5th Year Undergrad or PostBacc

[kyu516]

Advertisement - Members don't see this ad

x

 

[Sundarban1]

Hi everybody. I'm currently an OOS thinking whether it would just be better to take a 5th year at my undergrad, or to attend a postbacc program.

Depends, how many classes do you need to take?

 

[Gooble]

What classes? You can't take a full 15 credit courseload of all sciences at once. 3 sciences at a time I would say is the most you should try for. Taking 4-5 is insane.

 

[Sundarban1]

I'm thinking only two semester's worth if possible.

It's difficult to give advice we don't know what classes you've taken and what classes you still need to take to fulfill med school requirements. I personally would not want to pay another years undergrad tuition if you could get by spending less in an informal program.

 

[Hindiana_Jones]

will not be competitive enough for the range of schools that I wish to apply to. I'm thinking of attending Extension to basically boost my GPA.

What is in your range of schools? Are you doing an extra year because your GPA is not high enough to get into a US Allo or Osteo school and you don't want to go offshore, or do you really want to go to University of Chicago but that "B+" is holding you back? If its the former, then staying an extra year makes sense, but don't just stay if you already have >3.4 BCOMP and can graduate. I am doing a 5th year (next year) and it doesn't look like its pleasant. Last semester I took five science classes (16 hrs) and got three As and two Bs. I got a B in Neurosceince, after I got one of the highest grades on the final. This was because I did so badly on the first exam it was numerically impossible for me to get an A. I did badly on the first exam because I had five exams in the same week. So let me just say that if you decide to do an extra year and take 15 hrs of science classes per semester you may have the unfortunate joy of having 5 exam in a week once every five weeks. This will certainly test your mettle. Goodluck!

 

[ilovescience]

Well in a postbac program, informal or formal, you're basically just taking more upper division science courses...and it might cost more to do (at a formal program or through open enrollment) or be more trouble since you have to apply to a program. I would stay another year at your undergrad college if you're not above the unit cap. I would have done that if I didn't already graduate because after 4 years, you're already familiar with how things are at your college. I agree about not overloading on science classes. Yeah, the more you have, the greater potential of increasing that gpa, but you want to do well, and that is the key thing.