I'm wondering if I have a biochem bachelors can I do a 2nd bachelors in bio and go straight to the upper levels because i would have most requirements done. I'm only looking to take one semester of upper level bios. Idk if they would take me bc it would be obvious I just want to get fafsa aid
You most likely have to go through a typical college admissions process to get accepted as a degree-seeking 2nd bachelors student. This can be quick and easy, or it may take a year or more. If you can find somebody on campus who got accepted for a 2nd bachelors, their experience may be helpful. Also, you may find that getting accepted is easier off-cycle, such as starting winter/spring/summer.
Point being, if you'll only need a semester of classes, your effort to get this to happen under a degree program (2nd bachelors) may take longer than that one semester of classes you need.
Personally my favorite strategy is to find a job on campus that allows you to get a tuition discount and to get registration priority.
Nice. You didn't have any trouble registering for upper level classes right off the bat? I hope in can do this at my local university or else Ill have to take private loans, which I guess wouldn't be so bad.
PRIVATE LOANS ARE A DISASTER for premeds. You have to look at the big picture: after your work to address GPA shortcomings is done, you then have to do MED SCHOOL (or dental or whatever). If you're borrowing for med school, average debt is $250,000 under federal loan programs. Even though federal loan programs allow for several repayment plans so that you can survive residency and early practice, you will have much squirming and wringing of hands over managing that $250k. Add a private loan payment to that and
you may not be able to make rent on a resident's salary. Also, you have to diligently read the fine print on a private loan to see if you'll have payments deferred
or not while you're in med school. Having a $300 (or whatever) private loan payment come due when you're a 3rd year with no income (as several of my classmates have found) is unbelievable stress on top of the stress of school.
People get excited about a lower interest rate on private loans, but that makes no difference if you can't make payments. Again, federal loans have repayment plans that private loans don't.
Think of private loans as the same as credit cards.
So do adcoms see your second bacc grades listed in the post bacc column?
For AMCAS, there's a postbac category into which everything after the 4th year of undergrad goes. But the cumulative numbers are heavily emphasized.
Also, schools can play with your numbers any way they like. They get the raw data. Some schools will apply a weighted average, such as emphasizing the earlier years of undergrad. You can assume that the AMCAS presentation of numbers is seen during app review, but you can't assume that's the only way your GPAs are reviewed.
Hopefully someone who has gone through a recent AMCAS or dental app cycle will post a picture that is more current than the following, which is from 2007. AACOMAS looked similar to these:
AMCAS from 2007 (was the same in 2014, last time I did interviews):
TMDSAS from 2007:
Nope it adds to my overall gpa. I have a separate gpa for the school I went to tho. Each school has their own gpa and there is a cumulative gpa which factors all those. Keep in mind that the cumulative gpa is only for undergrad classes. An SMP will not factor into your cum gpa because that is grad level work.
For medical school, any GPA on a transcript will be completely ignored. GPA calculations are done by the application service such as AMCAS, TMDSAS, AACOMAS. The student enters coursework line by line, the application service verifies reported coursework against official submitted transcripts, and then the GPAs are calculated according to the app service's formula. For US MD schools, repeated coursework has no effect on the prior grade; both are included in GPA calcs. DO schools will not include the prior grade in GPA, but all coursework is visible and the repeated sequence is registered as a repeat.
So is there a distinct advantage in having your post bacc gpa highlighted for adcoms versus having an upward trend of a >3.8 gpa through 5 semesters of upper bio courses?
Highly dependent on the school reviewing your app. You have to get past an initial screening, which may have a GPA and/or MCAT cutoff, before your app is reviewed qualitatively. This initial screening may or may not happen until after you submit a secondary app and $100+.
If and when you get past initial screening to where faculty eyeballs are looking at your story, reading your essay, parsing your grades, your app then needs to inspire confidence that any past academic anomalies are truly in the past, as demonstrated by a multi-year mostly-science high-GPA effort comparable to the squeaky clean premed's four years of undergrad at 3.6+.
If you dont qualify for fafsa or priority registration then why do a post bacc at all?
As above, doing a 2nd bachelors means you're applying to be a degree-seeking, matriculated student. The benefits, yes, are registration and
maybe some federal loans. The downside is the overhead of applying and doing the dance to keep the program happy with you.
Of note, when you are accepted as a degree-seeking 2nd bachelors student, your transcript then shows you as seeking that 2nd degree. Which means if you don't complete the degree, that is visible on the transcript. Whether it's noticed or not is again subject to each school's process.
Also, why are you doing an SMP if you are about to finish upper bio classes? Did you initially plan this out are was this unexpected? Because i plan on doing well for the next 5 semesters of upper bio classes to prove to adcoms that i can handle medical school like material. Do you think I will need to do an SMP as well?
Your undergrad redemption plan sounds solid. As you've likely figured out by now, there's no such thing as GPA repair, because math.
Whether you need to also do an SMP depends on your damage. Your MCAT score will make or break you here. If you are able to get an above average MCAT score, then you add credibility to your comeback. If you are not able to get an above average MCAT score, then your recent undergrad effort is devalued. In other words, the MCAT normalizes your GPA as a national metric against regional GPA valuation. And again, as above, the reviewer doesn't see the story until you're past an initial screen.
In my view, in a case where there's a very weak undergrad GPA and an above average MCAT, an SMP is a reasonable use of time and money. In California, "very weak" is 3.4. In less competitive states, "very weak" is maybe 3.0.
tl;dr: 2nd bachelors has pros and cons, you get partial federal loans and registration priority, but you have to apply and get accepted. GPA calcs are done by the app service not read from a transcript. Choosing to go after extra shine from an SMP after an undergrad redemption effort depends on your cumulative numbers, MCAT and home state.
Best of luck to you.
