Post-Acceptance Grades

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ishr

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Does anyone know what the general requirements are? What sort of grades you have to maintain? Is it common for someone to have their acceptance revoked due to falling grades? How low do your grades have to go?
 
I've heard a D in any class will put you on automatic suspension/review at some schools. I don't know the severity of this review or what it takes to get off it, though. I'd also imagine getting straight C's after being accepted might look a little strange too, though I don't know if that would do anything.
 
I'd say a good rule of thumb is that you want to maintain your pre-acceptance performance. Do that, and everything will be fine. Realistically, you could probably pull a C or two without raising any eyebrows, but I wouldn't push it.
 
Like Milkman said, maintain your grades. You have done it thus far, it should not be hard since you have been doing it for so long.
 
UNMorBUST said:
Like Milkman said, maintain your grades. You have done it thus far, it should not be hard since you have been doing it for so long.
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Yes, except that some of us have been missing classes over and over for interviews and it's weighing on our grades.
 
copperfrog09 said:
Yes, except that some of us have been missing classes over and over for interviews and it's weighing on our grades.
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Ditto. I really hope this is the only time I ever have to apply, because my GPA will be somewhat lower after this semester; I've kept my grades reasonably strong, but it's just not possible to get better than a B in my molecular bio class when you've missed six days of lecture and two labs.
 
Keona said:
My letter says maintain your current GPA
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You are kidding me right! I submit my AMCAS before spring quarter grades came out, because I knew my GPA was gonna drop... and it did, during Spring Quarter...

By the way, WHY are you guys taking hard classes this quarter/semester. I purposefully am taking easier classes, so I do not get screwed over by missing class because of interviews...
 
funkydrmonkey said:
You are kidding me right! I submit my AMCAS before spring quarter grades came out, because I knew my GPA was gonna drop... and it did, during Spring Quarter...

By the way, WHY are you guys taking hard classes this quarter/semester. I purposefully am taking easier classes, so I do not get screwed over by missing class because of interviews...
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Because I need to graduate lol. My school only offers biochem and cell bio in the fall semester..
 
I'll probably only take easy classes next semester. Scheduling conflicts are making it pretty much impossible for me to finish my double major (I don't know what idiot is in charge of scheduling), so if I drop down to just Chem, I'm one class short of graduation.
 
Have some pride in yourself and finish strong. I like having Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa on my resume. I started college strong and I finished college strong - why allow yourself to do second rate work just because you got accepted. It reminds me of the good looking woman who starts turning into a fat slob as soon as the marriage ceremony is over. Have some self respect. It is pathetic that the OP even has to ask this question.
 
searun said:
Have some pride in yourself and finish strong. I like having Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa on my resume. I started college strong and I finished college strong - why allow yourself to do second rate work just because you got accepted. It reminds me of the good looking woman who starts turning into a fat slob as soon as the marriage ceremony is over. Have some self respect. It is pathetic that the OP even has to ask this question.
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While Im sure that there are some premeds out there who might think about purposefully slacking after an acceptance, I dont think that the OP, or the majority of others on this forum are purposefully thinking of not working hard their senior year. I think this is just typical premed neuroticism. We are doing our best as usual, its just that the "what if" factor always haunts us. "What if, by chance I do get a B or C, etc my spring semester? Will I still get admitted to med school?" I feel that that is a legitimate question. Afterall, we arent perfect and there's always that small chance that we could do poorly for once.
 
I've always done well in school, but right now, I'm taking a graduate-level organic synthesis class that I'm really struggling in. Most of the other students are 1st-year graduate students in the chemistry department, with research interests in synthesis and me, having just finished my undergraduate OChem class last year, feel like I'm no match for these people. On the midterm, the average was ~80, the lowest score was ~50, and I got ~60. Should I consider withdrawing from this class?
 
searun said:
Have some pride in yourself and finish strong. I like having Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa on my resume. I started college strong and I finished college strong - why allow yourself to do second rate work just because you got accepted. It reminds me of the good looking woman who starts turning into a fat slob as soon as the marriage ceremony is over. Have some self respect. It is pathetic that the OP even has to ask this question.
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What has this to do with self-respect? It has only to do with maximizing one's free time and enjoyment before medical school starts. Damn right I'll drop down to second-rate work the second it's acceptable, when else in my life am I going to have that opportunity? Honestly, if a grade is meaningless, why bust one's ass for an 'A' instead of cruising to a 'B'?
 
