pre-dental post-bac

[Mackchops]

Hey guys,

I posted something like this in the Post-Bac forum but was told that I should probably try asking my question on this thread. So, I'm curious if there are any of you out there who REALLY wanted to go to Dental School but A) didn't have stellar grades (I'm at about a 2.9) and B) had almost no pre-dent reqs (I have intro bio and physics I). I've recently decided that I want to become a dentist (I work well with my hands, like children, and want to be afforded the lifestyle that I choose... among other reasons) instead of the lawyer my parents set me out to be, but I need to do post-bac work. I would like to go to a big program like Columbia because I work well with structure and feel that the LORs I could get would be well worth it. But I'm still so unsure about so many things! Are there any schools out there with traditionally pre-dent programs? Is it worth the money to go to a brand-name school or should I just take classes on my own?? And do I even stand a chance of getting in anywhere (pre-med OR Dental School) with my grades??? I assume that I will do well on the DATs as I'm pretty talented in the sciences and test fairly well (received a 1460 on the SAT) but I really don't know what I should do, where I should go, or even who I should ask for advice!? Sorry, this was longer than I anticipated but I would really appreciate any advice you could give me!

Thanks much,
Mack

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[UBTom]

While I was an undergrad at Columbia, many of my classmates in the premed/predent prereq classes were post-bacs-- MBAs, JDs, etc. coming back to school to fulfill the prereqs so they can apply to med/dent school.

I liked all the pre-med/pre-dent classes at Columbia except GenChem-- I don't know if things has changed since then, but when I went through it, the department chairman (Dr. Leonard Fine) made us use a preliminary edition of his textbook and it was HORRIBLE (and I don't know if the finished edition would be significantly better!). I had to learn GenChem pretty much on my own.

Other than that, I had a blast in all the other pre-med/dent classes (Calculus, Physics, Bio, Orgo and English).

I definitely highly recommend the Columbia postbac program if you can get into it.

 

[KrebsPsycho]

Mackchops,
Your 2.9 GPA is not really bad. Since you still have a lot of predental courses to take, you can bring your GPA above 3.3 with some A's and some B's in your required courses (of course, the more A's the better). You don't have to go to a well-known school for your predental courses. A lot of people in this forum including myself go to a small 4-year college and still get accepted by various dental schools. Good luck!

 

[PBR95]

Mackchops,

I was in your exact situation about 2 years ago. I enrolled in a big name post-bacc (Northwestern), got pretty solid grades and good DAT's. Now I have 4 acceptances! One note of caution: the AADSAS averages all undergrad grades so my GPA still looks pretty low. If you don't differentiate your bacch from post-bacc some schools may reject you flat out. On the other hand, I found that schools tend to like the more mature students who come to dentistry later in life. They believe we are more committed to school and the profession, which I would agree with.

Good Luck!

 

[Mackchops]

PBR, I just PMed you