Are special circumstances considered?

[gmcguitar4]

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So I was wondering if dental schools take into consideration special circumstances when evaluating applications. I know that nobody here would know 100% because you aren't on an adcom. But if you do have any insight it would be appreciated!

So at the end of this semester my overall GPA will be around a 3.0-3.1 and my science will be around a 2.9. I had a family tragedy within my immediate family that affected most of my grades from sophomore and junior year of undergrad. My grades were terrible. It was worse because a majority of my science courses were during these two years. So I had to do 5 years because I dropped out of school at the end of a semester and took lighter course loads during this time. My last two years I did really well and had around a 3.7-3.8, if you don't count the previous years. I am doing post bac now and will probably get a 4.0 this semester.

questions:

-Do you think adcoms take these factors into account?
-Does the upward trend matter?
-Is there a certain timeline that schools want the grades for? for example if I took physics 6 years ago, is that counted in their calculation of my GPA? Would they want me to retake that course?

 

[amalgamgrillz]

So I was wondering if dental schools take into consideration special circumstances when evaluating applications. I know that nobody here would know 100% because you aren't on an adcom. But if you do have any insight it would be appreciated!

So at the end of this semester my overall GPA will be around a 3.0-3.1 and my science will be around a 2.9. I had a family tragedy within my immediate family that affected most of my grades from sophomore and junior year of undergrad. My grades were terrible. It was worse because a majority of my science courses were during these two years. So I had to do 5 years because I dropped out of school at the end of a semester and took lighter course loads during this time. My last two years I did really well and had around a 3.7-3.8, if you don't count the previous years. I am doing post bac now and will probably get a 4.0 this semester.

questions:

-Do you think adcoms take these factors into account?
-Does the upward trend matter?
-Is there a certain timeline that schools want the grades for? for example if I took physics 6 years ago, is that counted in their calculation of my GPA? Would they want me to retake that course?

-Do you think adcoms take these factors into account? Yes, but not to the extent where it will salvage your GPA.

-Does the upward trend matter? See above.

-Is there a certain timeline that schools want the grades for? for example if I took physics 6 years ago, is that counted in their calculation of my GPA? Would they want me to retake that course? Some schools want pre-reqs completed within the last 10 years.

I really hope you're not jumping ship to Dental because you couldn't get into Medical. Dental is 10x more about GPA than medicine, and less about extra-curriculars and sob stories, so you'd have a much better chance of getting into medical, at this point. No offense.

 

[MrAvicii]

So I was wondering if dental schools take into consideration special circumstances when evaluating applications. I know that nobody here would know 100% because you aren't on an adcom. But if you do have any insight it would be appreciated!

So at the end of this semester my overall GPA will be around a 3.0-3.1 and my science will be around a 2.9. I had a family tragedy within my immediate family that affected most of my grades from sophomore and junior year of undergrad. My grades were terrible. It was worse because a majority of my science courses were during these two years. So I had to do 5 years because I dropped out of school at the end of a semester and took lighter course loads during this time. My last two years I did really well and had around a 3.7-3.8, if you don't count the previous years. I am doing post bac now and will probably get a 4.0 this semester.

questions:

-Do you think adcoms take these factors into account? Yes but not as much as you would think they would.
-Does the upward trend matter? Yes but each and every grade is part of your GPA, so even if you have an updward trend, they will still look at at the whole picture and evaluate the GPA as a whole.
-Is there a certain timeline that schools want the grades for? for example if I took physics 6 years ago, is that counted in their calculation of my GPA? Would they want me to retake that course? Some schools have a cutoff of 5 or 10 years. not sure you might want to google this.

see above and I know I offered you advice before, just be careful on what you're doing. If you have a lot of $$$ to spare its good, but otherwise you might be wasting time with d-school. Again im not the judge and jury, but all your factors taken into account, I can't see why d-school adcoms would "jump for joy" when reviewing your app. Either way, take the DAT first and see how you do. If you happen to get like a 22AA or something, then you probably have a good shot. If you get a 20AA or below, I dont know if that will be enough. (give the fact your GPA seems very low.) GPA is the most important thing in d-school admissions, students with low GPAs (like below 3.3) often struggle to get into schools (not all students, but most.) So its all about time and money, if you have enough of both then I guess you can try. Just again be forewarned that you have a lot of red flags on your file. (Again I am not trying to discourage you, but I am being very honest about your chances. So again if you have the time and money go for it, but I wouldn't expect a very high chance of admission.)

 

[gmcguitar4]

Thanks for the advice. Is math included in sGPA?

 

[dmdluffy]

Thanks for the advice. Is math included in sGPA?

It's included in the science GPA but not the BCP GPA