Waiting a year before applying?

[niv3k]

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Has anyone waited a year before applying to dental school? If you know of anyone or have could you give me some insight on what your reason was? Did the interviewers ask why? Is it frowned upon??

I am graduating this semester but was not planning to send in my application until June when the next cycle opens for students wanting to matriculate in 2015. I plan on working and saving money to leave behind to help my mom and sister as my mom can't really work anymore. Also, I just don't feel like I am a strong enough applicant yet. I had a really big gimmick with nursing school where I withdrew when I realized my mom just could not handle work anymore (bad eyesight) and decided to go back to biology and just help out the family. During that time I heard about dentistry and started getting into it and found I thought it was a much better career choice for me than nursing.

I've taken the DAT, scored a 20, and have a 3.6 science and overall gpa. I just don't feel like I'm a strong enough applicant because I feel like I don't have enough dental experience yet either. I have like 30 hours of shadowing a dentist, no dental work or volunteer experience, and withdrawing from another program might look a little sketchy to them.

What do you guys think? I spoke with some pre health advisors today and they were all dumbfounded that I did not apply for this 2014 cycle. One advisor said that schools don't like that too and that I'll have to explain why.

 

[niv3k]

Oh and let me add, I withdrew after not even a month, leaving a WF and W on my transcript there. Got a borderline D for my first test and a B for my second. Not that making a B would make a difference anyways. W is a W.

 

[eggiweggi]

I don't think it would hurt you negatively at all. I'm taking a year off while applying, and have spent the time working and volunteering at a dental clinic. I've gotten 3 interview invites so far and my stats are similar to yours (with more dental experience of course). Only one interviewer asked me to explain my time off and it wasn't a big deal. I think it would only benefit you as you'll be working and saving up money for flights + hotels that come with interview invites. 🙂 Just make sure to really demonstrate your interest in the dental field by shadowing and volunteering and all that jazz during that year

 

[niv3k]

Great, thanks for the info. The advisory committee sure made me feel like an ant today. Yeah I definitely plan on saving up for the cost of application too.

 

[niv3k]

Well thank you much. They just really gave me hell for wanting to take a year off. I mean at first I thought my reasons were legit, after hearing them though I started freaking out.

I guess maybe they were dumbfounded because I requested a committee letter, but I honestly thought the committee letter was so that I can turn in June of 2014 to enter 2015. I didn't realize they did committee interviews soo late because most of the dental schools have already hit their deadlines for application so how could people even get their recommendation letters in?

 

[niv3k]

Are you serious..? How serious is a WF?

 

[stomatology]

Oh and let me add, I withdrew after not even a month, leaving a WF and W on my transcript there. Got a borderline D for my first test and a B for my second. Not that making a B would make a difference anyways. W is a W.

A W is a W, but a WF is not a W.

You're right W's don't count in the GPA calculation, but WF's do count as F's.

When I called to inquire about W's, I was told by an AADSAS representative that that a plain old W doesn't count, but a WF is counted as an F in your AADSAS GPA since it does have the F attached to it.

 

[bestcoast12]

Do not worry about taking a year off! Honestly, take that year to enjoy working, traveling, whatever. For you, it would probably be best to work to save money as well as maybe take a few upper-division recommended classes to increase your GPA (if that is a concern). I'm not sure how admissions will look at the Ws, but it sounds like you had extenuating circumstances. There is an opportunity in the application and supplementals to describe anything that may not be clear. Use that space to explain the situation.

I usually don't like to give too much advice, because I think everyone is different and will not be looked at the same by admissions committees, so take everything I say as my personal experience. I graduated in June and am applying this cycle. I have already interviewed at a few schools and none of them brought up me taking off a year of school in a negative manner. In fact, most of them used that as a discussion point. Being out of school for a year (or more) will let you grow as a person and develop more interesting things to talk about in an interview.

Best of luck!

 

[stomatology]

Are you serious..? How serious is a WF?

Yes, of course I'm serious!

If you look at the GPA Calculations sheet I've attached, it says "Withdraw/Fail grades ARE included in the overall GPA calculation." I was originally confused about this because I thought it meant that regular W's would be included but as was explained to me what that actually means is that a WF (aka Withdraw/Fail) is counted as an F.

I was only able to find the 2013 version of the GPA Calculations, but I doubt that this policy has changed based on what the AADSAS rep told me when I called to inquire about W's.

The gpa calculation is done like this:
Σ ((quality points assigned to the letter grade) * (# of credit hours for the class)) / (total # of credit hours added up)

An F goes in as a 0.0 on the numerator, and the credit hours get added into the denominator.

