Failed class but still got accepted into pharm school?

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Have any of you failed any classes but are now attending a pharmacy school? If so, how many classes?
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Can you retake the class?

I came across some posts before saying that some pharm schools have academic forgiveness, so if you retake and get a better grade, they will accept the higher grade. Meanwhile, other schools will average them out.

Please me correct if i'm wrong. 🙂
 
I think there are a few different ways schools handle it. my school includes every class within the last 10 years in the average, no exceptions. some have academic forgiveness like slowpepper said, and some will drop X number of your lowest grades when they calculate your average. the policy is probably listed online somewhere if you look around the school website.
 
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I failed three classes and retook two of them and got A's. My school didn't have academic forgiveness so those Fs still show up on my transcript. I also did a master's degree before pharmacy school, got a 4.0 in that program, and did a bunch of other stuff. So I would say it's possible but you are going to have to work hard.
 
I had two F's on my transcript, but both were partially due to military activity taking priority over college. You can still get in with black marks on your transcript, you just need to be upfront about them and address them when given an opportunity (primary app statement and if asked during an interview). Big points are explaining why it happened and what you've done to show that it was a rare exception in an otherwise good academic career.
 
I think you'll find that in general most schools have a sort of unwritten, unofficial "forgiveness" policy where there are no real "hard" rules to them but more of a general idea that the farther in the past something is, and the more someone has shown that they have changed since then and/or that it was an isolated incident and/or the incident had some very unusual circumstances that were at least somewhat out the person in question's control - the less that incident matters...

(I know I worded that awfully, but it's been a long week and I'm tired and really don't care...)

For the record, I have 2 full semesters of F's , one full semester of W's and a few more F's, and got accepted (to schools considered difficult to get into), but those all of those F's and W's were in the 90's. I never retook any of them. Counting all of them, GPA was still around a 3.0 so... I don't think I even talked about those semesters at all in my PS - did in a couple of specific supplementals though.
 
I have 5 Fs and I withdrew from an entire quarter. I applied on academic forgiveness so I never talked about it on my application or in the interview. They didn't seem to care and admitted me anyway.
 
I would also like to point out that they like seeing upward trends in GPAs and that you are actually maintaining good grades. An F is not detrimental like the others pointed out.
 
I got multiple F's, but repeated them all with success and was accepted to all 4 schools I applied to. There's hope!
 
Damn, I guess getting into pharmacy school isn't as hard like I have always thought it'd be.
 
bottlecap1990 said:
Damn, I guess getting into pharmacy school isn't as hard like I have always thought it'd be.
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Or grades (especially from a long time ago) aren't as important as you think they are...
 
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phathead said:
Actually, that's completely incorrect. If you view the class solely as memorization, you WILL fail
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Actually, that is partially correct. You are going to have to memorize some things.
 
bottlecap1990 said:
Actually, that is partially correct. You are going to have to memorize some things.
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Gotta be able to know what happens though. You can memorize structures but if stereochemistry is involved then simply memorizing a structure will not help you. Also, nomenclature is only a small subset of Orgo.
 
bottlecap1990 said:
Actually, that is partially correct. You are going to have to memorize some things.
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Why the hell do you always have to argue with someone who has experienced something you have not? We're only trying to be kind and help you along with this process.

What did your parents teach you when you were growing up? When people try to be helpful and give you advice to snap back at them with some smart ass remark? Even if they didn't, your parents have greatly failed at bringing you up as a child and I pray that they had no more children.

I'm done helping you. You sure as hell aren't ever going to make it to pharmacy school with an attitude like that. Hell, you won't make it very far in life with an attitude like that.

I wouldn't be surprised if a pharmacist took you out back sometime in the next year and showed you the better end of a spatula upside your puny little head.
 
phathead said:
Why the hell do you always have to argue with someone who has experienced something you have not? We're only trying to be kind and help you along with this process.

When people try to be helpful and give you advice to snap back at them with some smart ass remark? Even if they didn't, your parents have greatly failed at bringing you up as a child and I pray that they had no more children.

