cGPA Vs. sGPA

[Dillinjl]

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I am currently doing a post-bacc and am hoping to finish with a 3.75. I didn't take any science classes in undergrad and I will be applying DO only (so math classes won't count towards sGPA) so my sGPA would also be 3.75, but my undergrad cGPA is 3.0. Combining the 3.0 with 3.75 will only move my cGPA up to a 3.15. so my question is will schools really look at the fact that my sGPA is 3.75 and that I have an upward trend or will i get dismissed right off the bat because of the 3.15. Of course the MCAT will also play a role in this, so for the sake of a complete argument lets say I had a 30 MCAT. Would I be competitive for DO or would I get dismissed because of a low cGPA, regardless of the upward trend?

Thanks!

 

[Chip N Sawbones]

You won't get automatically dismissed. I've got five DO interviews so far, some of them to very good schools, and my cGPA is a 3.14. It probably helped that I have a 32 MCAT, a 4.0 in postbac work and three years of full-time volunteering, but as long as you're above a 3.0, you won't get instantly rejected. Exactly how competitive you are will depend on the rest of your application, but you should be able to get in somewhere if you apply to a good range of DO schools.

As you said, a lot will depend on your MCAT. Don't count on getting a 30 unless you're consistently scoring more than that in the practice tests. SDN is filled with people who based their chances of acceptance on the 30 or 35 MCAT they were going to get to offset a low GPA, and then found that good scores don't come so easily in real life.

 

[LPpostbacc]

I am currently doing a post-bacc and am hoping to finish with a 3.75. I didn't take any science classes in undergrad and I will be applying DO only (so math classes won't count towards sGPA) so my sGPA would also be 3.75, but my undergrad cGPA is 3.0. Combining the 3.0 with 3.75 will only move my cGPA up to a 3.15. so my question is will schools really look at the fact that my sGPA is 3.75 and that I have an upward trend or will i get dismissed right off the bat because of the 3.15. Of course the MCAT will also play a role in this, so for the sake of a complete argument lets say I had a 30 MCAT. Would I be competitive for DO or would I get dismissed because of a low cGPA, regardless of the upward trend?

Thanks!

Agreed w/ Saw. My stats are similar. It will come down to the MCAT. I have a handful of MD and DO interviews. Don't rule anything out. Just focus on learning everything you can in class, and then focus on the MCAT prep.

 

[Dillinjl]

Thanks, Guys! It is encouraging to here of others have success in a similar situation. good luck in your interviews!