Retsage said:
What has this to do with self-respect? It has only to do with maximizing one's free time and enjoyment before medical school starts. Damn right I'll drop down to second-rate work the second it's acceptable, when else in my life am I going to have that opportunity? Honestly, if a grade is meaningless, why bust one's ass for an 'A' instead of cruising to a 'B'?
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You reveal yourself as a typical grade grubbing premed with no intrinsic intellectual interest in learning. Sad but common, unfortunately. What will motivate you in medical school, the prospect of buying an expensive car someday? Oh, wait, you want to help people.
 
searun said:
You reveal yourself as a typical grade grubbing premed with no intrinsic intellectual interest in learning. Sad but common, unfortunately. What will motivate you in medical school, the prospect of buying an expensive car someday? Oh, wait, you want to help people.
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I call BS. You can learn just fine without excelling in a class. Being able to write out the mechanism for osmium tetroxide oxidation doesn't mean you really understand the key concepts of organic chemistry.
 
MilkmanAl said:
I call BS. You can learn just fine without excelling in a class. Being able to write out the mechanism for osmium tetroxide oxidation doesn't mean you really understand the key concepts of organic chemistry.
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Milkman, you seem a little defensive about getting all of those B's in college. There is nothing wrong with a B or even a few of those Gentleman's C's as you well know. You made it to med school. Just do the best you can. Make the effort. Don't embarass yourself to the point where you are worried about getting an acceptance to med school rescinded. That is absurd.
 
I took a research focused fall semester because I thought I might have to go on a lot of interviews. Turns out I only have two interviews, neither of which require missing more than a day of lectures. Oh well, at least research is more fun than sitting in pchem lecture.
 
Milkman, you seem a little defensive about getting all of those B's in college.
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Yes, clearly. I'm so defensive that I'm actually going to point out that they were mostly C's and C+'s bringing my GPA down. 😉

Maybe you'd be better served arguing against the point I made than making an ad hominem attack?
 
searun said:
You reveal yourself as a typical grade grubbing premed with no intrinsic intellectual interest in learning. Sad but common, unfortunately. What will motivate you in medical school, the prospect of buying an expensive car someday? Oh, wait, you want to help people.
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Excellent diagnosis, Doctor. Please, continue to psychoanalyze me based on little more than nothing. Seriously, that was amazing. You totally got me. Completely. 100% true! Every word of it. How did you figure me out so completely? Are you clairvoyant? Omniscient? The Antichrist? John Edward?

...Mom?

:laugh:

I woke up with a cough this morning too, can you diagnose that for me over the Internet as well? Is it cancer? Oh God, it's cancer, isn't it?

A tad obnoxious, a tad pretentious, a tad judgmental, and a whole lot of self-righteous. How silly.
 
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I hear you all about keeping the grades during interviews. My GPA looks like it may suffer a little, but I'm trying to get it back up. Calc II may defeat me, though, because this is the first time I've had Calc since Calc BC in high school seven years ago. (What was I thinking?)

I've got a related question: How obligated do you think we are to take the classes that we listed on the AMCAS for this year?

I put genetics on my AMCAS application for next spring, but now I see that it conflicts with another class that I need to graduate. I also recently found out that another class I've already taken can fulfill the graduation requirement that I was going to fill with genetics. Are med schools going to have heartburn if I drop it? I'll still be fulltime.

Will it hurt me at schools where my admission decision is pending if I call and tell them that I'm not going to take a class that was on my AMCAS?

What say you all?
 
searun said:
Have some pride in yourself and finish strong. I like having Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa on my resume. I started college strong and I finished college strong - why allow yourself to do second rate work just because you got accepted. It reminds me of the good looking woman who starts turning into a fat slob as soon as the marriage ceremony is over. Have some self respect. It is pathetic that the OP even has to ask this question.
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We werent all poly sci majors like you, some of us actually have to take difficult classes that are almost impossible to get As in because the mean on the midterm is 20/100 in an uncurved class required for the major.
 
