I am currently a sophomore majoring in Biology. My plan is to apply to med school after taking a gap year to medical school. I wanted to know what some people thought about what my chances are applying and being accepted in. I currently have been to three different schools. This time I ended up at a school that really worked for me. I am currently holding an approximate 3.15 gpa and am working hard to bring this up. I have taken 70 credits (including this semester) and I have not taken the MCAT yet. I am taking a course at my university that helps pre-med students with their personal essays and things like that, (interview process, applying, research, etc...) I was wondering what some people thought my chances were of bringing my gpa up to where it needs to be by the time I apply, Please help. Thank you
Need some reassurance
- Thread starter suchomski
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Your chances depend on how strong your grades are from this time forward. We cannot judge your level of motivation to excel and likelihood for success; only you can do that. But SDNers in a worse position than yours have done it.
If you can get a 4.0 for the next 50 hours, at the end of senior year you would have a ~3.5 cGPA. With a strong MCAT score (say 33+) and the steep upward grade trend, you might get an acceptance to an MD school (where the acceptee averages are cGPA 3.67/MCAT 31.1).
If you plan on a fifth college year before applying and get the same 4.0 throughout, your cGPA would be a more competitive 3.6 for MD schools.
If your grades are not near-perfect, you still have the option of doing additional postbac work or a Special Masters Program after graduation to make you more competitive for MD schools, provided your grades are excellent in those programs.
If you include DO med schools in your plans, your chances are much higher, as your cGPA has a better chance of being near their matriculant average of 3.47. Average MCAT is 26.49. Further, DO med schools have a grade forgiveness policy where they only count the most recent grade if you retake a low grade, provided the credit hours are the same or greater (need not be retaken at the same school or have an identical course title), which would make it easier to repair whatever is dragging your GPA down right now.
