The Ideal Dental School Candidate

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Longcatislong

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What kind of person is the ideal dental school applicant/candidate? In particular, I'm wondering to what extent dentist shadowing, community service and holding jobs while in school matter in admissions? Let's say I have stellar grades and a DAT score, but only about 25-50hrs of shadowing and pretty mediocre community involvement, would that be a huge set back in my dental school applications?

I'm asking because it just seems that on this message board, and on the predents site, everyone seems to be amazingly well-rounded applicants (i.e, presidents of their universities pre-dental society, grads w/ honors, 1000+ community service and shadowing hours), are websites like this representative of ALL applicants? Do "normal" people who have a minimal number of shadowing hours and pretty low-key extracurriculars get in as well, (let's say they have a 3.5+ gpa)?

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Interview plays a lot into it. You can have somebody with a stellar DAT, GPA and all those extracurricular activities but is just socially awkward. That is the exact description of somebody at one of my interviews who got a 30 on his DATs.
 
I feel like the numbers are very important for getting you an interview. Yes you need to have some community involvement and shadowing experience to show that you have actually looked into the career and you also help out around the community, but the numbers are what are going to get you interviews. Also, community involvement and ECs are important for your interview so that you have something to talk about. I had very few hours of community service, but a lot of dental related experience. Some of it is just being able to sell yourself. Obviously not everyone is super-candidate, but that's why there's more than one seat. In the end, they want a student who will succeed in school and not drop out, so how well you did in school is very important. It sounds like you are pretty set so far, just work on doing interesting things (that interest you, not just to fill an application) for you to talk about during your interview. Good luck!
 
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What kind of person is the ideal dental school applicant/candidate? In particular, I'm wondering to what extent dentist shadowing, community service and holding jobs while in school matter in admissions? Let's say I have stellar grades and a DAT score, but only about 25-50hrs of shadowing and pretty mediocre community involvement, would that be a huge set back in my dental school applications?

I'm asking because it just seems that on this message board, and on the predents site, everyone seems to be amazingly well-rounded applicants (i.e, presidents of their universities pre-dental society, grads w/ honors, 1000+ community service and shadowing hours), are websites like this representative of ALL applicants? Do "normal" people who have a minimal number of shadowing hours and pretty low-key extracurriculars get in as well, (let's say they have a 3.5+ gpa)?

There are SOOOO many factors thats.... its simply impossible to come up with 1 safe answer to satisfy all 59 dental schools.

There is a general trend tho, those with competitive GPAs and DATs tend to have an easier time landing interviews.... HOWEVER you can play things in your favor if your numbers aren't exactly within the correct range..

Here is what I mean. You can be a guy with a 3.7 GPA, 3.7 sGPA, and 22DAT (great numbers), but you've made the silly mistake of only applying to your state school. Incidentally, you didn't get accepted, there were too many qualified applicants this cycle and they decided to go with others.

On the other hand, you can be a guy with a 3.3 GPA, 3.3 sGPA, and 19 DAT ("okay" numbers, lower than average), but you applied wit 15+ schools..... This guy has a better chance of getting in than the previous guy.

Like previous posters suggested, GPA+DAT are the most important criteria. Shadowing is HIGHLY recommended, and I think it can lead to rejections after the interview because you didn't have a solid answer for "why do you want to be a dentist".... its so hard to answer this without any shadowing / observation experience.... I think shadowing hours between 50-150 is ideal, and actually some schools have shadowing requirements (like 50, 100, and even one has 150 ~ forgot which)

As far as volunteering / community involvement goes.... I don't think anyone knows exactly how much this plays. I do know though that pretty much EVERY dental school highly recommends its applicants to have been involved with helping their community. And I've never seen actual required hours. I had approx 300-350 volunteering hours between various activities, and it felt like it was okay for me. Some will have alot more, others alot less.

Ya know, here is a kicker. If you click under any one of us's names, where it says "Pre-Dental".... your going to get a list of ALL the pre-dental students oh SDN. There are approx 4800 members. Thats about40% of the applicant pool. I am assuming 1/2 of these 4800 have accounts on pre-dents.com so.... pre-dents isn't the most ideal way to look at statistics. Its only 20% of the pre-dental population.
 
