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Started by coolpianocat123
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The more time that passes between the IA and her application, the more her chances improve. However, an IA for academic dishonesty in chemistry is hard to overcome. I am sympathetic, though, to stupid mistakes made by young people and hope that this does not result in a lifetime ban from the profession.
 
The medical profession can be unforgiving. Because it is so competitive (60% of applicants do not get in and a substantial percentage of those that do get in get only one acceptance), an application with a red flag can make for an easy auto-reject. That said, allowing time to pass, demonstrating sustained excellence, and owning the mistake are powerful forces too. Good luck!
 
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Rachapkis said:
The medical profession can be unforgiving. Because it is so competitive (60% of applicants do not get in and a substantial percentage of those that do get in get only one acceptance), an application with a red flag can make for an easy auto-reject. That said, allowing time to pass, demonstrating sustained excellence, and owning the mistake are powerful forces too. Good luck!
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Well, it is off topic but I am really Tired of this SDN premed hype that only 40 (42 actually) percent get admitted. It is very misleading. And most people who were not admitted simply didn’t have the right numbers. And the majority of people with at least 3.6 gpa and 506 MCAT receive admission to MD. Let alone DO. With a whopping 88% of those who had 3.8/518+. So it is just the matter of numbers which OP definitely has.
 
coolpianocat123 said:
It was all over the place and it tanked senior year (<3.0 due to rough life circumstances but she doesn’t explain this in her app, just talks about redemption in smp, research and mcat) She went to a top 10 notorious for grade deflation
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I think that adcoms will provide a better response but in my opinion with good school list (that should include DO schools since they highly reward reinvention) your loved one shall not have any issues with getting admitted. Best of luck.
 
Would love to hear an ADCOMs take. My personal take (I am a pre-med) is that after all that time it shouldn't matter much. She's been through so much and grown so much since (I'd assume).
 
coolpianocat123 said:
Right, also it was a 1 credit lab and she retook it and got an A. Further, it was completely unintentional and turnitin marked the reports as being too similar...even though collaboration was encouraged. Does this fall under academic dishonesty/plagiarism? She basically chalked it up to carelessness and ignorance of how similar her lab report was to her partner’s.
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Let's get this straight. At the end of the semester the TA informs your friend that she and her lab partner got a 0 on an assignment because of Turnitin. Was an action actually taken by the university?
 
Does a school need her? No they don't. There are plenty others to choose from. Some may wonder how many other "similarities" to others' work contributed to her {marginal} success in undergrad. She has a downward trend in undergrad that she does not explain?? and she listed an IA on her application that was not really an IA? and she blew the SMP out of the water but didn't pay attention to the fine print that said she needed to apply to the med school the same year she completed the SMP??
And let's consider the gender change that happened in the original post.... I am always suspicious of these "my friend" posts.
coolpianocat123 said:
go in chemistry lab she received an F because her TA told him and her lab partner (at the end of the semester!) that 2 lab reports they had previously gotten As on they would get 0s for since turnitin marked them as being too similar. She reported this as an IA, took full ownership and expressed remorse and growth since the event happened 4 years ago.
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Good luck You may go 0 for 36 again this cycle but it won't be solely due to the IA.
 
coolpianocat123 said:
It was all over the place and it tanked senior year (<3.0 due to rough life circumstances but she doesn’t explain this in her app, just talks about redemption in smp, research and mcat) She went to a top 10 notorious for grade deflation
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Normally, TAs check turnitin as part of the process of grading the assignment. I don't understand how this would have happened so late in the process.

A single F in a 1 credit lab class shouldn't lead to a 3.2; that's not how weighted averages work. There must have been a lot of other mediocre to bad grades earned over the 4 years of undergrad.

Hopefully, this cycle works out. If not, (1) consider applying to DO, (2) have a decent explanation for the poor undergrad performance, which isn't at all fully explained by a single F in a 1 credit course, (3) perhaps do a postbacc to raise the undergrad GPA? (Are you being automatically screened from some schools?).

Also consider searching for the high MCAT/low GPA thread that gets recreated or revived every cycle. Apart from the IA, you're in that boat.
 
coolpianocat123 said:
1. She has the utmost integrity and put this incident on her application because it is technically considered plagiarism
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The unfortunate truth is that there are plenty of applicants that don't have an incident to report in the first place. You don't get integrity points for reporting your IA.

coolpianocat123 said:
But 4 years of an upward trend, by demonstrating 4 years of excellence in academics and research
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I was referring to the uGPA trend. You said their GPA tanked senior year.
 