I'm done helping you. You sure as hell aren't ever going to make it to pharmacy school with an attitude like that. Hell, you won't make it very far in life with an attitude like that.
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👍
 
Last edited:
phathead said:
Why the hell do you always have to argue with someone who has experienced something you have not? We're only trying to be kind and help you along with this process.

What did your parents teach you when you were growing up? When people try to be helpful and give you advice to snap back at them with some smart ass remark? Even if they didn't, your parents have greatly failed at bringing you up as a child and I pray that they had no more children.

I'm done helping you. You sure as hell aren't ever going to make it to pharmacy school with an attitude like that. Hell, you won't make it very far in life with an attitude like that.

I wouldn't be surprised if a pharmacist took you out back sometime in the next year and showed you the better end of a spatula upside your puny little head.
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calm down man. :laugh:
 
phathead said:
Why the hell do you always have to argue with someone who has experienced something you have not? We're only trying to be kind and help you along with this process.

What did your parents teach you when you were growing up? When people try to be helpful and give you advice to snap back at them with some smart ass remark? Even if they didn't, your parents have greatly failed at bringing you up as a child and I pray that they had no more children.

I'm done helping you. You sure as hell aren't ever going to make it to pharmacy school with an attitude like that. Hell, you won't make it very far in life with an attitude like that.

I wouldn't be surprised if a pharmacist took you out back sometime in the next year and showed you the better end of a spatula upside your puny little head.
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It isn't necessary to experience organic to know that you will have to do some memorization. And can you really criticize someone for "arguing" when what they say is true? It sounded to me like he was clarifying the point and there is nothing wrong with that. I think it would be just as damaging to his future prospects to take advice on things he hasn't experienced as gospel without weighing whether or not the information being given is true.
 
diastole said:
It isn't necessary to experience organic to know that you will have to do some memorization. And can you really criticize someone for "arguing" when what they say is true? It sounded to me like he was clarifying the point and there is nothing wrong with that. I think it would be just as damaging to his future prospects to take advice on things he hasn't experienced as gospel without weighing whether or not the information being given is true.
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I didn't say what he said wasn't true. I stated that you can't view the class solely as memorization, I never said that there was no memorization.
 
phathead said:
I didn't say what he said wasn't true. I stated that you can't view the class solely as memorization, I never said that there was no memorization.
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He said that there was some memorization and you blew a gasket.

Let's review. He said:

BottleheadDude said:
Actually, that is partially correct. You are going to have to memorize some things.
Click to expand...

To which you responded:

GasketBlowingPhatheadDude said:
Why the hell do you always have to argue with someone who has experienced something you have not? We're only trying to be kind and help you along with this process.

What did your parents teach you when you were growing up? When people try to be helpful and give you advice to snap back at them with some smart ass remark? Even if they didn't, your parents have greatly failed at bringing you up as a child and I pray that they had no more children.

I'm done helping you. You sure as hell aren't ever going to make it to pharmacy school with an attitude like that. Hell, you won't make it very far in life with an attitude like that.

I wouldn't be surprised if a pharmacist took you out back sometime in the next year and showed you the better end of a spatula upside your puny little head.
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So what was wrong with what he said to warrant this response?
 
diastole said:
He said that there was some memorization and you blew a gasket.

Let's review. He said:



To which you responded:



So what was wrong with what he said to warrant this response?
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Not getting into it on a public forum. You obviously have not had to deal with him and his 'taking' of advice the last few weeks.
 
phathead said:
Not getting into it on a public forum. You obviously have not had to deal with him and his 'taking' of advice the last few weeks.
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I do believe there is an ignore function though I can't say how effective that is as I have never used it. That would be preferable to telling someone their parents are failures, that they won't make it pharmacy school, that they won't get very far in life, and that they might to come to violence. If you can't handle giving out advice to people you find annoying without engaging in such behavior then perhaps you should just put down the keyboard for awhile.
 
phathead said:
Actually, that's completely incorrect. If you view the class solely as memorization, you WILL fail
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Memorization in almost any class is the wrong way to go, you may get a decent grade that way, but you set yourself up for failure in the long run. IMO the attitude that memorizing material and getting good grades are all that matters is why you see sooooooo many people with high GPA's that do awful on the PCAT (after spending hundreds of dollars on prep material like Dr. Collins and "studying" extensively for the PCAT).

