cGPA 3.54/sGPA 3.36 with 30N wanting to re-apply

[kfsa1]

---

Members do not see this ad.

Hi Guys,
I have a 3.54 cGPA with a 3.36 sGPA and a 13 ps 7v 10 bs MCAT. I've taken off a whole year to volunteer at a local hospital and applied last cycle MD only but I haven't gotten an acceptance. I did have 2 interviews one at Drexel and one at NJMS and I got rejected from Drexel and WL at NJMS. So far for the last 6 months I've been working as a full time scribe being in a urology clinic working 40+ hours a week while seeing an average of 60+ patients a day.

I am planning on re-applying this coming cycle but I am not sure how to go about improving my app. From what my pre-med advisor tells me, I would mostly benefit from taking some grad level science courses because I pretty much have 1 A in a biology course. The only reason why my sGPA is even close to a 3.5 is because I have As in math/phys/chem. On the otherhand, I am wondering if I should just re-take the MCAT because of that verbal but once again, the advisor tells me that because I am not a native English speaker a 7 is acceptable (asian). I used to average a 33 on practice but I am not sure if I can hit it anymore on the real thing. So, I was wondering if anyone has any advice on where I should take my app from here?

Thank you so much!

 

[Pons Asinorum]

Hi Guys,
I have a 3.54 cGPA with a 3.36 sGPA and a 13 ps 7v 10 bs MCAT.

Your GPAs and MCAT score are both below the mean for accepted students. Your MCAT score is also very unbalanced. You need to improve all of that. There are many ways to accomplish it, all of which can be found through the search function.

 

[Catalystik]

I am not sure how to go about improving my app.

From what my pre-med advisor tells me, I would mostly benefit from taking some grad level science courses because I pretty much have 1 A in a biology course.

I am wondering if I should just re-take the MCAT because of that verbal but once again, the advisor tells me that because I am not a native English speaker a 7 is acceptable (asian).

Your lack of As in Bio classes could well act as a red flag to adcomms that you will struggle to succeed in intense, rapid-pace med school science classes. I don't think you necessarily need grad level classes, but a string of As in some upper-level Bio and Biochem would be very helpful to your application. So you might consider a year's worth of, say, 2-3 classes per term of Physiology, Genetics, Cell Bio, Biochem, Anatomy, Histology, Embryology, Neurology, Endocrine, or whatever is available at your local cheap state school.

As far as retaking the MCAT: there are few MD schools in the US that take Out of Staters and have a bottom 10th percentile for VS of 7, giving you a very small pool of schools that will consider you (though if your native language is greatly valued in healthcare workers in a given state, it might be that you'd receive special consideration even though you're in the 1st to 9th percentile for a given school's range). Yes, a higher VS will help. Again, I agree with your advisor that a retake may not be necessary.

Of these two areas, by far the As in upper-level science are more important. Unfortunately, that is the fix that takes the longest.

If you don't want to put in the extra time, effort, and expense, I'd think you are practically a shoo-in for DO schools, so keep that option in mind.

If you care to detail your ECs, we can comment on them as well. Your clinical experience, at least, looks to be superb.