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Has "your friend" (who you defend like one would defend their child, so there must be a lot of love there) applied broadly or are they applying only to Top 10 MD schools? I find it hard to believe a DO school (especially a new one) would turn down the opportunity to advertise their MCAT range is 493-524 for an incoming class...
 
coolpianocat123 said:
Right but she's clearly not the same person she was in college, is there no hope for someone who has completely turned their life around?
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Your friend has to show that they're clearly not the same person anymore. That may be obvious to her friends, but an adcom is going to need to be convinced. Honestly, the IA doesn't sound insurmountable, as long as your friend owns up to it (and your description of "it was completely unintentional and turnitin marked the reports as being too similar...even though collaboration was encouraged", is not "owning up to it"). The thing I would be more concerned about is the low GPA and severe downward trend.
 
coolpianocat123 said:
So my friend is a reapplicant, she applied two years ago and received zero interviews. Went to a top 10 undergrad, had a 3.2x ugrad gpa, followed up with a 3.8-3.9 SMP and 100th percentile MCAT. In her gap years she has been working in an ivy league research lab and managed to get 9-10 papers, multiple abstracts and her other research achievements are quite impressive.

Unfortunately, 4 years ago in chemistry lab she received an F because her TA told him and her lab partner (at the end of the semester!) that 2 lab reports they had previously gotten As on they would get 0s for since turnitin marked them as being too similar. She reported this as an IA, took full ownership and expressed remorse and growth since the event happened 4 years ago.

She applied broadly to over 50 schools and was complete at most places by end of July. I greatly admire her tenacity, resilience and drive to become a physician and hope that adcom members see these same qualities in her.

She has the standard ECs, 500+ volunteer hours, standard shadowing, founded two clubs, basically checked all the boxes elsewhere. @LizzyM @Goro Will her IA make her dead-on-arrival?

If not, is it safe to assume she can expect her first interview later in the cycle? Like Nov/Dec?
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These types of infractions are pretty trivial, especially given the reinvention she's done and the time that has elapsed.

Applying to 50 schools was overkill!.
 
coolpianocat123 said:
It just seems a little ridiculous to me that after a stellar performance in a rigorous masters program, extremely high MCAT score and crazy research output that rivals most post-doc’s productivity, that she would not be able to become a physician due to a mistake she made in undergrad. How could adcoms not be blown away by her resilience and grit? This profession seems harsh and unforgiving at times. I fail to understand how a cookie cutter student with avg stats (say 510/3.6) and avg ECs would be chosen over my friend. It’s pretty clear, IMO, that a strong upward trend based on the past 4 years would be indicative of future success in medical school and beyond. She is on track to revolutionize how we treat the disease she’s published so much about. If it weren’t for her IA and if her ugrad gpa could be replaced with how she performed in literal medical school classes as a masters student, she would be a shoe in for any top medical school. I understand, of course, that that’s not how the process works. But to think that she’ll be rejected from everywhere a second time? That prospect is incredibly frustrating to me and I feel hopeless watching her go through this process
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If she gets shut out, it won't be due to the IA. Chill.
 
coolpianocat123 said:
The program interviewed the top 50% of its masters students, ONLY if they applied the same year they were enrolled in the program. She applied the year after, and didn’t benefit from this policy, got rejected pretty early on (the school is a high volume low yield institution)
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So was that her previous failed cycle? Or has she actually gone through two failed cycles? How has she Significantly improved her app since her failed cycle?
Med school admissions is incredibly competitive! Although it seems unfair why should a school accept someone with an academic dishonesty IA when they have thousands of qualified applicants without that red flag? And I’m not sure your friend has actually “owned it” as you said.
FYI- nobody is a shoe in for an acceptance at any med school let alone a Top Tier! And after treading your posts it sounds like the SMP was for grade repair and really had nothing to do with the IA. So was her first cycle before the SMP?Did the SMP not know about the IA before she enrolled in the SMP?
And why not a PhD? You are obviously involved very successfully in research!
Please keep us posted as she/he moves forward. It will be interesting to see what happens.
 
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