What kind of person is the ideal dental school applicant/candidate? In particular, I'm wondering to what extent dentist shadowing, community service and holding jobs while in school matter in admissions? Let's say I have stellar grades and a DAT score, but only about 25-50hrs of shadowing and pretty mediocre community involvement, would that be a huge set back in my dental school applications?

I'm asking because it just seems that on this message board, and on the predents site, everyone seems to be amazingly well-rounded applicants (i.e, presidents of their universities pre-dental society, grads w/ honors, 1000+ community service and shadowing hours), are websites like this representative of ALL applicants? Do "normal" people who have a minimal number of shadowing hours and pretty low-key extracurriculars get in as well, (let's say they have a 3.5+ gpa)?

Numbers are everything. I like to think of myself as a well rounded applicant with low stats, and I didn't get a single interview: 3.2cGPA, 2.9sGPA, 3.8 non-sci GPA, 5000+ hrs dental experience, 19/19/21, june 13th submission, varsity athlete, top tier university, pre-dental club executive, several community and campus leadership awards, speech competition awards, several scholarships, etc.

As long as you have the numbers, you'll at least get the interview.
 
how the heck did u get 5000+ hrs? You are joking right? i mean you must have been doing nothing but shadowing at an office since college?

Numbers are everything. I like to think of myself as a well rounded applicant with low stats, and I didn't get a single interview: 3.2cGPA, 2.9sGPA, 3.8 non-sci GPA, 5000+ hrs dental experience, 19/19/21, june 13th submission, varsity athlete, top tier university, pre-dental club executive, several community and campus leadership awards, speech competition awards, several scholarships, etc.

As long as you have the numbers, you'll at least get the interview.
 
After 5k hours of shadowing, still ambivalent about dentistry as a career choice.
 
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how the heck did u get 5000+ hrs? You are joking right? i mean you must have been doing nothing but shadowing at an office since college?
I have over 5000 hrs of experience. True, it would be insane to shadow that much but some of us have been working in the field for years.
 
how the heck did u get 5000+ hrs? You are joking right? i mean you must have been doing nothing but shadowing at an office since college?

hes probably a dental assistant... and in which case, 5000 hrs are achievable
 
5, 000 hours shadowing???? Are you kidding me???? Like seriously, I hope this is a joke.

Basically from what I've heard, the ideal D-school candidate is: 3.7 GPA(the higher GPA the better), 23 DAT, 100+ Shadowing hours, 100 + volunteering,
some leadership experience (i.e. President of a club, etc), at least 1 year of Research experience(if your going to specialize, research usually helps).

OP, as long as you have above 3.5 GPA, good DAT and can speak English you should have a good chance at Dental school. You don't need to have 1, 000 volunteer hours.

BTW: Seattle, shadowing and working is not the same thing.
 
Numbers are everything. I like to think of myself as a well rounded applicant with low stats, and I didn't get a single interview: 3.2cGPA, 2.9sGPA, 3.8 non-sci GPA, 5000+ hrs dental experience, 19/19/21, june 13th submission, varsity athlete, top tier university, pre-dental club executive, several community and campus leadership awards, speech competition awards, several scholarships, etc.

As long as you have the numbers, you'll at least get the interview.
He didn't say shadowing, he said experience.
 
What kind of person is the ideal dental school applicant/candidate? In particular, I'm wondering to what extent dentist shadowing, community service and holding jobs while in school matter in admissions? Let's say I have stellar grades and a DAT score, but only about 25-50hrs of shadowing and pretty mediocre community involvement, would that be a huge set back in my dental school applications?

I'm asking because it just seems that on this message board, and on the predents site, everyone seems to be amazingly well-rounded applicants (i.e, presidents of their universities pre-dental society, grads w/ honors, 1000+ community service and shadowing hours), are websites like this representative of ALL applicants? Do "normal" people who have a minimal number of shadowing hours and pretty low-key extracurriculars get in as well, (let's say they have a 3.5+ gpa)?

It sounds like you are a very strong applicant. While you could do more extracurriculars, make sure you give yourself credit for everything (such as jobs, IM sports, ANY and ALL groups, things like that). Give yourself credit for what you've done!
 
how the heck did u get 5000+ hrs? You are joking right? i mean you must have been doing nothing but shadowing at an office since college?

I started working in a dental clinic when I was in 9th grade.
 
One more question, maybe it's obvious, but which GPA is weighed more heavily, science GPA, non-science GPA or the total cumulative?
 
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