Greetings and my situation

[choeja]

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Hi everyone,

I am pleased to join this forum and hope everyone is having a great year so far.

I just wanted everyone's opinion on my current situation. This forum is a great resource for discovering where I stand and what my options are, even though your advice might be a little disheartening at times. My goal is of course to successfully apply to medical school in the coming years.

This post will probably turn out long, so thanks in advance for having the patience to read all the way through and answering with your thoughts.

First off, I'm a US citizen and 28 years old. I was born in South Korea but my family moved to the US when I was two. I attended public schools in the US until the 8th grade when my family moved back to Korea. I attended high school and Sogang University in Korea. I graduated with a double major in Political Science and Business Administration and graduated in 2002 with a 2.84 GPA. After working some in Korea and taking some accounting courses, I moved back to the US by myself in 2004.

I know my undergrad GPA is horrendous to say the least and I don't really have any excuse but to say I was unmotivated and significantly lacked direction at the time. I was an honor's student in the US, but as you can tell, I fell of the wagon during my years in Korea. I regret not taking my life seriously then but I can say that I am more focused now.

During my senior year in college, I came somewhat to my senses and realized I would be in deep trouble if I didn't get my act together. I knew I had to accomplish something and get a job after graduation. So I started taking accounting courses at a private institution in Korea. My goal was to pass the US CPA exam and go to work for a Big 4 accounting firm in the US. I knew I had to show the firms something, since my GPA was atrocious and I had no educational background in the US.

In order to sit for the CPA exam in California, I had to have a certain number of units in business and accounting courses. I lacked the units in accounting, so I attended a private accounting institute in Korea which provided courses on US accounting standards. The grades I received there were evaluated by a professional academic evaluation firm in the US and were accepted by the California Board of Accountancy. I sat for and successfully passed the CPA exam and was offered a job by EY in San Francisco in 2004. I have been working for the firm till now and will get my CPA license later this year.

I realized that accounting and finance were not really my areas of interest and after a bit of thought (actually it was very difficult decision to make 🙂) I decided to pursue my dream of becoming a doctor. I had wanted to pursue a career in medicine since middle school, but was discouraged when I moved to Korea. In Korea, they split you up during the second year of high school into two different groups. One group focuses on natural sciences, while the other group focuses on social sciences. My teachers discouraged me from joining the natural sciences because with my limited understanding of Korean (at the time) and my above average English abilities (compared to other Korean students), they thought I would be more suited to the social sciences.

So, I am set on participating in the informal pre-med program at SFSU since I have virtually no science or math classes, which I think is both a blessing and a curse. It will take longer to take all the pre-reqs, but will allow me to start fresh and show that I can achieve high scores in science courses consistently and that I am more focused now.

I plan to start in Open U in the summer and fall semesters in 2008 and hopefully transfer to the 2nd Bacc program in spring 2009. I discovered somewhat to my dismay that SFSU is no longer accepting students into the 2nd bacc program due to budgets cuts imposed by the state. But they might accept applications for the Spring 2009 semester later on. I plan to work until after summer at my current job and then transfer all my concentration into studies and volunteer work in the fall.

Well, thats my story and where I am heading. Any advice and of course criticism will be appreciated.

Thanks again for reading this far!

 

[SodaiGakusei]

It seems you are in a situation rather similar to mine. Here is the thread I started to discuss the issue.

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=484378

I think that you may want to consider a more competitive post-bac program. I have been talking to a lot of med school administrators and selection committee members and there general point is that a foreign degree holder a). will be expected to have a high GPA due to their complete inability to assess the curriculum b). that that high GPA will not count for much since its not in the US c). one would need top grades at a top name program (Bryn Mawr, Goucher, Scripps, Harv. Ext., etc.) in order to stand a chance.
Most of those programs have 85%-100% entry rates and are very competitive, and they are usually looking for a strong interest and history of activities in health, and with disadvantaged populations. So its a tough haul, but I also heard of some people with foreign degrees who made it through and into med school.

Please keep in mind that I only was able to talk to only a few doctors on selection committees at 3 med schools (n=4) so it doesn't make for a great statistical sample. But it seems to fit what I have heard and the story was consistent between those doctors.
As one foreign degree to another, I think there are some people who will think fact of holding a foreign degree as insignificant/no problem, and a lot who will say it is impossible to get into med school: they are both wrong. It is difficult as you will need to basically over perform on everything else before they will acknowledge your ability (since to most of them your 1st univ. GPA is nothing if good/everything if bad) but once you get past that you get extra points for being international and unique.... it seems at least.

Message me if you want to discuss or have questions. I am not an expert but I have been working through this for over a year now.

Good luck.

 

[Lokhtar]

Hi everyone,

I am pleased to join this forum and hope everyone is having a great year so far.

I just wanted everyone's opinion on my current situation. This forum is a great resource for discovering where I stand and what my options are, even though your advice might be a little disheartening at times. My goal is of course to successfully apply to medical school in the coming years.

This post will probably turn out long, so thanks in advance for having the patience to read all the way through and answering with your thoughts.

