Admissions formulas and Predents.com

Started by The Anhedonia
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The Anhedonia

The Anhedonia

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We are working to compile a complete and accurate list of of as many admissions formulas that are currently used by different schools as possible. These must be actual formulas from actual dental schools 😉. If you know of one, please list it in the below format and, if possible, explain its validity.

To start, these are the formulas that are verified:

modified UTHSCSA (according to doc toothache)
Science GPA X [ (AA / 30) X 4 ] + Overall GPA
theoretical maximum = 20

UNLV SDM: [(Science GPA + Cum. GPA)/2] X [RC/30] X [(BIO + OC + QR)/90] X 75
theoretical Maximum = 75
 
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I will be adding at most 3 different formulas, keeping with the, "keep it simple" approach I have adopted.

During the discussion, please state your preference of one over the other. Ideally, I'd like to use only one, but if multiple schools use them, then multiple formulas are warranted.

The score will be displayed next to every applicant on the schools page as well as their detailed info page. And, as stated above, you can search/sort people by them.


Your humble servant,

PDizzle
 
Are you sure the UNLV one is correct? For some reason I'm getting a number muchhh higher than 75. 😕
 
yes, you are correct. the corrected version should be:

UNLV SDM:
[(Science GPA + Cum. GPA)/8] X [RC/30] X [(BIO + OC + QR)/90] X 75
theoretical Maximum = 75


sorry, and thanks for the correction!!😳

UNLV weighs a significant portion on RC in conjunction with only 3 sections of the natural sciences.

I like the UTHSCSA formula because it reflects your AA, but i wish it would include your TS as well.
 
Is there a magic number we should shoot for with UNLV? I too have an interview but have now clue wha they are looking for as per the minimums or maximums to receive interviews and furthermore, and acceptance.
 
Hey Pdizzle--
kinda off subject but is there any way you can subcategorize interviews based on month? Thanks! I <3 predents 🙂

(And let me know if u need me to elaborate...)
 
Concepcion10 said:
Is there a magic number we should shoot for with UNLV? I too have an interview but have now clue wha they are looking for as per the minimums or maximums to receive interviews and furthermore, and acceptance.
Click to expand...

I was just at UNLV too, I think the director of admissions said that the highest she's ever had someone have was a 72.. so aim as close to that as possible i guess. But then theres another 25 points of the formula that goes to their interviews.
 
hajibandeh said:
yes, you are correct. the corrected version should be:

UNLV SDM:
[(Science GPA + Cum. GPA)/8] X [RC/30] X [(BIO + OC + QR)/90] X 75
theoretical Maximum = 75


sorry, and thanks for the correction!!😳

UNLV weighs a significant portion on RC in conjunction with only 3 sections of the natural sciences.

I like the UTHSCSA formula because it reflects your AA, but i wish it would include your TS as well.
Click to expand...
Not that this concerns me, but I was reading over and had a quick question. You said RC is in conjunction with "3 sections of NS". With OC and Bio, I only see two. Is QR supposed to be GChem ?
 
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FutureDent020 said:
Not that this concerns me, but I was reading over and had a quick question. You said RC is in conjunction with "3 sections of NS". With OC and Bio, I only see two. Is QR supposed to be GChem ?
Click to expand...

No, the three sections other than RC that UNLV focuses on are BIO, OCHEM, and QR. sorry if i misclassified QR as natural science. i guess then it's 2 natural sciences and QR.

2014orbust said:
I was just at UNLV too, I think the director of admissions said that the highest she's ever had someone have was a 72.. so aim as close to that as possible i guess. But then theres another 25 points of the formula that goes to their interviews.
Click to expand...


right, there is an interview component, but for the purposes of predents.com and a qualitative analysis, using the stats-only section will suffice. either way, the purpose of the interview is to assess your personality (even if you miss 1 or 2 points from your student/faculty interview, that isn't going to be as statistically significant as your stats score).


so far, it seems to me that the best equation to use for a generalized scale would be the UTHSCSA Formula. unless anyone else objects, i move to nominate this formula as the one used on predent.com 🙂
 
So i tried to use this formula but I almost cried bc of the difference in my GPA from my school compared to AADSAS GPA. Its almost a difference of 0.2. And another thought, how do grad GPAs come into play with these formulas?
 
DrDDSman said:
So i tried to use this formula but I almost cried bc of the difference in my GPA from my school compared to AADSAS GPA. Its almost a difference of 0.2. And another thought, how do grad GPAs come into play with these formulas?
Click to expand...

The difference on my GPA's was 0.44 😱
 
DrDDSman said:
And another thought, how do grad GPAs come into play with these formulas?
Click to expand...

they come into play exactly how they are represented.

For the UNLV equation, for example, the Sum of your sGPA and oGPA divided by 8 represents a value less than or equal to 1. if you have a 4.0 in both, you'd have 8 / 8 = 1. that means you will be closer to the score of 75 🙂

make sense?
 
Sorry to go off topic but can you guys work on updating the school stats also, those stats must be from yeeeaars back. Thanks
 
Tommy43087 said:
Sorry to go off topic but can you guys work on updating the school stats also, those stats must be from yeeeaars back. Thanks
Click to expand...
Yea, this definitely needs to be done. Yo, pdiz, if you need any help gathering stats please let us know. I would be glad to help
 
So what's competitive at UNLV? I tried the equation twice, and even if I reach my goal on the DAT I'm only going to have like a 39 out of 75.
 
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I think I read somewhere on SDN in a past thread about the UNLV interview that someone heard at their interview or something that a "competitive" score is 50-55 -- but that's taking into consideration the interview score (full score is 25). I don't remember the interview equation off the top of my head though.
 
FutureDent020 said:
Haha, yea I was fooling around and mine came to about a 30. Does not sound so hot
Click to expand...

