cGPA 3.94, sGPA 3.99, MCAT 36Q, TFA

[KillerPanda]

Hey there, first post. Usually a lurker but I'll give this a shot. I'm looking to: 1) see if I'm way over my head with these top schools, and 2) add more match/safety schools outside of California that accept a relatively decent percentage of OOS.

Background:
CA resident. Took a whole year of community college courses in high school. Ivy League alum. Currently in TFA with a pretty mediocre GPA in teaching credentialing courses (3.5) due to crazy workload/stress of a first-year teacher.

MCAT breakdown is 14/8/14/Q (PS/VR/BS/W)...

ECs:

*TFA, full-time last year & continuing next year, lots of stories/experiences/lessons for interview fodder
*EMT, primary crew, ~400 hours, main clinical experience
*Clinical Research Intern in hospital emergency department ~360 hours, main shadowing experience
*Lab research assistant in Drosophila lab (summer 2009) & pharmacology lab (senior year), no publications or projects (probably my weakest EC, but research nonetheless)
*Neuropharmacology TA
*Executive board for cultural organization (2 years)
*EMS summer course instructor
*Club basketball for college

Schools I have on my list:
Columbia
Harvard
Northwestern
Oregon Health & Sciences University
Stanford
UC Davis
UC Irvine
UCLA
UCSD
UCSF
USC
UPenn
Yale

Suggestions to expand/edit list of schools? I'm very partial to staying in California/West Coast and as I will be teaching next year I can't afford to fly out long distance to a whole bunch of interviews.

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[Entadus]

Hey there, first post. Usually a lurker but I'll give this a shot. I'm looking to: 1) see if I'm way over my head with these top schools, and 2) add more match/safety schools outside of California that accept a relatively decent percentage of OOS.

Background:
CA resident. Took a whole year of community college courses in high school. Ivy League alum. Currently in TFA with a pretty mediocre GPA in teaching credentialing courses (3.5) due to crazy workload/stress of a first-year teacher.

MCAT breakdown is 14/8/14/Q (PS/VR/BS/W)...

ECs:

*TFA, full-time last year & continuing next year, lots of stories/experiences/lessons for interview fodder
*EMT, primary crew, ~400 hours, main clinical experience
*Clinical Research Intern in hospital emergency department ~360 hours, main shadowing experience
*Lab research assistant in Drosophila lab (summer 2009) & pharmacology lab (senior year), no publications or projects (probably my weakest EC, but research nonetheless)
*Neuropharmacology TA
*Executive board for cultural organization (2 years)
*EMS summer course instructor
*Club basketball for college

Schools I have on my list:
Columbia
Harvard
Northwestern
Oregon Health & Sciences University - oos
Stanford
UC Davis
UC Irvine
UCLA
UCSD
UCSF
USC
UPenn
Yale

Suggestions to expand/edit list of schools? I'm very partial to staying in California/West Coast and as I will be teaching next year I can't afford to fly out long distance to a whole bunch of interviews.

Way too risky. Your list is very top heavy... Yikes those are all going to be reaches
Most of these schools won't shrug off your imbalanced MCAT score. I think you should add some more mid-tier schools and balance out your list. Have you considered other schools in NY besides just Columbia? How about other Boston/ East Coast schools?

 

[I like meowmix]

Your list is a little too top heavy, so you should apply to some "lower ranked" schools. Nevertheless, you have a pretty good chance at getting a Top20 regardless.

 

[KillerPanda]

Thanks for your suggestions!

I recently added Boston University, Albert Einstein, University of Colorado, and UC Riverside, as these schools have a little lower matriculant GPA/MCATs (except UCR, it's brand new). Should I add more matches/safeties or am I somewhat set? Can anyone suggest any solid safeties based on my numbers?

 

[railgun]

I'm in a similar situation, just posted:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?p=14198720#post14198720

 

[KillerPanda]

So my updated list is below:

Albert Einstein
Boston University
Columbia
Harvard
Northwestern
Oregon Health & Sciences University
Stanford
UC Davis
UC Irvine
UCLA
UC Riverside
UCSD
UCSF
University of Colorado
USC
UPenn
Yale

I had already submitted my AMCAS by the time I started this thread, so there's really no point in taking the reach schools off my list since I already paid their fees...

Any other recommendations for matches/safeties? Thanks in advance!

 

[Omppu27]

UChicago, Wake Forest, Mount Sinai, St. Louis, why not USC?

 

[KillerPanda]

Thanks for the help.

Another question--would top 20 schools be a longshot because of my 8 on VR? Would the 14s in the sciences somehow offset the poor verbal score? Is there any way the rest of my application can make up for the 8 on VR (say if I had a great cumulative GPA, or wrote my essays well)? Should I try to explain my 8 on VR in any optional secondary essays, as I was consistently getting 10s & 11s on my practice tests?

 

[Lucky Louie]

Yes, I do think your 8VR will be a problem. But trying to work around it is tricky too. If your essays are so terrific, the adcoms might think someone else wrote them. If you tried to explain them in your optional essay, it might come off as looking for excuses. (Unless there's a really valid explanation.) And do you really need to underscore that 8? Personally, I think the score may indicate a bigger issue that you may need to address. Would coursework help? Would you consider retaking the test? I do not think top ranked schools would consider you. There may be too many other students who have a 3.9/36 MCAT who aren't as unbalanced. Adcoms have so many applicants, they don't need much to reject you.