Completing PreReqs 2 years post-undergrad - what do I still need?

[themountain]

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Hi all,
Turning my attention back to the medical route after taking a 2 year sidetrack into another important passion for me.
I completed a B.A. in Music at UC Berkeley in 2012. I was pre-med for most of my time there and completed most of the medical prereqs (albeit at a very slow pace).
A few concerns about what I need to do now to get back on the wagon:

Completed Coursework (semesters):
MATH 1-year (16A / 16B, 'calculus for humanities majors')
BIO 1-sem. (1A, basically all animal bio, including cellular, molecular, genetic, most of the 'hard' stuff)
PHYS 1-sem (6A, newtonian physics)
GEN CHEM 1-year (1A, 3A, 1-sem "gen chem", 1-sem "o-chem", but at our school, apparently the 1st sem of o-chem counts as the 2nd sem of gen-chem)
O CHEM 1-sem (3B)

Courses I remember I needed to complete at my school but didn't:
BIO 1B (Evolution, populations, ecology, plant bio)
BIOCHEM upper div course (don't know what it was about, apparently a lot of detailed chemical pathways)
PHYSICS 6B (Electromagnetics, waves, light, fluids, all the other stuff)

Courses I Never Took
ENGLISH (our school had a year of 'Reading & Comprehension' requirements that normally covers this 1-year for med school, but I waived the first half with APs and waived the second half with writing samples from humanities upper div research classes re:30-page papers).

So I'm a little confused how to "complete" these requirements. I live in southern California so I'm looking at courses at UCLA/Extension, for instance.

The PHYS series is clear enough; no problem.

Their BIO classes are broken into 4 quarters, THREE of which are already topics I covered in my ONE semester. So there is only 1 quarter of "new" bio.
Their BIOCHEM courses are broken into 3 quarters and apparently cover a LOT of material we covered in our 1 sem of BIO. But there's definitely one or one and a half quarters of new material for me in the UCLA series. Maybe better to take other upper divs that count as biochem?

Also because our Chem series was split the way it was at Berkeley, I've actually finished all the material that's presented in the UCLA O-Chem series. Maybe it would be better that I took a second semester of GEN Chem and used my year of "O Chem" actually as a year of "O Chem?"

I'm debating whether to spend an extra year fleshing out the coursework, taking potentially redundant coursework to complete the reqs, between community college and/or UCLA classes, or just take an MCAT prep course and tackle the MCAT, then complete any remaining classes after applying to med schools and seeing what they want to see?
There is a lot of confusing shuffling-around of my coursework and I'm left sort of wondering, actually how strict are admissions committees about the coursework prereqs? Do they take applicants and go, "we like you, but you need to finish this this and this, go do that this year," so I can sort of avoid another "gap" year?

Other Considerations for my application:
My science GPA is very good, straight As, but my transcript looks to my eyes very weak, almost never more than 1 science class in any given semester, I took it slow and steady to make sure I could do well, but I don't know if my transcript shows any hint of the "intensity" required in med school.

I did some volunteering at a free clinic, maybe a semester to a year, i dont remember or have any 'proof' of this. I did two semesters of TA work for O-chem lab and tutoring at the student learning center (i have credits on transcript for this), and i did take an education course in teaching/learning math/science.

Other than this I have no "clinical" or "research" experience. In high school I tried "volunteering" at a hospital, it was either filing paperwork, or standing around awkwardly in the ER. Are these actually the "experiences" admissions committees are looking for?

There's a lot of information and many questions here and I hope it's organized in a way that makes sense to others, as I'm a little confused myself. Thanks for any feedback, happy to clarify anything

 

[gp2]

Hi, I am also curious about the answers to some of your questions and hopefully others will chime in with advice and info.

First off, congrats on straight As! Even though it might seem like you could have done more, having a high GPA is a great place to start. I am in a similar situation and completed most of the same prereqs as you have at Cal except for physics. I am most likely going to take MCB 102 in a summer session to complete the chem series. I am not sure if that is possible for you to do but I am hoping it will make it easier to demonstrate that all of the material is covered and fully complete the series. However, I totally understand how you feel about how confusing it can be to work with the different way Cal organizes the Chem series.

Besides coursework, I think you are already on the right track by recognizing your lack of clinical experience. I think starting to work on that is important for application purposes to have enough hours over a period of time even if it may not seem important or meaningful to you at the time. What I have been reading on this site is that it demonstrates that you have had experience with sick people beforehand which is what adcoms want to see. Plus, if you have already volunteered some hours at a clinic, that will hopefully be helpful in getting better experiences in other positions since you have prior experience.

Also, if you have specific schools in mind that you are interested in applying to, I am sure many of the schools will be able to answer your specific questions about which classes would count towards completing coursework. It might be best to ask beforehand rather than putting it off until after an application cycle and having to complete courses last minute. I would be curious to see how they respond directly. Good luck!