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applying DURING a master's
- Thread starter rootz02
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I had classmates in my master's program apply to medical school between the 1st and 2nd year (of a 2 year program). That probably doesn't help you out, because by the time they started medical school, we all had our degrees given the timeline you apply to schools.
Not sure if it's different since many people don't make the transition from epidemiology to dentistry, but my friends said med schools prefer you finish the degree you are working on before moving on to the next thing. I cannot imagine dental schools to be all that different in this regard. I decided to wrap up some research projects with my PI and stay (hopefully only) one year.
Not sure if it's different since many people don't make the transition from epidemiology to dentistry, but my friends said med schools prefer you finish the degree you are working on before moving on to the next thing. I cannot imagine dental schools to be all that different in this regard. I decided to wrap up some research projects with my PI and stay (hopefully only) one year.
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Yep, plenty from my program applied halfway through their master's in previous cycles and gained acceptance.
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Many professional schools require the degree you are in the middle of to be finished and officially conferred before matriculation. This is to prevent people from not finishing theses, wasting grants, etc. I can't imagine why you would need to finish a degree before applying, since it could potentially be a year from application to acceptance.
Are you getting extra impatient now like me, rootz? 😛
Are you getting extra impatient now like me, rootz? 😛
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Sure people have. A girl from a year before me in the MS program applied right before she started her MS program and did an academic update. She got interviewed in Jan or Feb and got accepted just a little later in the cycle. She had mediocre undergrad GPA and also mediocre PCAT. I think this only really works if you're right on the cusp and need that one semester of MS to boost you.
Others who need a much bigger boost decided to do a 2 year track MS instead. When they conduct thesis research, their schedule is usually flexible so they can essentially work just a few hours a day and study for MCAT/DAT and whatever standardized test full time so they're a much more solid candidate after they graduate from their masters.
I personally finished a semester early and applied with my MS already completed instead of degree-in-completion. The original plan for the program was to finish at the end of July. A lot of students applied after they finished at the very end of July or later. I didn't want to be later in the cycle and just sucked it up and finished everything at the end of April and got my application out ASAP to be early and have gotten an interview in July, during which my classmates from MS program are still finishing school.
It's much better to scope out the programs and opportunities that really suits your situation and have a plan of attack and stick with it.
Others who need a much bigger boost decided to do a 2 year track MS instead. When they conduct thesis research, their schedule is usually flexible so they can essentially work just a few hours a day and study for MCAT/DAT and whatever standardized test full time so they're a much more solid candidate after they graduate from their masters.
I personally finished a semester early and applied with my MS already completed instead of degree-in-completion. The original plan for the program was to finish at the end of July. A lot of students applied after they finished at the very end of July or later. I didn't want to be later in the cycle and just sucked it up and finished everything at the end of April and got my application out ASAP to be early and have gotten an interview in July, during which my classmates from MS program are still finishing school.
It's much better to scope out the programs and opportunities that really suits your situation and have a plan of attack and stick with it.
I'm hoping I have yalls problem of going to interviews during my masters. I'm just doing a non-thesis masters that's supposed to take 2 years but I'm on track to finish it in 1 so I can go to dental school if I get in this round.
For those of you who have received interviews while still in your masters programs, would you mind sharing your stats the first time you applied and your stats this time? My stats are pretty low (sGPA: 2.99, BCP: 3.19, oGPA: 3.1; DAT: 20 TS, 20 AA, 21 PAT) so i'm not expecting to get any interviews this cycle and if I apply again next cycle, I will be half way through my masters program so i'm just trying to get an idea of how much improvement it took for you to land some interviews. Thanks!
