MD Non-traditional student with no science course taken at a 4 yr university

[koolsmn]

Hey guys,
I'm a non-traditional student hoping to get into medical school.
In a nutshell here are my stats/experiences
- Came to America alone at the age of 15 (did receive financial assistance from my parents who continued to stay in Korea, with added income coming from my working various retail jobs)
- Went to University of Washington and graduated with a degree in Economics
- Worked as a banker for 2 years and decided to go to medical school
- Attended community college while working 25+ hours at the bank and took all of the prerequisites up to Organic Chem
- According to AMCAS's calculation my total GPA is 3.49 (Undergrad GPA was 3.27 and my GPA while taking prereqs @ CC was 4.0 on all of my classes)
- 32 MCAT (11/10/11)
- Volunteered at the hospital for 200+ hrs at the ICU help desk assisting patients and their family members
- 45 hrs of Physician shadowing at the local clinic
- Taught intro level Korean at the local community center for three months
- Good letter of recommendations from 4 science professors

So the only thing that has been a real concern for me is that I've taken all of my prerequisites at a community college instead of going back to a 4 yr university. I originally planned on going back to UW as a post bac but I soon realized that taking one chemistry class would cost me $1700 which was more than enough for me to take the whole chem series at the community college. So my thought process at the time was that I would make up for it on my MCAT and thus hoping to prove that the institution that I received my education from does not define how knowledgeable I am in the relevant subjects. I was wondering if my community college background would significantly hinder my chances of getting into medical school and whether I should go back to a 4 yr university to retake some of the upper level sciences to prove to them that I could manage the workload at a much more rigorous setting. Any insights would be appreciated. Thanks for taking the time to read this!

P.S. @LizzyM I've read many of your comments on various threads and would actually love to get an opinion from you on this matter. Thank you!

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[LizzyM]

Although this forum gets some traffic, you might be better off asking on the non-traditional forum if any non-traditional applicant has been admitted or been shunned (no interviews) after doing the entire post-bac at a CC. I really have no idea what the likelihood of admission is for someone like yourself.

 

[koolsmn]

Thanks!!! I'll try that!

 

[Promethean]

I wouldn't worry so much about the community college credits. The rest of your application seems pretty solid. Adcoms understand that someone who already has an undergrad degree isn't necessarily going to do post-bacc work at the most expensive university they can find. And the fact that you scored well on the MCAT demonstrates that you must have been paying attention in those courses, and that they were teaching something.

If you apply to a nice range of schools, you are going to get in.

Source: I am also nontrad, unrelated degree from many years ago. Then nursing school and a few years of being an RN. Only in the last two years have I done pre-reqs at a CC. Did well on MCAT, good ECs, good GPA. But nothing as cool as teaching Korean. I got a lot of interest from schools that I would have thought were out of reach for me, and they didn't seem to mind the CC credits. Ultimately decided to focus on DO schools, and was promptly interviewed and admitted.

Some schools will not like the CC credits, but those schools tend to mention that on their websites. Don't apply to those few.

 

[koolsmn]

Thanks Promethean! I really appreciate you sharing your experience with me.