I'm on searun's side here. Learn for learning's sake, for god's sake. Let's not forget what we're paying for here... an education, not just a degree. If you have this mindset, I'm sure your grades aren't going to suffer too badly.
 
searun said:
You reveal yourself as a typical grade grubbing premed with no intrinsic intellectual interest in learning. Sad but common, unfortunately. What will motivate you in medical school, the prospect of buying an expensive car someday? Oh, wait, you want to help people.
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Lame. interest in learning does not correlate to getting A's, which also take much more time and effort than "cruising" to a B. Let's be honest. It's much harder to get motivated about material when you already see the light at the end of the tunnel. People do it in high school, people do it in college, its called senioritis. Don't pretend pre-meds have been getting A's all these years only because of intrinsic intellectual interest. Many people pushed themselves harder for a reason, and it was to better their chances of getting into med school.
 
-
Don't be so self-righteous.
 
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funkydrmonkey said:
You are kidding me right! I submit my AMCAS before spring quarter grades came out, because I knew my GPA was gonna drop... and it did, during Spring Quarter...

By the way, WHY are you guys taking hard classes this quarter/semester. I purposefully am taking easier classes, so I do not get screwed over by missing class because of interviews...
Click to expand...
Graduation requirements have us do so. I have to take credits to fulfill my biochemistry major. That means this semester I take pchem lab, inorganic chemistry (chem elective) and cell biology. Next semester I will be taking nucleic acid biochemistry and immunobiology. Senior year isn't a "walk in the park." We just make it seem that way because we don't care anymore.
 
MadEvans said:
I'm on searun's side here. Learn for learning's sake, for god's sake. Let's not forget what we're paying for here... an education, not just a degree. If you have this mindset, I'm sure your grades aren't going to suffer too badly.
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I agree that we should continue learning for learning's sake, but I haven't read any posts on this thread that suggest that anyone has thrown in the towel on learning for learnings sake. I disagree with you that anyone here is lazy, or just a grade grubbing pre-med.

I value learning as much as anybody, and I have a pretty good GPA (I hope to graduate summa cum laude). I realize as well that this is due both to hard work AND good fortune. There are pursuits just as rewarding, or perhaps more so, than college courses. I have an 18 month old daughter, that I only see for a few minutes before I head to school because I work every evening and have school every morning. So when it comes down to getting an A in Calc II or putting down my homework for a few minutes to play with my daughter, can you blame me for playing with her? Especially now that I've been accepted to medical school.

If academics are the only rewarding pursuit for someone, then perhaps academia would be a better career than medicine for that person. Doctors are more than just smart.
 
Another point is that I know I am not the only one who intentionally shuffled the extremely difficult courses to senior year to avoid having them on my transcript when AMCAS saw it and thus am going through a hard time now. Was it because I dont like to learn? Nope, I just wanted to get into med school more than take hard classses at the normal times in Jr year.
 
chessknt87 said:
Another point is that I know I am not the only one who intentionally shuffled the extremely difficult courses to senior year to avoid having them on my transcript when AMCAS saw it and thus am going through a hard time now. Was it because I dont like to learn? Nope, I just wanted to get into med school more than take hard classses at the normal times in Jr year.
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seeing as how you got into UCSD, I can't really blame you, it sure as heck worked out. I did the exact opposite of what you did. I took the hardest courses in my freshman and sophomore years (genchem, ochem, ochem2, ochemlab, achem, biochem1, biochem2, physio, biostat, physics, bio1, bio2, and a few other classes all in the first 2 yrs). gpa took a hit though.

now in my senior year, I don't really have much courses left that I HAVE to take, other than 3 humanities courses for graduation requirements and senior thesis.
 
For my acceptances, I've been told to "pass" every class (i.e. get at least a C).

SCORE!
 
Bump... I might be getting 2 C's and I just got accepted to an md med school ><... how does this work.. should i assume im in? How should I go about making sure i don't get rejected the day before matriculation... Any advice is appreciated.
 
The school may let those two C's slide, or they may ask for an explanation. If so, play up the "I missed so much class due to interviews" line.
 
mine says "complete degree program as you outlined" I will have to send an email to one of the deans because I had a course conflict with a required course and they offered an elective that I was much more interested in taking...

this semester though is a mess- I had emergency surgery last week and so I will be getting an incomplete for 3 of my 5 classes (the other two were already complete)... I am going to have to finish those 3 courses in January and then I can get a grade- but the school I got into just wants a final transcript not a fall and spring transcript.
 
