Factors that matter for getting interview/accepted

[missdiana]

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HI. I have been reading a lot of post here and noticed something weird..

when someone said I have 3.8 and 20 on DAT, people say "Good to go. Apply anywhere"

when someone said I have 3.5 and 20 on DAT, people say "Oooo bit risky..try to improve DAT"

but when someone else post 3.3 and 20 on DAT, people say "not bad at all. apply schools



SO I am seriously wondering.what DAT and GPA are considered "average" to get ACCEPTED.

Let's assume, Candidate A has over 100 hour clinical experience, descent school activities, nice LoR, nice personal statement, little to zero research experiences
What DAT scores and GPA does Candidate A needs to get interview/ accepted from state pubic school?


I am really confused on all the word saying "3.3 is fine" then hard to find people who got accepted with 3.3 gpa.
and i also see people who had 3.8 gpa yet didn't even get an interview. wth?

so can you guys give me our thoughts on this???

 

[Hawkteeth]

There is no actual way to know what will happen, the process is unpredictable. You will get rejected from schools you think will be easy to get into and interviews at schools you thought would reject you. You can look at one of doc toothace's excel sheets for avg accepted stats, or find an ADEA guidebook, I suggest buying the new one, or you can find older ones on the internet somewhere. These will list the averages for each school as well as other important information that will help you decide the best schools to apply to.

 

[Papasmurf1234]

I understand what you are going through because I am going through the exact same thing.
But I really think each school has different factors on what they look at. Some may be extremely academic and numbers based while other schools like UCSF focuses a lot more on your E.C. The biggest key factor is to be able to convey WHY you want to do dentistry. Without that, no matter how competitive you are, you won't get in if you can't convince admissions why dentistry is right for you.

 

[tkorech]

The ADEA Offical Guide to Dental Schools is a GREAT resource. It's only about $35 and you can buy it through the ADEA. It has a short intro about dental school, how to get in, etc etc, but the bulk of it is listing every single school, their pre-reqs, and most importantly, the range and mean of their DAT scores and GPA's. Check it out!