Check out my coursework. I need advice

[UTLOONGHORNS]

You'll see I sorta screwed up in some of my classes...The problem was bad study skills and time management. Also, I lived with four business majors and their lifestyle kind of draped itself on me. Anyways, yeah I started off strong and i'm now limping towards the finish line..I need advice. I need a mentor. I don't need a snark. I need someone to tell me what I need to do to reinvent myself into a good medical candidate. I've realized to get back onto my ****. I haven't taken my MCAT yet, but I am currently studying for it along with my classes. Some courses are left out and will be done over the summer. I have some volunteer experience. My work experience is very entrepreneurial, as I have worked and started multiple small companies focused on e-commerce while my undergrad. I am aiming for a 510 in my MCAT.



Here is a Google Drive link to my Coursework. Please look over it as I have made a couple notes regarding the classes I bombed:

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[WoundupKnight]

Well, you can't keep explaining poor grades away because "the class was hard". That's really not gonna fly in an interview and just that mentality alone is probably going to hold you back. So, I guess step 1 would be figuring out why you did poorly and fixing it. You're also kind of just packing your semesters with upper div sciences. There isn't really much point to overloading yourself on classes if it just leads to B/C/D/Fs. If you want to reinvent yourself, you're really going to have to string some A/A- semesters together.

I finished my freshman year with a 2.6 GPA and was pretty much a 3.0 student until senior year. I aced a post-bacc and got a 507 on the MCAT and was accepted this year with a 3.2 cumulative, so while you can definitely still turn it around, you've dug yourself into a bit of a hole.

A 510 MCAT will definitely help your app, but I'm concerned when you say you're studying for it while also taking 4 upper div science classes at the same time. Based on your grades I'm worried this'll just lead to you bombing not only the MCAT but also doing poorly in the classes. The DO cycle is very long (I applied Oct/Nov) so you can definitely push the MCAT back a month or two after the semester is over to dedicate time to it.

My advice to you for reinvention would be:
1. Figure out why you're doing poorly in classes and try to remedy the problem.
2. Only take on a course load where you're confident of getting an A/A- semester average. Add classes/upper div sciences as you are comfortable.
3. Keep doing #2 until you've got 2+ semesters or 30+ units of A/A- grades.
4. Once #3 is done, start studying for the MCAT, put aside a solid 1-2 months of nothing but MCAT prep and then take the exam only when you're scoring ~510 on AAMC FLs.
5. Shadow a DO, multiple if you can and also get 200+ hours of clinical volunteering plus 100+ hours of nonclinical volunteering.
6. Get a DO LOR and a committee letter. Do this early just in case your committee denies you a recommendation. If you school doesn't have a committee or you do get denied then get 2x Science and 1x NonScience LOR.

Do all that and you should be in a pretty good spot. It's pretty much what I eneded up doing.

 

[Osminog]

A 510 (or even a 520) MCAT isn't going to make up for a ~2.0 sGPA. You're gonna need to push both your cGPA and sGPA up to a 3.0 in order to meet cut-offs at DO schools.

Check out: Goro's advice for pre-meds who need reinvention

 

[candbgirl]

So what are your GPAS? Stop studying for the MCAT. You aren’t anywhere near ready to apply so don’t bother with the MCAT yet. You have to figure out how to turn your grades around. That’s going to be hard because I’m not sure you know or accept what has been happening. We all know these courses can be hard so that’s not an excuse at all. You also seem to have very few ECs. I do think your entrepreneurial work is interesting but it won’t save your application. You need shadowing, clinical experience(different from shadowing) and nonclinical volunteering to those less fortunate than yourself. You might also need new roommates who will support you in your quest to be a doctor.

 

[deleted953743]

Hey fellow longhorn, PM me and let’s try to figure out what has gone wrong in your past science courses. I can help you figure out clinical opportunities in the Austin area as well!