Thought this application form link was good information.
http://utsa.edu/admissions/undergrad/doc/AcademicFreshStart_Request.pdf
http://utsa.edu/admissions/undergrad/doc/AcademicFreshStart_Request.pdf
For those thinking about Texas' Acedemic FreshStart
- Thread starter rrt
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Quick question: Everything prior to the 10 years are not included in our gpa, but the schools still request that you send them your transcripts in addition to TMDSAS? Then they will see all the bad grades prior to the 10 years and influence their decision??.....
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If they still require your transcripts then, yes - looks like they'd be doing just that. Sounds like a gimmick just to make you feel better.
Not a gimmick at all. In the end the school has a choice whether or not to use any of your classes, but in Texas, All Texas public school take into account your GPA from the 10 year mark forward. When you send your classes to TMDAS, this gets you past some of the hard cut off points for interview or no interview. At that point, let them see your grades! All the better! I'd love the oppurtunity to explain why my gpa pre 10 years is a ~1.9-2.0, but my post 10 year GPA is 3.85-3.9. For people like me who served in the military and worked in healthcare as a RT after the 10 year mark, it can do wonders. Add it to a higher than 30 mcat, and I am sure you will impress someone.
Besides, in order to get a degree, you essentially have to start over again. You can't take classes which have pre-reqs before your 10 year mark. I say it's pretty damn impressive if you suceed with this plan.
All in all, the choice between utilizing this plan and going strickly DO is still there for me. I just so happen to have the chance to graduate with my BS in Biology 1.5 years before I would need to utilize the fresh start program. If I wait for my chance to start the fresh-start, I'd have to wait until Spring 2016, which would mean I wouldn't matriculate until 2017 minimum. If I continue retaking classes like I am anyways, I can utlize DO's grade replacement and graduate 2014-2015.
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Im a texas resident, and really intrested in this.
My main problem is about 10 years ago straight out of high school i went to california school and total messed up w's f's anythin bad you can imagen. Fast foreward to present
im totally kicking ass qill grad with a 3.7 to 3.8 at utep chemistry.
How bad will my 10year old transcript hurt me from california? Will texas not count those to my total gpa? If so it will turn my app to a weird cGPA 3.2 and sGPA 3.8 . It would be so nice not to have that that year old anchor of a transcript
Sorru wrote this on cell phone
My main problem is about 10 years ago straight out of high school i went to california school and total messed up w's f's anythin bad you can imagen. Fast foreward to present
im totally kicking ass qill grad with a 3.7 to 3.8 at utep chemistry.
How bad will my 10year old transcript hurt me from california? Will texas not count those to my total gpa? If so it will turn my app to a weird cGPA 3.2 and sGPA 3.8 . It would be so nice not to have that that year old anchor of a transcript
Sorru wrote this on cell phone
I just finished applying and being accepted into med school while invoking Academic Fresh Start. It is true that via AFS TMDSAS wants all your transcripts even prior to the 10 year cut off; however, before my app was submitted to the member schools and the GPA adjusted per AFS provisions, which appears to be done manually, all those old transcripts were effectively redacted, showing up as deleted on my client end of the TMDSAS site.
Not being on an adcom nor having asked the question, I cannot say with absolute certainty that they never saw my old transcripts at all. Nevertheless, it does appear that is what happened. It only makes sense since that's the whole point of AFS.
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Not being on an adcom nor having asked the question, I cannot say with absolute certainty that they never saw my old transcripts at all. Nevertheless, it does appear that is what happened. It only makes sense since that's the whole point of AFS.
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Hey all, I wanted to chime in here with some thoughts on a successful Academic Fresh Start. I applied and was accepted using AFS and I am now two months away from graduating at age 39! It was the best decision I made but I want to make sure everyone understands what they are doing. Some of these are more obvious than others:
1) It only works for applying to Texas public professional schools. It has no effect on other schools.
2) It is true it will remove any scores in your GPA prior to 10 years before the AFS application. And it is true you have to submit all of your records regardless. But the Texas schools will use your AFS-calculated GPA in their interview algorithm.
3) Here's the tricky part: you still have to have >= 90 hours of college course-work to apply to Texas medical schools and the hours deleted by AFS cannot be used. I.e., timing is important, otherwise, you may be taking A LOT of hours that are not necessary to get into med school (I had to take 3 years of part-time just before med school)
4) Continued tricky part: any pre-requisites taken prior to 10 years cannot be taken. I.e., you may be re-taking gen. chem, english, o. chem, etc., etc. even if you did well in those (but if you're like me, you need to take those over anyway because you have forgotten it all).
5) At the time I was applying, no one knew how AFS worked and I had to convince my pre-med advisor that I could get into med school with it.
I wish I could tell you that it will all work out but I took a huge risk that could have crashed and burned. Not everyone who gets into med school finishes. Fortunately for me, it worked out.
Let me know if you have any questions about AFS,
DrGump
1) It only works for applying to Texas public professional schools. It has no effect on other schools.
2) It is true it will remove any scores in your GPA prior to 10 years before the AFS application. And it is true you have to submit all of your records regardless. But the Texas schools will use your AFS-calculated GPA in their interview algorithm.
3) Here's the tricky part: you still have to have >= 90 hours of college course-work to apply to Texas medical schools and the hours deleted by AFS cannot be used. I.e., timing is important, otherwise, you may be taking A LOT of hours that are not necessary to get into med school (I had to take 3 years of part-time just before med school)
4) Continued tricky part: any pre-requisites taken prior to 10 years cannot be taken. I.e., you may be re-taking gen. chem, english, o. chem, etc., etc. even if you did well in those (but if you're like me, you need to take those over anyway because you have forgotten it all).
5) At the time I was applying, no one knew how AFS worked and I had to convince my pre-med advisor that I could get into med school with it.
I wish I could tell you that it will all work out but I took a huge risk that could have crashed and burned. Not everyone who gets into med school finishes. Fortunately for me, it worked out.
Let me know if you have any questions about AFS,
DrGump
I applied to The University of Houston under Fresh Start but it was rejected after I had already started taking my first course there. To be able to quailify for fresh start a student cannot already have a bachelors degree and I already had one... I want to try Fresh Start again and was wondering where you used the Fresh Start provision... apparently the institutions have a lot of leeway in how they want to use the provision.
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If you are already enrolled, you can't unless you wait a year after not taking courses. A better option would to concurrently enroll in a distance learning course at another school and Fresh Start. I believe this works for all courses older than 10 years old after the semester which you elect Fresh Start.
Might want to double check this, but this is what I have learned this when I considered Fresh Start.
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You can't invoke Academic Fresh Start at a school you are currently attending. You can either stay away from the school for 12 months and apply for readmission. You have to get approved for Texas Academic Fresh Start before registering for classes.
If you can't wait a year, you apply somewhere else, such as a community college. Take a mini-term or 5 week long course. Your transcript will have an entry stating that you invoked Texas Academic Fresh Start. Once TMDSAS sees that on any transcript, you're set.
If you can't wait a year, you apply somewhere else, such as a community college. Take a mini-term or 5 week long course. Your transcript will have an entry stating that you invoked Texas Academic Fresh Start. Once TMDSAS sees that on any transcript, you're set.
