Grade Replacing Irrelevant Courses with Online Courses (Non-traditional RN and Vet)

[ReformedLiberalArtist]

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TLDR: Can I use online courses from reputable, accredited schools to use AACOMAS's grade replacement policies to erase old, irrelevant coursework in the Humanities? Will this reflect negatively on my second brick-and-mortar nursing double major with biology? Details follow that may or may not be relevant to your decision. Thank you for your time.

Hi, I'm Ben, a reformed liberal artist.

Once upon a time, I was 18. I was encouraged by my Baby Boomer parents to "enjoy college," "not worry about grades," and "take time to soak in the culture." Terrific advice. My biggest purchase at that point was a PlayStation... now I was allocating tens of thousands of dollars in educational debt, using one criterion: which courses interested 18-21yo me. Gotta love the American education myth.

Philosophy of Nihilism
Existentialism
History of the Ottoman Empire

It all sounded so fascinating--until I graduated, and couldn't locate the philosophy factory. Whoops.

I joined the Army, looking for a way that I could use what little abilities I had to serve something greater than myself. Honorable discharge. Looking to continue serving, enrolled in an Associates in Nursing program--realized that I liked chemistry, when I took chem for allied health.

Took general chem and majority of the prerequisites. Soon I will graduate with a Bachelors in Nursing and enough science coursework (most of my pre-med prerequisites are filled) for a double major in Biology.

GPA- ~3.97
First baccalaureate degree GPA- 2.5

Basically, if I find some state school offering 'Existentialism' or 'Ottoman History' online--assuming AACOMAS' criteria for grade replacement are met--will they look down on my application for taking about 10-12 random Humanities courses online, to replace the Fs, C+s, etc. that I earned nearly ten years ago during my first degree?

I'm not talking about Organic Chem I or something important to the pre-med curriculum--just something clearly irrelevant like 'Philosophy of Nihilism,' that the 20yo version of me didn't take seriously?

Thank you in advance.

 

[ReformedLiberalArtist]

My mistake, I just realized I had posted this in the Med Students forum instead of Pre-Osteo

 

[kenjixshadow]

Hi Ben, wth is philosophy of Nihilism? Anyway, I'm pretty sure you can retake it or any non-science class online and take advantage of grade replacement. If any Adcom is cool like Goro, they wouldn't care. If you want to make adcoms to drool all over you, do well on the MCAT, have uptrend GPA & high sGPA, have tons of volunteer, tons of shadowing, and some research experience, etc.

 

[group_theory]

My mistake, I just realized I had posted this in the Med Students forum instead of Pre-Osteo

 

[ReformedLiberalArtist]

Hi Ben, wth is philosophy of Nihilism? Anyway, I'm pretty sure you can retake it or any non-science class online and take advantage of grade replacement. If any Adcom is cool like Goro, they wouldn't care. If you want to make adcoms to drool all over you, do well on the MCAT, have uptrend GPA & high sGPA, have tons of volunteer, tons of shadowing, and some research experience, etc.

I know many of the COMs technically accept online courses, I'm more concerned whether it will reflect poorly on my application to have a bunch of random online classes.

My application is robust in other respects, this is just my Achilles' heel.

 

[SkyBlueMonkies]

The majority of DO schools will accept online credit (from reviewing school websites and having lurked on SDN for a long while), with a few exceptions, and online courses can be used in grade replacement through AACOMAS.

 

[ReformedLiberalArtist]

The majority of DO schools will accept online credit (from reviewing school websites and having lurked on SDN for a long while), with a few exceptions, and online courses can be used in grade replacement through AACOMAS.

Thank you for your reply. I just want to say that I did the research and I've read other threads on this forum confirming that many COMs will accept grade replacement for online courses.

However, many of these discussions are addressing being able to take lab science prerequisites using an online format... that's not what I'm trying to do, I don't want an easier or more convenient way to do the things that actually pertain to medicine. The replies to these threads have indicated that COMs will askance on these online courses, and only grudgingly accept them while quietly disadvantaging candidates who have made use of the online option without a good excuse.

I am wondering if taking these irrelevant courses online will disadvantage my otherwise robust application, simply because I don't want to return to a 200-level philosophy class and discuss how many angels can dance on the head of a pin with stoned teens.*

(*Not because I'm above such pursuits, mainly because I've got a family and a job and grownup stuff to do...)

 

[DrMikeP]

Thank you for your reply. I just want to say that I did the research and I've read other threads on this forum confirming that many COMs will accept grade replacement for online courses.

However, many of these discussions are addressing being able to take lab science prerequisites using an online format... that's not what I'm trying to do, I don't want an easier or more convenient way to do the things that actually pertain to medicine. The replies to these threads have indicated that COMs will askance on these online courses, and only grudgingly accept them while quietly disadvantaging candidates who have made use of the online option without a good excuse.

I am wondering if taking these irrelevant courses online will disadvantage my otherwise robust application, simply because I don't want to return to a 200-level philosophy class and discuss how many angels can dance on the head of a pin with stoned teens.*

(*Not because I'm above such pursuits, mainly because I've got a family and a job and grownup stuff to do...)

Quite a few established universities offer online courses for non-science classes and there is no difference on their transcripts between online vs brick-n-mortar. You might want to avoid a half dozen different universities with 1 or 2 courses each, as that could raise undue questions. If adcoms ask then tell them how you changed and why you retook the classes. If you have a really good sgpa then you could get away with a bit lower cumulative gpa so don't kill yourself retaking classes like intro to music appreciation. Best of luck.

 

[ReformedLiberalArtist]

Quite a few established universities offer online courses for non-science classes and there is no difference on their transcripts between online vs brick-n-mortar. You might want to avoid a half dozen different universities with 1 or 2 courses each, as that could raise undue questions. If adcoms ask then tell them how you changed and why you retook the classes. If you have a really good sgpa then you could get away with a bit lower cumulative gpa so don't kill yourself retaking classes like intro to music appreciation. Best of luck.

Dr. P.,

Thank you for your encouraging response!

My next question would be whether AACOMAS will allow Humanities/LibArts courses with different titles ('History of Dance' vs. 'Dance Through the Ages: A Historical Survey') and different syllabi, but that are--let's face it--practically the same thing replace each other. :-/

 

[DrMikeP]

Dr. P.,

Thank you for your encouraging response!

My next question would be whether AACOMAS will allow Humanities/LibArts courses with different titles ('History of Dance' vs. 'Dance Through the Ages: A Historical Survey') and different syllabi, but that are--let's face it--practically the same thing replace each other. :-/

You would have to ask. There is a pdf of detailed replacement policies on the AACOMAS site.