Post-Bacc Classes?

[DoctorSaab]

Hello,

I've been browsing through the forums, and have been reading about "POST-BAC CLASSES."

Would anyone please tell me what this is, and why it supposedly helps your chances to get in dental school?

 

[UBTom]

Post-bac means Post-Bacculaureate Program.

Post-bac programs are mostly for people who already have a Bachelor's Degree but needed to take additional courses to satisfy the requirements for applying to graduate or professional school.

For example, if you already graduated with a B.S. degree in say Music, but never took courses required for medical/dental school (1 year of Calculus, 1 year of Organic Chemistry with Lab, 1 year of Inorganic Chem with lab, 1 year of Biology, 1 year of Physics, and 1 year of College English), then you will have to enroll in a Post-Bacc program to take those courses before you can apply to dental/med school.

HTH!

 

[Yah-E]

or...

You've earned your B.S. and only graduated with a 2.5 cumulative GPA and you need a remedial opportunity to demonstrate that you're actually brighter than that.

Post-Bac. programs in the U.S. are now getting more attention from second-time applicants as well as sub-par applicants. Some Post-bac. programs will go as far as insuring you a seat in the next entering class to their medical or dental school AND/OR guarantee med or dent school interviews if you do well in their program .

Post-Bac. programs initiated originally with the medical schools, creating a opportunity for those applicants that weren't successful with their first application. With a heavy rigorous basic science curriculum, Post-Bac. students are able to take medical school courses with the medical students.

The idea here is if you can show that you can do well (>80%) in these medical school courses in the Post-Bac. program, then you will have shown that you can handle the rigorous curriculum of medical school.

Dental schools, I would say, just in the last 5 years starting to recommend sub-standard applicants to look into these Post-Bac. programs in leu to just taking additional upper division science courses to enhance your cumulative B.S/B.A. GPA. As mentioned earlier, some dental schools now has their own Post-Bac. programs for you to apply to!

Admissions to these Post-Bac. programs are getting more and more competitive due to the fact that more applicants are finding out about them. To apply to these Post-Bac. programs, you'll need 3 letters of recommendation, official DAT or MCAT scores, in addition to earn an interview invitation with your application. In another words, they're just like applying to dental and medical schools!

Also another thing, the tuition for these programs are expensive! They range from $23,000-$30,000/year (since most of them are at a private school).

Bottom line, if you have a non-science degree or you have a low cumulative GPA and you would like to go to a med or dent school, then a Post-Bac. program will do you wonders (if you earn >80% in all your Post-Bac. classes and if you get into a Post-Bac. program)

 

[groundhog]

One exception to that "expensive note of caution" is if you have a great GPA as a non-science major and have taken few if any of the physical science pre-reqs, some public universities will let you matriculate and qualify for financial aid as a post bac student in order to qualify for entrance into med/dental school.

 

[dragonj]

i am a post bac student and i'm at georgia state university which doesn't have competition to get into the program and the tuition is just $1700 a semester for in state residents. so any people out there who need to booster their grades or get their pre-reqs done, i recommend going to your state school.