Yea the UNLV equation is kinda stupid. Almost everyone is concentrated between 30 and 50. It's impossibly hard to break 60 considering your multiplying 75 by 3 different percentage/decimal amounts.

What it does do is make all 3 of those sections equally weighted (RC weighs as much as GPA... ouch).

4.0gpa/sgpa with 30 TS, 30PAT, 30QR 17RC

is a worse applicant than

3.0gpa/sgpa with 23 BS/OC/QR 30RC
 
2014orbust said:
I was just at UNLV too, I think the director of admissions said that the highest she's ever had someone have was a 72.. so aim as close to that as possible i guess. But then theres another 25 points of the formula that goes to their interviews.
Click to expand...

Aim towards a 72? Wow, I think mine came out to around 53-54... That person with a 72 was a beast.
 
uclaDDS101 said:
Aim towards a 72? Wow, I think mine came out to around 53-54... That person with a 72 was a beast.
Click to expand...
Wait, there is no way yours came out to that. Mine was right at 30 and that was without the 25 interview points. So if I added those points it would at 55. Yours should be in the mid/ upper 60's

Just did it with your stats and I got like 77, haha. Something's wrong....
 
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As a Nevada resident with a 26 RC score and a couple 2.97 GPAs, I love the format of their formula. Having an RC score that high makes me equivalent to someone with a 3.5+ and like a 19 RC. 👍
 
Gbrando2 said:
As a Nevada resident with a 26 RC score and a couple 2.97 GPAs, I love the format of their formula. Having an RC score that high makes me equivalent to someone with a 3.5+ and like a 19 RC. 👍
Click to expand...

And thats a serious problem....Dont get me wrong that great for you and congratz, but it kinda sux that someone had to work their ass off in some hard classes to get A's and someone can click a couple right answers on the RC section of the DAT and be considered academically equivalent lol

Seriously though HUGEEEE flaw if you ask me!
 
FutureDent020 said:
Wait, there is no way yours came out to that. Mine was right at 30 and that was without the 25 interview points. So if I added those points it would at 55. Yours should be in the mid/ upper 60's

Just did it with your stats and I got like 77, haha. Something's wrong....
Click to expand...

Ohh, I never added any of the "interview points"... (54 was just the number I got from the equation by itself.)
 
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Tommy43087 said:
And thats a serious problem....Dont get me wrong that great for you and congratz, but it kinda sux that someone had to work their ass off in some hard classes to get A's and someone can click a couple right answers on the RC section of the DAT and be considered academically equivalent lol

Seriously though HUGEEEE flaw if you ask me!
Click to expand...

No offense taken, I agree 100%. But they did their study and found that RC scores strongly correlate to board exam scores, so that's where they put their emphasis. I don't get it, but I am cool with it.
 
Tommy43087 said:
And thats a serious problem....Dont get me wrong that great for you and congratz, but it kinda sux that someone had to work their ass off in some hard classes to get A's and someone can click a couple right answers on the RC section of the DAT and be considered academically equivalent lol

Seriously though HUGEEEE flaw if you ask me!
Click to expand...

not a huge flaw at all. the DAT is an equalizer. I have taken some pretty difficult courses. I have so many firends who take easier courses and get high GPA's. The DAT serves as a standardized test and a part of admissions because it can help spot the people who jus took BS classes and got their A's where as some of us took some hard courses and didn't do as well because of the difficulty. and if RC is as simple as clicking a couple of right answers... why couldn't you do it?
 
dmd87 said:
not a huge flaw at all. the DAT is an equalizer. I have taken some pretty difficult courses. I have so many firends who take easier courses and get high GPA's. The DAT serves as a standardized test and a part of admissions because it can help spot the people who jus took BS classes and got their A's where as some of us took some hard courses and didn't do as well because of the difficulty. and if RC is as simple as clicking a couple of right answers... why couldn't you do it?
Click to expand...

umm... becuase the way the DAT is scored really screws up UNLV's formula?

Someone who scores a perfect score on RC still has a chance to get a 75, but a person who misses 5 questions and scores a 23 can get at the highest a 57.5 out of 75. That's a biiig difference for 5 questions...
 
It's hard to argue with their formula because they have conducted research (published in Journal of Dental Educ.) that shows a strong correlation between the score they come out with and "UNLV student" performance on part I of the Nat. boards.

Dr. Kingsley is careful to say in the Discussion section of the research paper that these indicators differ from those used by other dental schools and that another researcher found different: "Bergman et al. reported that DAT-QA was the least accurate predictor of dental school performance, while at UNLV-SDM the predictive value of DAT-QA was significant in the initial evaluation from the first class of students at UNLV-SDM"

Whether you feel cheated or luck out in their formula, it's pretty interesting either way. I wish I had access to all school formulas to see where I stand at other DS's. I calculated a 57 at UNLV (assuming perfect interviews).
 
Gbrando2 said:
Yeah I got a lot of Fs and replaced them later with As
Click to expand...


GUYS,

If this is true, can you retake the equivalent classes that you have Fs at a different school. For example, I have D- on Geology I at UC Davis and I want to retake an equivalent class at a community college and replace it with an A. Is it appropiate to do it this way?
 
danchoi03 said:
GUYS,

If this is true, can you retake the equivalent classes that you have Fs at a different school. For example, I have D- on Geology I at UC Davis and I want to retake an equivalent class at a community college and replace it with an A. Is it appropiate to do it this way?
Click to expand...


Nonono, AADSAS won't replace the F, they will count both the F and the A. I was saying that my school doesn't include the first grade in your GPA calculation on your transcript if you retake the class. That's why my transcript is a lot higher than my AADSAS GPA.

So if you took that course at a community college, AADSAS would count and report both grades, the D- won't disappear
 
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