How to overcome poor undergrad...

Started by tadawdy
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tadawdy

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Relevant stats: 2.4 undergrad GPA in a science major. 760 quantitative/630 verbal/6.0 writing. Currently working as a personal trainer.

I know the GPA thing comes up constantly, but my case is truly one of being totally aimless and discontent during my undergrad. I had semesters of 3.9 in engineering, and one where I took an F in psychology because I just wouldn't jump the hoops.

Now that I have focus, I have decided to get into a DPT program.

It has been 3 years since I graduated, and more than that since I took lower level sciences (prereqs); I came into college with 57 credit hours of AP and other college credit. I have been told that my prereqs have basically expired anyway, so I am currently planning on doing a post-bac at Northwestern to redo them all, and establish some recent academic success (I did ace orgo last spring, as well).

It has been 5 years since the worst point of my career, and I have to think that if prereqs expire, GPA's can only taint you for so long, right? Don't people presumably grow over the course of a decade?

So basically my question is whether retaking and rocking all of those prereqs is going to do me any good in terms of admissions. I've got recommendations, I can write a personal statement like a champ, and my GRE is pretty good.

My guess is that I can get someone to bite. Any thoughts or advice?
 
It depends on where you're applying and what the other people applying have done. I would try to get the overall GPA up to 3.0 as that is a minimum for many programs.

The fact that you're a personal trainer and have good recent grades is really good and I think you could definitely get in someplace (possibly after being on a waitlist, but getting in is getting in). Make sure you have lots of hours in PT in various settings too.
 
I think you're going to have to re-take some, if not the majority, of your pre-requisites in order to get your cumulative GPA up, as a 2.4 won't likley meet the minimum GPA rquired for consideration at any PT schools that I know of.