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MD & DO chances: GPA 3.75 MCAT 23
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Unfortunately, if you're Asian, you'll be lumped in with all the other Asians and not considered as a URM at all. The only exception I've seen to this rule is Filipinos at University of Utah.
By way of your VR of 5 and an MCAT of 23, you're out of the running at every MD school. You're wasting your money there. Most DO schools will be apprehensive to take you in as well. The newer schools may take a gamble, but I think most screen for a score of 6. You'll have to do your research into what schools accept a 5. I know of one person that made it into LMU-DCOM with a 5 in VR as a URM, but you won't be a URM.
Good luck.
By way of your VR of 5 and an MCAT of 23, you're out of the running at every MD school. You're wasting your money there. Most DO schools will be apprehensive to take you in as well. The newer schools may take a gamble, but I think most screen for a score of 6. You'll have to do your research into what schools accept a 5. I know of one person that made it into LMU-DCOM with a 5 in VR as a URM, but you won't be a URM.
Good luck.
Any special reason for Fillipinos being the exception? And how can you say that I will just be lumped with all other Asians? I dont want to mention where exactly I am from but we are probably the newest asylees in the US. I am pretty sure medical schools have a criteria of defining what a URM is. An applicant classified as Asian could be someone who has been born and raised in America and another Asian applicant could be a naturalised citizen having lived here only for some years. There should probably be a difference in how medical schools might be looking at their applications. In addition, I also personally happen to know an naturalised immigrant friend who got accepted into a MD school which accepts only scores above 30 despite he having a score lower than a 30 and his Verbal score was only 6. It's still worth a try my friend.
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Are you Hmong?
You may or may not be classified as a URM. Your best bet for acceptance to medical school is to retake the MCAT and get better score.
Yes! I was thinking about retaking but not sure they would consider January Mcats for the 2014 cycle otherwise I might have to apply for DO schools. So supposing if I was considered a URM, that means I would have some chances right?
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I understand your argument about URM and different experiences (e.g. Southeast Asian history), but most schools do not understand/know of the difference between our experiences and those of "ORM" API folks. I believe U of Colorado and U of Wisconsin acknowledge this, but the most you can get away with is identifying as disadvantaged for a lot of the schools. Even if you could fulfill the URM criteria, the low VR would still raise a few red flags. You should raise your score to at least a 27-29 to have a more reliable chance at some MDs. Your story may get you looked at though, considering the different obstacles you faced to get to the same point as others.
My parents are also refugees, so I understand where you're trying to come from, esp since I've worked with laotian, cambodian, hmong, malaysian, and mienh students (had a few from indonesia and burma too). Yes, it's important to distinguish us from "Asian," but the rest of the nation just hasn't necessarily caught up yet.
My parents are also refugees, so I understand where you're trying to come from, esp since I've worked with laotian, cambodian, hmong, malaysian, and mienh students (had a few from indonesia and burma too). Yes, it's important to distinguish us from "Asian," but the rest of the nation just hasn't necessarily caught up yet.
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I understand your argument about URM and different experiences (e.g. Southeast Asian history), but most schools do not understand/know of the difference between our experiences and those of "ORM" API folks. I believe U of Colorado and U of Wisconsin acknowledge this, but the most you can get away with is identifying as disadvantaged for a lot of the schools. Even if you could fulfill the URM criteria, the low VR would still raise a few red flags. You should raise your score to at least a 27-29 to have a more reliable chance at some MDs. Your story may get you looked at though, considering the different obstacles you faced to get to the same point as others.
My parents are also refugees, so I understand where you're trying to come from, esp since I've worked with laotian, cambodian, hmong, malaysian, and mienh students (had a few from indonesia and burma too). Yes, it's important to distinguish us from "Asian," but the rest of the nation just hasn't necessarily caught up yet.
Thanks for your opinion. I shall certainly look up for schools that might favor minorities. I have mentioned about my story and experience in the disadvantaged section of the application. I know my low VR most certainly raises a few flags and I might just retake the MCAT. I am not really sure retaking would be a good idea. I am sure retaking would only raise my VR score by 1 or 2 points. I may improve on the science section though.
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A lot of schools do auto screens for any section less than a 7. Even if you could get that to an 8 and 10 on the other guys, that'd boost your chances at a lot of different schools. 25 is usually the lowest a lot of schools are willing to go for MDs. Even a 26 score would especially help for DOs!
However, since you've already applied, the best you can do is ace your secondaries. I'd say if you have no IIs by November, really reconsider retaking the MCATs and follow the study schedule on SDN for raising your VR. It's def not easy, esp for ESLs, but if med school is your dream, it's just one more hurdle. Good luck!
