Taking courses elective pass/fail

[bwc]

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How do dental schools view taking a course elective pass/fail (if a course is mandatory credit/no credit or satisfactory/unsatisfactory, that's a different story) as a pre-dental student? They only state that prerequisites cannot be taken pass/fail, but I have been hearing that you are implicitly required to take every course for a grade, regardless of how irrelevant it is to your major or dental school. I have heard the following argument:

With dental schools being very competitive, they would look for any reason they can to rule out your application. Even though pass/fail courses don't affect your GPA, dental schools can look at your P's as C's unless you ask your school's registrar to uncover your actual letter grades on your transcript.

 

[Kittenz]

How do dental schools view taking a course elective pass/fail (if a course is mandatory credit/no credit or satisfactory/unsatisfactory, that's a different story) as a pre-dental student? They only state that prerequisites cannot be taken pass/fail, but I have been hearing that you are implicitly required to take every course for a grade, regardless of how irrelevant it is to your major or dental school. I have heard the following argument:

With dental schools being very competitive, they would look for any reason they can to rule out your application. Even though pass/fail courses don't affect your GPA, dental schools can look at your P's as C's unless you ask your school's registrar to uncover your actual letter grades on your transcript.

That argument is silly. All of the courses that are non-prereqs are up to you to take how you want to take. If you have the option to take an elective course for P/F, then go for it. It's just generally better to take electives for a grade because they're usually easier and will boost your overall GPA.

 

[bwc]

It's just generally better to take electives for a grade because they're usually easier and will boost your overall GPA.

I'm not talking about just taking some random blow off elective. For example, I'm interested in a computer science course at my school, but I'm worried that my GPA could take a hit if I took it for a grade. It's the the third class that computer science majors take, and the weaker students from the prerequisite courses do not continue into it. I am interested in the subject, but am worried about the competition.