First off, I'm a US citizen and 28 years old. I was born in South Korea but my family moved to the US when I was two. I attended public schools in the US until the 8th grade when my family moved back to Korea. I attended high school and Sogang University in Korea. I graduated with a double major in Political Science and Business Administration and graduated in 2002 with a 2.84 GPA. After working some in Korea and taking some accounting courses, I moved back to the US by myself in 2004.

I know my undergrad GPA is horrendous to say the least and I don't really have any excuse but to say I was unmotivated and significantly lacked direction at the time. I was an honor's student in the US, but as you can tell, I fell of the wagon during my years in Korea. I regret not taking my life seriously then but I can say that I am more focused now.

During my senior year in college, I came somewhat to my senses and realized I would be in deep trouble if I didn't get my act together. I knew I had to accomplish something and get a job after graduation. So I started taking accounting courses at a private institution in Korea. My goal was to pass the US CPA exam and go to work for a Big 4 accounting firm in the US. I knew I had to show the firms something, since my GPA was atrocious and I had no educational background in the US.

In order to sit for the CPA exam in California, I had to have a certain number of units in business and accounting courses. I lacked the units in accounting, so I attended a private accounting institute in Korea which provided courses on US accounting standards. The grades I received there were evaluated by a professional academic evaluation firm in the US and were accepted by the California Board of Accountancy. I sat for and successfully passed the CPA exam and was offered a job by EY in San Francisco in 2004. I have been working for the firm till now and will get my CPA license later this year.

I realized that accounting and finance were not really my areas of interest and after a bit of thought (actually it was very difficult decision to make 🙂) I decided to pursue my dream of becoming a doctor. I had wanted to pursue a career in medicine since middle school, but was discouraged when I moved to Korea. In Korea, they split you up during the second year of high school into two different groups. One group focuses on natural sciences, while the other group focuses on social sciences. My teachers discouraged me from joining the natural sciences because with my limited understanding of Korean (at the time) and my above average English abilities (compared to other Korean students), they thought I would be more suited to the social sciences.

So, I am set on participating in the informal pre-med program at SFSU since I have virtually no science or math classes, which I think is both a blessing and a curse. It will take longer to take all the pre-reqs, but will allow me to start fresh and show that I can achieve high scores in science courses consistently and that I am more focused now.

I plan to start in Open U in the summer and fall semesters in 2008 and hopefully transfer to the 2nd Bacc program in spring 2009. I discovered somewhat to my dismay that SFSU is no longer accepting students into the 2nd bacc program due to budgets cuts imposed by the state. But they might accept applications for the Spring 2009 semester later on. I plan to work until after summer at my current job and then transfer all my concentration into studies and volunteer work in the fall.

Well, thats my story and where I am heading. Any advice and of course criticism will be appreciated.

Thanks again for reading this far!

Overseas degrees are going to be tough - especially if you did badly in them. My advice for you would be to start over and get a second bachelor's degree full time somewhere here. A place like UNC - Greensboro has open enrollment, and go do a biology major, doing all your pre-reqs and science. If you can get very close to a 4.0 by the end of that, you'll be in great shape.

You may be able to do less, by retaking some courses and then going the SMP route, but thats not guaranteed since your degree was not in the US. You didn't mess up your GPA in a year, and you won't be able to fix it in a year. Forget post-bac programs - you should do a second degree at a university that you think you'll get straight A's at.

 

[NewmansOwn]

I agree with Lokhtar on this one. I think you're going to need a new bachelor's degree. I don't think it needs to be 4 years necessarily -- perhaps if some of your miscellaneous business coursework could transfer, you might be able to get a degree in 3. However, if you're really into science now, you might want to take the full 4 years, do all your medical prereqs and take a bunch of upper level sciences to show you're no slouch.

Unfortunately, Sodai is absolutely right -- you're fighting against the tide with a foreign degree. I agree that a good GPA will still be questioned, whereas a poor GPA will be a true death knell.

It's not impossible -- but you're a good number of years away from medical school, I'm afraid. Look into getting a new bachelor's degree at a US institution and do the whole premed BS thing -- shadow doctors, volunteer at the hospital, maybe dabble in some research...it'll pay off when you finally do apply. And yes, people much older than you have done it successfully.

 

[choeja]

Thank you for your replies.

I knew going in that my situation was bad and I appreciate the advice.

I am planning to start taking classes at San Francisco State University. They have a 2nd Bac program there. From what I have read, a lot of post bac students apply as second bacs to either get prerequisite courses or to improve their GPA. Most of the second bac students do not get their second BS in a science major and just apply to medical school once they meet their goals

Obviously my situation is different so after reading everyone's advice I am thinking of enrolling as a 2nd Bac student and actually getting another bachelor's degree in Biology. Reading their website, it seems like the cycle for post bacs with no science pre-reqs to start and apply to med school takes 3 to 3 1/2 years, so I might as well attain a 4 year degree from a US university given my circumstance.

I would like to stay in the Bay Area if possible and SFSU seems to have a great pre-med support group as well as some good research/volunteer opportunities at nearby UCSF and other hospitals.

Financially I've put myself in a good position by basically saving up and investing every penny that came my way from my years of working both in Korea and the States so I think I can survive even in SF for a few years...living frugally of course. I am an accountant right?🙂

Please mercilessly poke holes in my plans and thanks again for your help.