However, since you've already applied, the best you can do is ace your secondaries. I'd say if you have no IIs by November, really reconsider retaking the MCATs and follow the study schedule on SDN for raising your VR. It's def not easy, esp for ESLs, but if med school is your dream, it's just one more hurdle
. Good luck!
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Also when ppl are saying retake the mcats, they mean reapply next year too. September was the last test this cycle accepts. I believe you need a physician LoR for DOs, but your chances there right now are far better
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To be honest, I don't think it would damage your application if you scored lower than a 23 on a second attempt. Really, you can either improve your chances or make no difference by studying hard for the MCAT and retaking it. Aim for at least a 9 in every section, apply broadly to both MD and DO programs, and I think you've got a shot.
Thanks! I am also considering DO schools. So do all schools need LOR from a DO? Do LORs from MD be helpfulfor DO application?
Actually, I took the MCAT two times. I didn't mention it earlier.During the second time, I improved my score by 6 points. The first one was absolutely horrible. I honestly didn't understand most of the Verbal passages and am even ashamed of revealing my score. I scored below 8 on both science section. It was probably because I was working full-time and also my first MCAT. Well who doesn't take the MCAT more than one time right? I did improve significantly during the second one.
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Not all DO schools require a DO letter, but many do so you will need one asap. The majority of MD schools do not require a lor from any physician, but U of Arizona recently changed their reqread and now requires a clinical letter, for example.
Letters that you used for MD can be used for DO as long as it doesn't say MD somewhere, lol. Rule of thumb is have 2 science letters and one non-science/academic (+ Do letter for DOs)
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A lot of schools do auto screens for any section less than a 7. Even if you could get that to an 8 and 10 on the other guys, that'd boost your chances at a lot of different schools. 25 is usually the lowest a lot of schools are willing to go for MDs. Even a 26 score would especially help for DOs!
However, since you've already applied, the best you can do is ace your secondaries. I'd say if you have no IIs by November, really reconsider retaking the MCATs and follow the study schedule on SDN for raising your VR. It's def not easy, esp for ESLs, but if med school is your dream, it's just one more hurdle
Hey just a quick question. What does receiving the secondary application mean? Does it mean in a way that you have been pre-accepted. I know acceptance only happens after the interview. Does receiving a secondary application mean that the school has at least decided to select you as one of the possible candidates. I know some schools like MCG send you secondary application even without the AMCAS being verified. A little more light on this please?
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No. Schools expect the applicant to self evaluate their fit for the school by investigating the historic norms for MCAT, gpa and mission. That means that all who complete a primary application through AMCAS and apply will receive a secondary.
So no matter how low your MCAT score and GPA is, you will still receive a secondary application to be completed?
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For many schools, yes.
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I don't know why they are the exception. Perhaps call Utah and ask if your people will be. Unfortunately, it matters very little what you define to be underrepresented and what schools will go out of their way to classify as URM. Most schools already have guidelines of what they consider to be URM and not. For example, some schools say all hispanics are URM, but some say only mainland Puerto Rican and Mexican are. Besides, how are you sure that you're considered underrepresented? If your community is very small but have 5 doctors, those 5 doctors may represent your population.
I don't think you'll find the success you wish with your current scores, but go ahead and apply if you think that's best. Best of luck.
I have already explained why I think I should be considered URM. We are recent arrivees in the US (dont want to reveal from where). Also by a small community, I dont mean just a group of about 500 people. It actually totals a number of 60-70K all over the US. I am pretty sure there are maybe about five doctors from our community. Also out of this population of 60-70K, approx half of them are adults maybe over 40 and don't speak English at all. I am pretty sure with this fact, our community is in dire need of doctors and we are obviously "hyper-underrepresented"( not sure which term to use here). That is the also reason the reason why I am currently working as a Medical Interpreter. Mind you we don't also speak the same language that the represented Asians in medicine speak.
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You've received the same answer repeatedly about being considered a URM, so I don't think that you're going to get a different answer regardless of the information that you share. I'm not saying that it's necessarily a fair answer, but what has been said previously seems to be consensus on the board.
You can attempt to spin it in your personal statement, but the fact remains that your MCAT verbal score is too low to be considered for most places. Furthermore, since you've already taken the MCAT twice, so I think that you really need to do something extraordinary to improve your verbal score. Improvement over your first attempt is nice, but that verbal score is a major red flag to your application.
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I am an immigrant as well. I have no idea how represented my community is in medicine but there is one thing I know for sure. I am not a URM for all intends and purposes of medical school admissions. To be URM you must come from a group that had historically suffered institutional discrimination and underachievement in America: Native American, African-American, or Hispanic. There are some rare case-by-case exceptions (Utah and Filipinos) but most likely you will not benefit from AA.
Yes this sounds like quite a legit answer for URM classification.
