Retake class okay?

You can retake any class you want to. I know people who have retaken Gen Chem. An advisor at the local pharmacy school told us unless you got a D, you don't necessarily have to worry about retaking. They want to see that you can get it right the first time around. I got a C- in Gen Chem I. I asked her if I should retake and she said no. Just depends I guess.

 

fujitsux,

Yes, you can retake any class at a community college. Just make sure it is transferable. I actually think it's better to retake the classes that you did poorly in, especially if you have a lot of C's. As for the GPA calculation, I know that PharmCAS calculates your overall gpa, meaning they'll include the classes you took for your degree and also the classes taken from other colleges (including retaken courses). Some schools will use your overall gpa while there are others that will take the higher grades (if retaken...which is even better). So it just depends on the school. Hope this helps!

 

I would not recommend you take it at CC if you are already university student. It will not look good that way. In addition, you can always take higher lvl chemistry and do well on them. That looks much better in your transcript.

 

fujitsux,

I think transferable classes are the ones that are equivalent to the classes taken at a university. There should be a description of the class at your community college that tells you if it's transferable to university level or not. You can also try www.assist.org and check if it's transferable. If you still can't find out somehow, you can ask the college counselor or call the pharm school that you plan to apply to and ask if they accept that course. I actually have retaken a few science courses (gen. chem and bio) over at a community college after getting my B.S. and they were accepted and included in my overall gpa by PharmCAS. So no worries. Just make sure they are the right classes. Also, do very well in them to show good improvement.

 

Most pharmd schools calculate a cumulative gpa (overall) and a pre-req gpa (usually sci/math), so padding your gpa will help your overall but it won't help your sci/math gpa. Most schools will heavily weigh the sci/math gpa over your cumulative, but then again, that depends on the school you are applying to. You need to calculate and see what types of improvements to your gpa if you were to pad it or if you were to retake classes.

 

You can improve your overall gpa by taking a bunch of humanities or social sciences classes. A lot of pharm schools require them anyway. To improve your sci/math gpa, you can just retake the ones you did poorly in b4 or take some new upper division courses (like genetics, biochem, etc.). As long as you show a positive trend in your grades, your chances will be better.