Q: How do they grade you in dental school?
A: Majority of U.S. dental school will use a grading system. I know for fact that some dental schools uses a Pass-Fail system (no grades like medical schools). For the dental schools that do have a grading system, there are two types, A-F or Percentage. At my school, Nova, we get graded based on the Percentage system. A 92.1% average is better than a 92.09% average. Everything is in percents.
Q: What type of work will you be graded on?
A: EVERYTHING from basic science courses to clinical work to preclinical courses (quizzes, projects, papers, presentations, exams, and procedural assignments/requirements).
Q: What is the average/mean gpa of dental schools in a typical dental school?
A: I would hypothesize that the average GPA in dental classes across the nation would be above a 3.0. Being in a graduate school and program, it is pretty typical that the class aveage GPA is above a 3.0. The peek of the bell curve would probably be around 3.3-3.5. The bell curve also would probably be lobsided towards the high grade marks, meaning a lot more of classmates will have a GPA higher than the class average and fewer classmates with a GPA lower than the class average.
Example of a class' grading demographics:
Class Rank: Out of 100 students
#1 = 99.5%
#2 = 98.4%
#3 = 98.1%
#4 = 96.4%
#5 = 96.3%
#6 = 95.9%
#7 = 95.7%
#8 = 93.7%
#9 = 93.5%
#10 = 92.4%
#20 = 90.3%
#50 = 86.3%
#70 = 81.5%
#90 = 78.4%
#99 = 73.3%
#100 = 72.8%
[A = >90%; B = >80%; C = >70%; Fail = <70%]
As you can see, you're ranked 50th in your class and you have a 86.3% grading average! Based on these numbers, there are roughly 30 students cramp together between the range 86.3% and 90.3% and it shows its extreme competitiveness.
Hope this gives you some idea.