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The reason why Filipinos aren't lumped together with the general Asian population at some schools is the same reason why some schools separate East Asians/South Asians from Southeast Asiasn (Malaysians, Cambodians, Hmong, etc.) Although the type of "institutional discrimination" is not the same, they do have a history of educational underachievement and lack of representation in the US in certain circumstances.
That same definition is also why OP is pushing so much to prove that they fulfill the definition of URM, despite numerous people agreeing but saying that it will not help them for their med school apps. However, like many people have said, it will only help at mission-based schools that have these policies already in place. Stats heavy schools will hardly pay a second glance at the app before accepting their cash dues and promptly rejecting these folks (unfortunately). The fact of the matter that still stands is that the MCAT score is low for MDs, even if they were URM.
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Even schools that recognize that Filipinos are under-represented at the college level must acknowledge that Filipino physicians are well represented in practice. Sadly for the applicants, a large percentage of Filipino immigrants are, in fact, physicians.
The designation of under-represented in medicine is not to serve the applicant, but rather the community, thus no UIM status.
The designation of under-represented in medicine is not to serve the applicant, but rather the community, thus no UIM status.
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The reason why Filipinos aren't lumped together with the general Asian population at some schools is the same reason why some schools separate East Asians/South Asians from Southeast Asiasn (Malaysians, Cambodians, Hmong, etc.) Although the type of "institutional discrimination" is not the same, they do have a history of educational underachievement and lack of representation in the US in certain circumstances.
That same definition is also why OP is pushing so much to prove that they fulfill the definition of URM, despite numerous people agreeing but saying that it will not help them for their med school apps. However, like many people have said, it will only help at mission-based schools that have these policies already in place. Stats heavy schools will hardly pay a second glance at the app before accepting their cash dues and promptly rejecting these folks (unfortunately). The fact of the matter that still stands is that the MCAT score is low for MDs, even if they were URM.
I was just trying to give him practical advice. Almost every group in America aside from white Anglo-Saxon Protestant males has faced some historical hardship. He can "push" for that URM status all he wants but it just will not happen and I personally would advice him not to mention anything like this in the application. He doesn't want to give the impression of "that guy" trying to game the system (eg. Egyptians checking "African-American" box). Besides application includes all of the necessary information for the ADCOM to know what group he belongs to.
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I agree with you. There's simply no kosher way for OP to go out there and make schools classify him as a URM. Even then, that's no guarantee. Only 39.2% of all black applicants are accepted into a medical school. OP has a 23 (w/a 5 in VR) which is well underneath the 10th percentile of every single school. The best OP can do is write about his community and his desire to serve them. Then the hope is that OP will somehow make it through the automatic rejection screens and (the personal statement) fall on the hands of someone willing to go out of their way for him.
OP simply needs to accept that a 23 is an unacceptable score for an MD institution and barely qualifying for the lowest tier of DO programs. OP should also know that African-Americans are the only group of URM that catch any slack from DO admissions, so there's not even that hope of catching a break.
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Are you serious?
What is there to be serious about? I am just a first-time applicant and not familiar with this process. Are you serious about asking this question?
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The answer is no. Absolutely no. Noooooooooooo
A lot of schools dont even screen for secondarys they give them to everyone
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You can look up all the statistics you want, but odds are pretty much zero that you're going to be that 20 something MCAT that gets accepted at the school that only takes 30+s. There are people like that at every school, but generally they are there by some combination of outstanding extracurriculars, being very nontraditional, and/or knowing people in high places.
Feel free to continue to delude yourself if you want, but your question about competitiveness has been pretty well answered in this thread. You're only hurting yourself by choosing to ignore what people are telling you.
Also, lol at you telling adcoms that they don't know what the MSAR is...we all know what the MSAR is. We also know the reality of medical school applications, of which you seem to have a tenuous grasp.
Good luck.
I got it. Is that how you would answer your patients if they have a question? I bet you would make an awesome doc
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Average MCAT for MD matriculants is about a 32. For those that are accepted to MD programs with mid to low 20s there are other confounding factors you have to consider, such as being significantly disadvantaged and having an amazing underdog story coupled with a very strong application (with the exception of the weak MCAT), or URMs that are accepted at schools with a mission for particular URM groups. For example my state school reserves 7 spots for Native American applicants. The data for these applicants and matriculants are often lumped in with everyone else in things like the MSAR despite lower admissions requirements for the Native American applicants. So those 19 or 21 MCAT and < 2.80 GPAs you come across in the MSAR 99.9% of the time have extenuating circumstances are not reflective of the majority.
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A lot of the people who have answered have been through the entire medical school application process, were accepted, are residents/attendings now, or at least familiar with the steps to get there. I don't think you're in a position to be telling people they don't know what an MSAR is, considering nearly everyone is telling you the same thing based on MSAR info and published numbers.
