"Rigor of undergraduate major"?!

[poshdoctor]

UCLA is my dream dental school, I currently have a 3.6 Science GPA so I think I'm on the right track

HOWEVER.....I was reading on their website that the admissions committee take the "rigor of undergraduate major" in consideration.

Do you think I'll lose points because I am a French Major & Public Health Minor?

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[AwesomeTeeth]

UCLA is my dream dental school, I currently have a 3.6 Science GPA so I think I'm on the right track

HOWEVER.....I was reading on their website that the admissions committee take the "rigor of undergraduate major" in consideration.

Do you think I'll lose points because I am a French Major & Public Health Minor?

Maybe......did you just take the prereqs for dental school? If you just did the minimum, I would think that would look a little weak. I would take some upper level biology like biochem and anatomy to strengthen your app. Then do well on the DAT and get some volunteer/shadowing in.

 

[poshdoctor]

Maybe......did you just take the prereqs for dental school? If you just did the minimum, I would think that would look a little weak. I would take some upper level biology like biochem and anatomy to strengthen your app. Then do well on the DAT and get some volunteer/shadowing in.

ugh....I'm planning on taking microbio, histology, and some ceramics classes as well as shadowing this summer.....

 

[dentalWorks]

UCLA is my dream dental school, I currently have a 3.6 Science GPA so I think I'm on the right track

HOWEVER.....I was reading on their website that the admissions committee take the "rigor of undergraduate major" in consideration.

Do you think I'll lose points because I am a French Major & Public Health Minor?

You can do any major, and if you wanna make urself just as competitive (major-wise) as the typical biology-major applicant.... take upper level biology courses and do well. Things like Biochemistry, Physiology, Microbiology, Histology, Anatomy, and a few others look very attractive especially when they are accompanied with a high mark IRRESPECTIVE of major

 

[zzyyfff]

if you are passionate about and do well in every discipline you associate yourself with, i don't think you can go wrong. i focused on information technology and electronic art/music as an undergrad and did very well this past admissions cycle. i think that it's extremely important to care deeply about whatever you are studying.

 

[doc toothache]

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=813958

 

[Maygyver]

Dental school is going to be really heavy on science classes, so I would suggest trying to fit some busy quarters in to show that you can handle multiple science classes. It's a lot tougher to do well when you have a bunch of science courses together. With that said, I think that as long as you didn't breeze through with really easy courses, then it shouldn't be too bad, but I would give them a call to see what they say.

 

[321931]

UCLA is my dream dental school, I currently have a 3.6 Science GPA so I think I'm on the right track

HOWEVER.....I was reading on their website that the admissions committee take the "rigor of undergraduate major" in consideration.

Do you think I'll lose points because I am a French Major & Public Health Minor?

I'm assuming if you kill the dat (23-24+ especially in the TS), it will make up for your alternate major which may seem very uncompetitive in the applicant pool of "biochemistry, chemistry, and various biologies."

Edit: And yes, I know majors don't really matter for Dental Admissions; however, we are talking about UCLA which is extremely competitive. If it was any other Dental School that wasn't as competitive, I would say you would not lose points.

 

[Maygyver]

Actually, I just assumed you were in-state. Are you out of state?

 

[allDAT]

How serious are you about UCLA?

I can tell you this, UCLA is one of the hardest dental schools in the country to gain acceptance to. If you're not a California resident, your chances are slim (they only interviewed 20 out-of-state applicants in 2010 and you can bet that the selected students represented the upper 5% of applicants - statistically speaking). You may be one of the 20 to be selected, but the odds are stacked against you.

If you are a CA resident, I would recommend majoring in a biological science, weither that be general biology all the way to bioinformatics or biochemical engineering.

You should also get as much research experience as possible. Why? UCLA's dental school is famous for being on the forefront of oral-health research. It's not the most heavily funded NIH school in the country (that title went to UCSF in 2010), but it is considered a top contender. What does this mean? It means that the admissions committee will be looking for candidates who bring more to the table than just grades.

A 3.6 science GPA is very strong for almost every dental school, but you'll want to bring that up for UCLA (their 2010 average was 3.67) and you won't find too many students gain acceptance that fall .2 - .4 points bellow their 3.67. Additionally, I would not be surprised if their average science GPA go to 3.7 next cycle.

A quick note - dental schools do not discriminate between majors. All that they want to see is 1) the pre-requisites and 2) upper-division success. However, as the applicant pool becomes more competitive, we may see an even steeper decline in the number of non-traditional students accepted (non-science majors). If you're passionate about dentistry and a non-science field of study, you can cover all your bases by getting a double major.