If you can't visualize all of that in your head I'll put some numbers to it, let's say you have 150 credits with an AADSAS calculated GPA of 3.6 overall and the course you got a WF in is 3 credits that is not part the 150 I already mentioned, the GPA calculation that includes the WF as an F would look something like: ((3.6*150)+0)/(150+3) = 3.53 GPA

I've also attached the AADSAS Course Subjects sheet so that you can see what GPAs will likely be affected by this. I assume this was a nursing class, meaning that it will be counted as other science and will certainly go into your overall and science GPAs, possibly even your BCP GPA depending on what the course actually is. If it clearly falls under one of those Biology topics listed--if it was Anatomy and Physiology for ex--I think it would end up classified as Biology meaning it'd be part of all the GPAs calculated (overall, science, BCP). The last attachment is the AADSAS 2014 General Instructions Booklet just in case any of what I'm saying didn't make sense to you.

If you have any other questions about this, I would encourage you to email or call AADSAS:

ADEA AADSAS Customer Service Representatives are available:

Monday through Friday, 9:00a.m. to 1:00p.m, 2:00p.m.-5:00p.m.
Eastern Time, except federal holidays
Email:[email protected]
Phone: 617-612-2045

I don't have any WFs or Fs so I don't have personal experience with this, but I know that there certainly are people who have gotten into dental school with WFs and Fs on their transcripts. Since you have a relatively high GPA otherwise, I doubt that one grade will sink your application. Adcoms understand that things come up, sometimes people have a bad semester. Additionally, there is a place in the AADSAS application that asks about whether your education has been negatively affected due to mitigating circumstances.

 

[niv3k]

Well thanks stomatology for the info, and thanks everyone else who has posted. I plan on taking several classes next semester then to try to bump my gpa up a little more because of the WF.

I have another question though for anyone else that reads this. So that committee letter, one reason why they might have been confused/dumbfounded with me about is that I registered for an application for 2014...

I completely misinterpreted that and now that I'm thinking about it I'm just like agh *facepalm*..

What I was thinking was, oh application for 2014 to SEND IN 2014.. Not students wanting to matriculate in 2014.. The letter I had requested was something I thought I could get early so that I may turn in my application as early as possible, that being June. Not only that but knowing now when they do committee interviews for the rec letter I really don't even want a committee letter anymore because when I looked at the deadlines for the schools, over half the schools I wanted to apply to had already hit past their deadline.

Does anyone know if the dental schools will count that as me trying to apply or anything like that??

 

[ToothbrushBuddy]

Has anyone waited a year before applying to dental school? If you know of anyone or have could you give me some insight on what your reason was? Did the interviewers ask why? Is it frowned upon??

I am graduating this semester but was not planning to send in my application until June when the next cycle opens for students wanting to matriculate in 2015. I plan on working and saving money to leave behind to help my mom and sister as my mom can't really work anymore. Also, I just don't feel like I am a strong enough applicant yet. I had a really big gimmick with nursing school where I withdrew when I realized my mom just could not handle work anymore (bad eyesight) and decided to go back to biology and just help out the family. During that time I heard about dentistry and started getting into it and found I thought it was a much better career choice for me than nursing.

I've taken the DAT, scored a 20, and have a 3.6 science and overall gpa. I just don't feel like I'm a strong enough applicant because I feel like I don't have enough dental experience yet either. I have like 30 hours of shadowing a dentist, no dental work or volunteer experience, and withdrawing from another program might look a little sketchy to them.

What do you guys think? I spoke with some pre health advisors today and they were all dumbfounded that I did not apply for this 2014 cycle. One advisor said that schools don't like that too and that I'll have to explain why.

I have tons of red flags and it hasn't hurt my application in any real way. Dental schools have to realize that the applicants are people too and we do things for reasons too.

For example, I graduated last May and am working at a nursing home until dental school next fall. I only had one school question why I didn't apply last fall and why I am working at a nursing home. I just explained that I am waiting for my husband to graduate and that I just needed a job and couldn't find one in dentistry.

I don't think that stuff like this actually hurts anyone's application, it hasn't hurt my chances at all, I have gotten interviews at 7 of the 8 schools I applied to. And the 8th just wants another LOR before moving on with my application. Moral of the story is: don't worry about the small stuff. 🙂 Keep cool and keep smiling 😎

Plus, I would apply for the HPSP military scholarship too if I were you, they give you a $2k stipend a month, you could definitely send some of that home each month to your family once in D-school.

 

[niv3k]

Thanks toothbrushbuddy, great to know. I'll definitely look into that. Lots of good info guys ty much.

 

[stomatology]

Does anyone know if the dental schools will count that as me trying to apply or anything like that??

Dental schools won't count you as trying to apply until you submit AADSAS.

As for the committee letter dilemma, I am confused. Is this a committee letter for this current cycle or next cycle? I believe that the committee letters for the current cycle are all already written, considering that we are in the middle of it right now. Did you end up interviewing and actually getting a committee letter?

 

[niv3k]

I was interviewed by the committee to get a letter for the current cycle. But what I thought I was doing was being interviewed to get a letter for the next cycle to get a letter in 2015.

But yesterday, as I was freaking out by what they said (that schools don't like you taking a year gap) I went home and started my application right then. But I realized later that a lot of the schools I wanted to apply to were already past deadline. I'm not sure how they planned to write a letter or what their intention was but yeah... I don't think I want to get a committee letter for my application.