and score higher on the MCAT (scored 508, took it 9/2022), I also want to show schools that I am ready for the rigors of medical school and that I am (will become) a competitive applicant.

Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

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[gyngyn]

Any sustained period of academic excellence would serve (even DIY).
Do not re-take the MCAT unless you are confident of getting a much higher score!
508 is a good score. You don't want to mess things up by getting a second score that doesn't help. Of course if you do not apply within 2 more years, another score will be needed.

 

[D-dimer500]

Thank you so much for your response and advice @gyngyn

I have another question for you. I looked through MSAR and the schools I’m interested in applying to accept online classes for prereq’s, and I have the opportunity of retaking my premed prereq’s online. Do you think this would hurt my chances, vs. retaking all my prereq’s in person?

Again, thank you in advance for the advice.

 

[gyngyn]

Generally, one need only re-take pre-reqs if the original grade was a C or less.
Upper div sciences are a better alternative.
Check to see if your target schools consider your"old" classes expired (most don't).