A college soph's questions

[ainfean]

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Hi everybody, I just joined after going extensively through the forum, and I kind of have some unanswered questions...

Does the "prestige" of your school matter when it comes to applying for vet school? I go to a top 10 liberal arts college where courses are rather difficult, and my grades have suffered quite a bit (GPA as of now 3.25) from my workload, but will the application reviewers look into that? And if I took classes at UC Berkeley and did reasonably well in them, will UC Davis look into that and factor it into the decision-making process? (I'm a CA resident also.) I'm really hoping that my experience in working at animal hospitals here and abroad will help, as I was able to assist in surgery when I was 16.

Thanks in advance for your help! Time to study for my orgo exam...

 

[canis13]

i'm a junior at a top liberal arts school with almost exactly the same GPA (3.28 - and i don't even think it's that bad, although it could be better). i've heard from some that most schools weigh the difficultly of the undergrad institution you're coming from (some more than others). my school even sends out a letter with the transcript saying that they don't inflate grades, so yeah, i'm really counting on the difficultly of my undergrad to help me.

 

[stick91]

As mentioned, there are some schools that will weigh the rigor of your undergrad academics more than other schools. It will probably get better after o-chem since that is a hard one for almost everyone. My sophomore year I took o-chem and physics because I wanted to get them both over with. My overall GPA for that year was probably around a 3.2 but once I got to the upper division bio classes that I actually enjoyed my GPA went up considerably. Yay for liberal arts colleges, study hard but don't forget to have fun too!

 

[projekt]

I think they are rather wise and they know prestige and rigor are not the same thing. There's an Ivy league school in NY that consistently gives lower grades than the rest of the ivy league schools, and there is are several liberal arts schools in NY that routinely inflate grades. Some schools may not consider rigor, though.

A lot of people in my class here at GA went to smaller schools, but I also imagine they were near the average GPA.

 

[FlyOnTheWall]

Does the "prestige" of your school matter when it comes to applying for vet school? I go to a top 10 liberal arts college where courses are rather difficult, and my grades have suffered quite a bit (GPA as of now 3.25) from my workload, but will the application reviewers look into that? And if I took classes at UC Berkeley and did reasonably well in them, will UC Davis look into that and factor it into the decision-making process? (I'm a CA resident also.) I'm really hoping that my experience in working at animal hospitals here and abroad will help, as I was able to assist in surgery when I was 16.

It is REALLY important for you and your professorial letter writers from the "prestige" schools to take a sentence or two to educate the AdComs on your pre-vet program. We realize that there are programs out there that are a lot more rigorous but don't expect us to know how rigorous. If it's a well known program we might know.. If it's a small private school we probably won't... and we probably won't take the time to find out.