Am I being realistic?

[soIwantTobeADoc]

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[blee]

Welcome to SDN, dysfunctional home to neurotic pre-meds across the globe.

Your undergrad GPA is impressive, and as long as you keep that trend in your pre-reqs you should be fine in that department. Congratulations, BTW, for keeping that up as a CompE.

I am not an adcom member or premed advisor, but I would be concerned about your MCAT strategy. You obviously want to do your very best on the test; it therefore makes little sense to take it without first having completed the prereqs (or at least being enrolled in the second half/halves at the same time). In my opinion, the material you need for the MCAT is not easily studied in prep books or classes without first having actually taken the class.

If you're dead-set on applying next year, then don't take cell bio before finishing orgo and shoot for the August MCAT. If you can afford to cut back a bit on work and concentrate on doing very well in more than one class, I would do that too (but I realize this isn't always possible). Good luck, whatever you decide.

 

[QofQuimica]

Hi Scott, and welcome to SDN.

I don't know anything about any of the schools that you've mentioned applying to, so I am sorry, but I can't help you with specifics about them. However, I did want to tell you that you sound like you'll be a strong applicant overall if you do reasonably well on the MCAT. Since you won't have taken organic II yet by the time you take the test, make sure to spend some time studying the biomolecules (proteins, carbohydrates) on your own. Those are typically covered at the end of an organic II course. You should also make sure that you have a strong background in the chemistry of carbonyl compounds, which many schools also cover in the organic II course. If you haven't seen it already, check out the Study Questions subforum in the main MCAT forum for help with studying.

One last suggestion for you: contact UNC (do it *now*, well before you apply) and ask for a pre-application appointment with the admissions director. Bring copies of your transcripts and your CV (include activities, awards, and jobs), and ask that person to assess your strengths and weaknesses and make suggestions about how to improve your competitiveness. Best of luck to you.

 

[glp]

the way i read your question, the only class you will not have mostly completed by the april MCAT is orgo 2? orgo 1 and cell bio will almost be over by then and a good bit of the material learned. if you are legitamtely spending 20 hrs a week right now, i think your plan to take the mcat in april is realistic. you sound very dedicated and if you take the april MCAT you will have more time to get clinical/volunteer experience over the summer to bolster you app. as far as UNC goes, it is an extremely competitive public school. for the class of 2008, UNC received 750 in-state applicants, interviewed 430 and 136 matriculated according to the MSAR. the median gpa for UNC 2008 was 3.65cum/3.64sci. the median MCATs were 10v, 10ps, 11 bs, P. keep in mind a place like UCLA received 2413 out-of-state applications for 23 spots in its class of 2008 and its median gpas were 3.8cum/3.8 sci with med MCAT 10v, 12ps, 12bs, Q. these medians include in-staters so you can assume oos applicants had much higher median scores.

Edit: Info on schools from 2006-2007 MSAR

 

[soIwantTobeADoc]

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[QofQuimica]

Start here for general MCAT studying tips. Post 09 in particular is relevant to your situation. For what it's worth, I agree with blee that you are probably better off waiting to take the MCAT until August so that you will be mostly done with organic II before you take it.