bad grades in secondaries

[waynerooney1994]

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I have looked through past threads. However, there doesn't really seem to be a good consensus. For the "is there anything you want our adcom's to know" question on secondaries, is it appropriate to talk about bad grades? I have extremely low freshman year grades (>2.5) due to depression which I touch upon very briefly in PS. Should I expand upon it in these types of secondary questions?

 

[Funny_Current]

I suspect you didn't look hard enough as there are literally so many threads regarding this. Long story short, you don't want to waste valuable space drawing more attention to something negative. If you briefly touched on it already, I wouldn't bother.

 

[waynerooney1994]

I suspect you didn't look hard enough as there are literally so many threads regarding this. Long story short, you don't want to waste valuable space drawing more attention to something negative. If you briefly touched on it already, I wouldn't bother.

I have seen this and I have also seen the rationale of that it provides context for an outlier in your academic record. I have normally been using this space for a "why I want to attend your school" but in the case where that is already a secondary prompt, my only two options are either to leave it blank or talk about the low grades.

 

[Funny_Current]

Then I guess it's your call. Personally, I don't think it's worth it to draw any more attention than necessary. I imagine adcoms have seen it all when it comes to students explaining bad grades (death in the family, personal struggles, financial obligations, etc..). If it's truly unique then okay. Otherwise, I'd leave it blank if you have nothing left to say. Just my $0.02

 

[waynerooney1994]

it is appropriate to talk about your low grades but as was suggested above you may not want to draw attention to it. If you choose to do so, do it with the positive spin "While I had poor performance freshman year as my first year away at college, subsequent academic terms showed significant improvement achieving a solid record." If you had a really low freshman and a really high rest of college, you could make the statement that "excluding my freshman year my GPA for BCPM would be 3.8 and cGPA would be 3.9" or something like that.

You should set up the AMCAS GPA chart for her for us to help advise

ACMAS BCPM (w/ fresh) = 3.57 ACMAS BCPM (w/o fresh)= 3.75
ACMAS cGPA (w/ fresh)= 3.6 ACMAS cGPA (w/o fresh) = 3.8

So like an increase of 0.2. Not sure how much of a difference that makes.

 

[deev04]

If you do mention it, I would strongly suggest not mentioning depression/mental health issues. Even saying this makes me sad (c'mon medical profession) but medical schools can't get extra weary of mental health issues and that might draw even more negative attn.

If you search mental health or depression on here you'll find a lot of threads talking more about this. The BEST advice is to make sure you are being proactive about addressing your mental health and not applying to medical school until it is very stable. Medical school can be brutal. Make sure you have a strong support system and a therapist/treatment plan.

 

[waynerooney1994]

If you do mention it, I would strongly suggest not mentioning depression/mental health issues. Even saying this makes me sad (c'mon medical profession) but medical schools can't get extra weary of mental health issues and that might draw even more negative attn.

If you search mental health or depression on here you'll find a lot of threads talking more about this. The BEST advice is to make sure you are being proactive about addressing your mental health and not applying to medical school until it is very stable. Medical school can be brutal. Make sure you have a strong support system and a therapist/treatment plan.

It isn't so much mental health as it was depression due to racial environment exposed to in high school (URM in 95% white HS) in which I am completely fine now due to the friends I made in the latter portion of college.

 

[deev04]

Sorry to hear. That sounds tough. I'm happy to hear things have improved.

Advice about mental health for medical school still stands. Medical school is tough for many people and can cause problems with mental health/happiness for pretty much anyone, regardless of prior history. Support systems are always a good idea.

 

[waynerooney1994]

I think the difference is worth mentioning and can make you reach at slightly higher schools, depending on MCAT. Having dealt mostly with nontrads who often had to overcome original mediocre poor grades, I have used this kind narrative view.

@Goro tends to have the opposite view on this so I would like to have his opinion in this case

That was my rationale behind including if I have nothing else to put there. As long as there's a positive spin and you focus on how you've changed. Also is it appropriate to talk about what your BCPM and cGPA would be w/o that year?

 

[waynerooney1994]

Sorry to hear. That sounds tough. I'm happy to hear things have improved.

Advice about mental health for medical school still stands. Medical school is tough for many people and can cause problems with mental health/happiness for pretty much anyone, regardless of prior history. Support systems are always a good idea.

Thanks! And your completely right I've built my school list around where my support system is.

 

[Goro]

I have looked through past threads. However, there doesn't really seem to be a good consensus. For the "is there anything you want our adcom's to know" question on secondaries, is it appropriate to talk about bad grades? I have extremely low freshman year grades (>2.5) due to depression which I touch upon very briefly in PS. Should I expand upon it in these types of secondary questions?

That part of the secondary is fine for your explanation.