If you really want to use statistics to compare, try looking at https://www.aamc.org/download/321516/data/2012factstable25-3.pdf
Even if you had a 4.0, your statistical odds are less than 10% of getting accepted. Yes, it does happen, like your friend, but you'd have to be a serious gambler to believe that that is in your favor. Most of the people who do get accepted with lower numbers have something that makes up for it, fall into a school's mission-based groups, are URM, or have "something" that sets them apart. Regardless, it's not a guaranteed situation even with your story. If you could raise your score to 27, those odds shoot up to 60%. We didn't say no chance, actually. Most people said several schools have hard cutoffs of 7 in each section or at least a 24. Those would not be schools you should apply to.
However, we all know that once a person makes up their mind, there's little point in discussing further, as everything will go in one ear and out the other. In that case, the only option left is to prove everyone here that you are the statistical anomaly, beat the odds, and that we all are, in fact, very wrong.
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I got it. Is that how you would answer your patients if they have a question? I bet you would make an awesome doc
I've seen plenty of docs do that to patients, and there wasn't a single time where the patient didn't deserve it.
Actually I think you read it wrong. I was not asking about my chances at schools accepting scores of 30+. I know I don't stand a chance at schools which accept 30+s. I was only wondering about my chance at schools that accept lower scores. But whatever you answer, I already understand my chances are very slim and I have already acknowledged that.
A lot of the people who have answered have been through the entire medical school application process, were accepted, are residents/attendings now, or at least familiar with the steps to get there. I don't think you're in a position to be telling people they don't know what an MSAR is, considering nearly everyone is telling you the same thing based on MSAR info and published numbers.
If you really want to use statistics to compare, try looking at https://www.aamc.org/download/321516/data/2012factstable25-3.pdf
Even if you had a 4.0, your statistical odds are less than 10% of getting accepted. Yes, it does happen, like your friend, but you'd have to be a serious gambler to believe that that is in your favor. Most of the people who do get accepted with lower numbers have something that makes up for it, fall into a school's mission-based groups, are URM, or have "something" that sets them apart. Regardless, it's not a guaranteed situation even with your story. If you could raise your score to 27, those odds shoot up to 60%. We didn't say no chance, actually. Most people said several schools have hard cutoffs of 7 in each section or at least a 24. Those would not be schools you should apply to.
However, we all know that once a person makes up their mind, there's little point in discussing further, as everything will go in one ear and out the other. In that case, the only option left is to prove everyone here that you are the statistical anomaly, beat the odds, and that we all are, in fact, very wrong.
I didn't actually mean to question the credibility of other members who answered my post . I wasn't just getting the right answer to my question. Your answer seems to make the perfect sense. Thanks for answering.
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I got it. Is that how you would answer your patients if they have a question? I bet you would make an awesome doc
Depends on how stupid the question is. I may come across harsh but ask anyone here I give fair and honest advice. Questioning my ability to be a good doc because I gave you a little lip makes you look like the ass, not me
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If you're ignorant about the process, ask what the ramifications of a secondary are. Don't suggest what a secondary may mean based on guess work. That's the reason people laughed at your comment.
I don't know where you're getting these statistics from. The average MD score is a 31, where if you discount HBC and Puerto Rico you'll find it to be closer to a 33. Most schools have automatic cut-offs for the MCAT or even subsections. For example, Western University of Health Sciences, an Osteopathic School, will send you an auto rejection if your MCAT is before a 24 or any subsection is below a 6. Most MD schools have a screen at around 27 with no section below 8, but yes, a select few may go lower than that. Fact remains that more than the 23 it'll be the 5 that hurts you the most. I know 5 and 6 seem so close, but in terms of the MCAT, they are not.
Also, we have seen the MSAR. The difference is we understand that medical school is more complex than just those numbers. Many kids with low GPA get in because they did an SMP. Many kids get in with a low MCAT because they live in a special place like New Mexico that has limited applicants and only accepts in-state. Many kids get into schools just because their parent is a donor or they are a legacy of some kind.
At this point all I can tell you is to go ahead and apply. You act like you "know" more than everyone here and don't realize how oblivious you are, so go ahead and see for yourself.
I don't know what you are trying to prove but whatever you answer I have already acknowledged that I understand my chances are slim. (in the previous post). Additionally, I am pretty sure you have not read my post clearly. I had clearly written I have already applied. Gosh!
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Seriously are you trolling?
Dude isn't this forum supposed to get answers to whatever kind of question we have or any other clarifications??
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Dude I told you I understand your explanations and also acknowledge my negligible and slim chances of getting a shot.
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Yes, a main purpose of this forum is to get answers to questions and clarifications. Your question was correctly answered by the first person to respond and affirmed by everyone else
But apparently you just wanted to be lied to?
But apparently you just wanted to be lied to?
