Community college or post bac?

[xleedaniel]

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Hi I will be graduating this june at a 4 year accredited university with a non-science major. I decided to pursue a career in dentistry just recently and have been doing thorough research regarding it.

I had a couple of questions and need advice on what to do.

1) Does it make a difference whether I take my pre-dental reqs at a community college rather than a 4 year university?

2) What are the reasons for a student to want to be in a post-bacc program? Is a post-bacc program for students with low gpa's and/or low DAT scores? Because my undergraduate college gpa is 3.5. So I would like a general idea of what post-bacc programs offer.

Thanks guys!

 

[quillow]

1) Does it make a difference whether I take my pre-dental reqs at a community college rather than a 4 year university?

It depends on what schools you want to apply to. Some schools don't accept community college credits. So if you can afford it, I would probably take pre-reqs at a university. If you can't afford it, cc should be fine but it might limit what schools you can apply to.

2) What are the reasons for a student to want to be in a post-bacc program? Is a post-bacc program for students with low gpa's and/or low DAT scores? Because my undergraduate college gpa is 3.5. So I would like a general idea of what post-bacc programs offer.

From my understanding, a post-bacc is for people who want/need to take classes after having received their bachelor's degree (hence the term post-bacc). It's not simply for people who have low gpa's. I think there are even schools with specific post-bacc programs for people who already have bachelor's degrees but just need a few classes to apply for medical or dental school (like you). Otherwise, I think you just enroll as a post-bacc student and register for classes like normal. I don't know how this affects financial aid though.

If I don't get accepted this cycle, I'm strongly considering doing a post-bacc... mostly because it's been a few years since I've graduated and it'll help me get fresher letters of recommendation and I can complete a few of those classes that dental schools "strongly recommend".