I was accepted last year and deferred due to health issues. Due to a course classification my sGPA has dropped 0.10 and I have no idea what to do.

[badatbiochem24]

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To give some backstory: last year, I applied to medical school and was accepted to my state school. However, I was injured in a car accident and decided to defer my admission for a year to focus on recovery and rehab. One of the conditions of my deferral was that I had to resubmit my AMCAS application, and the school "reserved the right to withdraw my acceptance if any of my personal or academic credentials changed before matriculation".

Here’s where the problem comes in. When I originally filled out my application last year, I accidentally misclassified two courses while entering them quickly. In the same semester, I took a 5-credit Spanish course (in which I earned an A) and a 5-credit Physics course (where I earned a C). Because the two courses were listed next to each other on my transcript, I accidentally labeled the Spanish course as Physics and the Physics course as Spanish. Somehow, AMCAS didn’t catch the error during last year’s processing, and no corrections were made.

This year, I resubmitted essentially the same application to the same school. Since AMCAS saves prior coursework and activities, I didn’t need to make any major changes. I submitted it, thinking it would be a simple process.

Today, I got the “Your application has been processed” email from AMCAS, which advised me to double-check for any discrepancies. While skimming through, I noticed that my science GPA (sGPA) had dropped by 0.10 points. I immediately panicked and dug into the details. I saw two Xs next to those same courses, indicating that AMCAS had made changes. After cross-referencing with last year’s application I realized that the misclassified courses had been corrected, and now my sGPA had dropped from 3.37 to 3.27. Both numbers are on the low side, but last year (before applying the first time) I had worked incredibly hard in a postbac program to earn a 4.0 and boost my sGPA above 3.3. I was really proud of that progress.

Now I’m terrified that the school will think I deliberately misclassified the courses to inflate my GPA. It was an honest mistake, but I don’t know how to explain it or whether I even should. I’m afraid this could jeopardize my spot, and I honestly feel sick about it.

 

[wowow23]

If there's a discrepancy between your previous and current application's coursework, I would personally consider that the fault of AMCAS not you. I would give them a heads up that there an error in how your coursework was processed last year that has been corrected.

 

[LizzyM]

There is nothing you can do to change what has happened. Agree with @wowow23 that you should give the school a heads up that there was an error that AMCAS didn't catch last year that was corrected in your reapplication. Whatever comes of it, there isn't anything you can do to change the past. Fingers crossed for you that the school sees it as a non-issue. (Its not as if you took more courses and got Cs in those courses -- I think that's what they are concerned with.)

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Speaking from the admissions perspective:

I think your concern that you were being deceitful is irrational. AMCAS approved your previous application and course categorization, overlooking the apparent error. Now, you may have had a chance to review the course entry last cycle as you have been given that chance this cycle, but the schools also technically review your course entry and compare against your transcript. So many other people had a chance to notice this error. Perhaps the admissions office has the ability to change the classification on its portal, but it won't show up on your AMCAS. We can do prereq checks to verify BCPM.

AMCAS did not open a formal investigation, which typically occurs when you report having an IA in a previous AMCAS application but do not report it this time.

Admissions staff also should verify and check what AMCAS reports, and any "concerns" about irregularities should be brought up by anyone having full access to your file including course entry. I don't know how thorough your school reviews this or if it makes a huge difference.

I tell everyone, we don't rely on one GPA to make decisions. There's a big spreadsheet of GPAs we look at so that a course description switch has minimal impact on our decisions to interview or extend offers.

For advice, let your admissions team know of your concern about this. I don't know what your deferral conditions say about you maintaining a specific GPA. But to me, it's obvious that the course classification error is not deliberate, but whether it affects whether you can take your deferred seat... that's up to them (i.e., the admissions committee leadership).