Is this a red flag? Locked into 3rd quartile at this point

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Doctoscope

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I'm a 2nd year at a DO school that has graded preclinicals and a GPA. I have been fully on the UFAPS boards grind, doing AnKing/AMBOSS/UWorld. Our in-house material don't align with 3rd party super well, and we're taught a lot of "useless" stuff according to our 3rd years (their words, not mine). I'm doing decently well in question banks, and I think AnKing is starting to stick. I've been told a strong Step 1 foundation lends itself well to preparing for Step 2.

I have been getting mostly B's in everything, so I'm around that 3.0-3.1 mark. Haven't failed anything. I know GPA is meaningless, but our class rank is entirely based on preclinical GPA, and I just learned that historically the 50th percentile point has almost always been ~3.4. I just did the math and it's unlikely I'll bring myself up to that point. I can't believe I'm worrying about f'ing GPA in medical school lol.

I'm just gonna keep what I'm doing to build a strong foundation for Step 2 and 3rd year. My clerkship grades will not affect my rank, so as far as I'm considered even a 6/6 H will not move me.

But it's got me worrying... is being in the 3rd quartile something that's gonna hurt me in a meaningful way if I keep grinding for Step 1/2 and end up with 250, 260+ (easier said than done I know)? It seems so silly to me that clinical grades don't affect my rank at all, and I hope that a class rank based entirely based on preclinical grades holds less meaning...

I'll probably have maybe 1 pub and a couple of posters, perhaps more. I'm strongly interested in academic IM/anesthesia. Thanks for your input.

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Class rank is one of the metrics potentially used. Apps are holistically reviewed now so one metric being low doesn't tank your app, but you need to be strong in another to make up for it. AS a DO you are already facing significant barriers to academic IM And gas.

Tbh I don't agree with the preclinical ranking hard on at some DO schools. Preclinical classes (especially useless ones that don't align with boards material) are probably one of the worst predictors of future success. They should be training you to do a job, not be in college again
 
Most applications are holistically reviewed. What that means in relation to your hypothetical application is that you’ll likely first be rewarded for a high step 2 CK score likely by some manual/electronic filter and it will be seen as a positive on manual review. If everything else doesn’t match up with that (good clinical grades, etc.) I suspect people may wonder if you just did nothing but study for CK. Outside of low scores, <230 I don’t think USMLE matters much other than a reflection of how efficiently you studied the content material in UWorld. PDs realize this but they need some means to filter applicants and this what they have.
 
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hi - just curious, but how come there are a lot of DO students on the MD students section? Not that I mind or anything but I thought there was a whole section just for DO students
 
hi - just curious, but how come there are a lot of DO students on the MD students section? Not that I mind or anything but I thought there was a whole section just for DO students
...because there's not a whole lof of difference between what MDs are here for and what DOs are.
 
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