Mine said "This is contingent upon the satisfactory completion of all admission requirements prior to date {sept 2009}". I already completed their requirements, so I just have to... relax?

Who am I kidding? I am always striving to make top marks. It means even if it is hopeless, I am still working hard. Which is the case for my anthropology grade...
 
Vadd0 said:
Mine said "This is contingent upon the satisfactory completion of all admission requirements prior to date {sept 2009}". I already completed their requirements, so I just have to... relax?

Who am I kidding? I am always striving to make top marks. It means even if it is hopeless, I am still working hard. Which is the case for my anthropology grade...
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Excellent and commendable. You will finish your undergrad career strong, unlike the various slackers who have posted on this thread!
 
ishr said:
Does anyone know what the general requirements are? What sort of grades you have to maintain? Is it common for someone to have their acceptance revoked due to falling grades? How low do your grades have to go?
Click to expand...

Your acceptance letter should outline what requirements you still need to meet to matriculate in terms of grades. Most say just pass.
 
searun said:
It is pathetic that the OP even has to ask this question.
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You're wrong. It's a completely reasonable question to ask when you fear that your grades will suffer from missing many lectures while still putting in the same amount of work ("finishing strong") or even working harder than normal.

I, too, am wondering what the policy is at most med schools because I think my grades may have taken a hit this semester...from missing class, NOT from doing "second rate work." You should recognize the difference before you start accusing people of being a "typical grade grubbing premed with no intrinsic intellectual interest in learning"
 
JDOC13 said:
You're wrong. It's a completely reasonable question to ask when you fear that your grades will suffer from missing many lectures while still putting in the same amount of work ("finishing strong") or even working harder than normal.

I, too, am wondering what the policy is at most med schools because I think my grades may have taken a hit this semester...from missing class, NOT from doing "second rate work." You should recognize the difference before you start accusing people of being a "typical grade grubbing premed with no intrinsic intellectual interest in learning"
Click to expand...

I know the feeling...the fact that so few profs are accommodating to seniors going on interviews has been a real problem for me this semester. I've already had to bail out of two (!) classes because of the fact that various professors simply would not allow me to take exams scheduled for my interview days at an alternate time. I warned them well in advance and all, even talked to deans who tried to help me - but still, no dice.

I also agree with all the people who made the point that getting As at most colleges is more about "playing the game" than actually learning anything. I've taken classes where I've only managed to finish with a B despite working like a dog and feeling like I knew the material stone cold, and I've taken classes where I received an A and felt like I'd barely learned anything.

As Mark Twain put it, "I never let my schooling get in the way of my education."
 
searun said:
Excellent and commendable. You will finish your undergrad career strong, unlike the various slackers who have posted on this thread!
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Your level of obnoxiousness is simply stunning, but I do thank my lucky stars that ignorance such as yours can be spotted a mile away, and luckily avoided. I mean, you do realize that there are people that probably have more to do with their life than just studying? (ie..kids, family, work, etc...) I mean, obviously we all know that it takes a certain amount of hard work and determination to go through the med school process, but contrary to your narrow point of view, there is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting a teeny weeny tintsy 5 or so month chill period.

How dare you imply I (or anyone else) is a slacker w/o even knowing what the situation is, or even knowing the person themselves! For myself personally, I have family members that I support financially, my own bills to pay, and the stress of my job is beyond astounding -- just yesterday, I had to deal with, among other things, a divorced mother who's getting kicked out of her house...and yes, after going through all that, it would've been very nice to not have to go to class until 11:30pm and get home at 12:30am. I've made my decisions, I'm very proud of them, and I'm most proud of my own accomplishments in life (hey, it got me into med school!), so it's not like I'm asking anyone to feel sorry for me. But excuse me for wanting some time off before the rigor that med school is going to present. I'm just really amazed that anyone could be so short-sighted as to criticize another person (who may have a hell of a lot going on) for wanting a little break without knowing ANYTHING about the person.

I love it, a future doctor that makes judgement calls with little to no idea what the hell he/she's talking about.

Bite me.
 
searun said:
Excellent and commendable. You will finish your undergrad career strong, unlike the various slackers who have posted on this thread!
Click to expand...

while others have said it more eloquently, I shall say it in the way someone with a SDN username such as schoolsucks would say it:

Go **** yourself.
 
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