5th year

[daniella07]

Hey guys.. I was hoping you guys could help me out with this. How do american schools count your gpa if you take a 5th year (ie. take 5 years to do your degree inorder to bring up your gpa). Would they take the avg of all 5 years or drop 1st year and take the avg of recent 4 years. I'm from canada and I know there is a diff forumla for each school there, but in the MSAR book it didn't say how a 5th year would be treated. Thanks.. I'm debating whether to take a 5th year or do a masters.. so this would help me decide! Thanks for any help! take care

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[bubabugster]

5th year in undergrad counts as yet another senior year on AMCAS.

 

[daniella07]

so just avg of all 5 years then?

 

[MinnyGophers]

If you want to bring up your undergrad GPA for med school, I would suggest to do the fifth year instead of the masters which will not count toward your undergrad GPA.

 

[daniella07]

thanks for the response. I'm just worried about how competitive I'll be as a canadian student applying to the US with a cgpa of about 3.57 form all my 4 years. Now if I do a 5th year it only brings it up to about 3.62 (or 3.65 max possible if i get all 4.0s in 5th yr)..so it doesn't improve that much. I have been thinking and thinking about what to do for so long it is driving me insane. I'd really appreciate any input about what I should do and how competitive you think I am. Also I should mention I do have on epublication (4th author) and I didn't write the MCAT yet but will soon.. and I think I have a good chance of scoring high.. I know I have to! thank you!!!

 

[MadHopsMD]

thanks for the response. I'm just worried about how competitive I'll be as a canadian student applying to the US with a cgpa of about 3.57 form all my 4 years. Now if I do a 5th year it only brings it up to about 3.62 (or 3.65 max possible if i get all 4.0s in 5th yr)..so it doesn't improve that much. I have been thinking and thinking about what to do for so long it is driving me insane. I'd really appreciate any input about what I should do and how competitive you think I am. Also I should mention I do have on epublication (4th author) and I didn't write the MCAT yet but will soon.. and I think I have a good chance of scoring high.. I know I have to! thank you!!!

Hey fellow canuck,

First of all, its "TAKE" not "WRITE" the MCAT in America. haha. I been corrected so many times on SDN it's not even funny.

5th year counts as a "post bacc" on the transcript. So you will have freshman, sophomore, junior, senior and then post bacc. everything you do after you get your degree counts as a post-bacc. Not graduate marks, they count in a seperate Grad section.

I wont worry about doing a masters. I am saying this not because your gpa is low, but because you have research (publication) and masters in canada is a 2 year commitment (it seems like you dont want to do this). If you could find a 1 year masters program that would be great and ideal for you, but none exist in Canada (well not in science).

Post bacc (5th year) might also not be a good idea because again your GPA is high enough in the US. Unless you are doing a 5th year to get an interview at Canadian schools (at western you need 2, 3.7+ for acceptance).

Anyways, I think you should just work and apply. Work at kaplan, lab, pharma, etc....and make sure you pull a 30+ in MCAT (with 3.57 you will need it!). MCAT are pretty important in US, especially for a canuck applying...your GPA is fine, dont worry about it!

PM me if you have any questions...peace

 

[daniella07]

ooh I thought my thread disappeared when I went looking for the responses.. but it was just at the bottom haha..things move fast here! Anyway, thanks to all who replied... If anyone has any other input/comments I'd appreciate it.

 

[Hassler]

thanks for the response. I'm just worried about how competitive I'll be as a canadian student applying to the US with a cgpa of about 3.57 form all my 4 years. Now if I do a 5th year it only brings it up to about 3.62 (or 3.65 max possible if i get all 4.0s in 5th yr)..so it doesn't improve that much. I have been thinking and thinking about what to do for so long it is driving me insane. I'd really appreciate any input about what I should do and how competitive you think I am. Also I should mention I do have on epublication (4th author) and I didn't write the MCAT yet but will soon.. and I think I have a good chance of scoring high.. I know I have to! thank you!!!

Haha. I thought writing the MCAT is pretty funny too. Certainly, if you are qualified to write the MCAT, you're probably a doctor already or on some med school faculty

Anyway, I would just advice studying very hard for the MCAT. Even if you take that extra 5th year, it's not going to change your GPA that much. In fact, there is always a possibility that you will lower it. And I also don't think having a master's degree necessarily puts you ahead of other applicants, unless you're doing one of those programs where you'll get an automatic interview if you complete a certain master's program at a med school (forgot what it's called...)

3.57 gpa is not impressive but not terrible. However, as an international applicant (since you're from Canada), you definitely need to rock the MCAT to be competitive.