For OChem specifically, in chemistry, biochemistry, and even biology, it's considered a "core" class. I almost feel sorry for people that think OChem is hard. It's not, and if you think it is you're in for a rude awakening when you get into advanced material that uses it - not quite as bad as someone who had difficulty with algebra trying to go into the sciences - but a similar idea. In the aforementioned fields (among others) once you get to even the junior or senior undergraduate level, you're expected to understand OChem pretty much in a similar way to how you're expected to understand gen chem when in OChem or how you're expected to understand trig and algebra once you get to calculus... At undergrad for me OChem was technically a junior level class but - there were quite a few junior level chemistry and biology classes that required OChem as pre-reqs, it's nearly impossible to graduate in 4 years if you wait to take OChem until you're a junior, and profs treat basic Ochem knowledge as something any upper level student is supposed to know.

phathead said:
Not getting into it on a public forum. You obviously have not had to deal with him and his 'taking' of advice the last few weeks.
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I'll say this much on the subject... On this forum Bottlecap has a history of getting advice from "us" arguing about it with us, eventually taking our advice, and then telling us how good our advice was...
 
Wow almost forgot about that... Fingers crossed I don't fail Organic Chem! Not relying in my fingers though more on my mind haha.
 
I have a degree in chemistry. ALL chemistry classes are a joke except for physical chemistry. Organic is nothing come to PChem.
 
SHC1984 said:
I have a degree in chemistry. ALL chemistry classes are a joke except for physical chemistry. Organic is nothing come to PChem.
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P chem 1 on thermo was okay. When it switched over to quantum and kinetics, I prayed to god daily that I would pass. Eigenfunctions and alal that crap... 😕😕😕😕

I'm so glad we don't see any of this stuff in pharmacy
 
nexus14 said:
P chem 1 on thermo was okay. When it switched over to quantum and kinetics, I prayed to god daily that I would pass. Eigenfunctions and alal that crap... 😕😕😕😕

I'm so glad we don't see any of this stuff in pharmacy
Click to expand...


I actually found quantum to be (considerably) easier than thermo... but - I also hadn't had calculus for over 15 years, had a much harder prof for thermo, and had quantum physics (quite a long time ago) in the past.
 
nexus14 said:
P chem 1 on thermo was okay. When it switched over to quantum and kinetics, I prayed to god daily that I would pass. Eigenfunctions and alal that crap... 😕😕😕😕

I'm so glad we don't see any of this stuff in pharmacy
Click to expand...

I agree if PChem or Physics was used a lot in pharmacy school then I would NOT be in pharmacy. PChem was killer. Organic and Gen Chem was a joke. :laugh: Gen Chem didn't require any studying at all! :laugh: Organic maybe a little...
 
b1234 said:
I actually found quantum to be (considerably) easier than thermo... but - I also hadn't had calculus for over 15 years, had a much harder prof for thermo, and had quantum physics (quite a long time ago) in the past.
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Quantum was the hardest IMO.
 
SHC1984 said:
Quantum was the hardest IMO.
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Yeah most people seem to feel that way, but my background and situation made thermo way harder for me. I struggled to get a C in thermo, I ended up with a B in quantum, but had an A going up to the point when I found out I was accepted to at least one pharmacy school and sort of stopped caring as much then... Not like I planned on using it in the future - even if for some reason I change my mind and go on for a PhD in chemistry instead of or in addition to a PharmD it won't be for PChem...
 
diastole said:
I do believe there is an ignore function though I can't say how effective that is as I have never used it. That would be preferable to telling someone their parents are failures, that they won't make it pharmacy school, that they won't get very far in life, and that they might to come to violence. If you can't handle giving out advice to people you find annoying without engaging in such behavior then perhaps you should just put down the keyboard for awhile.
Click to expand...

👍

I agree 100%...
 
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