wake forest, anyone familiar?

[LupaCupcake]

Thing is, I live in the same city as Wake Forest med school. I have driven past it more than I can count and I have gone to the hospital they use to visit sick family members. Due to my recent situation (going single mommy route) it is imperative that I try to stay near my only family members that can assist me. This has bumped up Wake Forest to my #1 pick. If accepted at WF, I would not need to move, my kid stays in the same school, Grandma is 10 min away to help babysit...it just makes sense. I know I know......I can't put all my eggs in one basket and WF happens to be a VERY expensive private school. That being said, I have to try.

On the website it states that CC courses are STRONGLY discouraged. ehh..... Money is a big factor for me so I really need to stick with CC. Anyone know how lenient they are with this? My bachelor degree (psych maj/bio min) was from a 4 year school and I have a 3.8. I need the chem and phys from the local CC. Do you think they would even consider me with CC courses since they stated "strongly discouraged"?

I tried contacting them, but no reply just yet on this one. Any idea how they feel about online/hybrid courses?
The whole working fulltime plus single mom thing gives me limited time so hybrids really appeal to me.

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[ejw5075]

Thing is, I live in the same city as Wake Forest med school. I have driven past it more than I can count and I have gone to the hospital they use to visit sick family members. Due to my recent situation (going single mommy route) it is imperative that I try to stay near my only family members that can assist me. This has bumped up Wake Forest to my #1 pick. If accepted at WF, I would not need to move, my kid stays in the same school, Grandma is 10 min away to help babysit...it just makes sense. I know I know......I can't put all my eggs in one basket and WF happens to be a VERY expensive private school. That being said, I have to try.

On the website it states that CC courses are STRONGLY discouraged. ehh..... Money is a big factor for me so I really need to stick with CC. Anyone know how lenient they are with this? My bachelor degree (psych maj/bio min) was from a 4 year school and I have a 3.8. I need the chem and phys from the local CC. Do you think they would even consider me with CC courses since they stated "strongly discouraged"?

I tried contacting them, but no reply just yet on this one. Any idea how they feel about online/hybrid courses?
The whole working fulltime plus single mom thing gives me limited time so hybrids really appeal to me.

Sorry about your situation- makes things a bit tougher but you can make it happen.

If they advertise CC classes strongly discouraged, they likely mean it- schools that don't openly admit it still discourage it.

The issue you'll have is there are more qualified applicants than positions so anything subpar (some would say not taking university courses) is going to hurt you. Obviously not impossible but you're already up against a huge wall w trying to get into a specific school, a relatively competitive one at that.

 

[hawkbit]

I know it's tough to be in a situation where you have limited, or practically limited geographical options. We want to believe that our situations merit special consideration, and sometimes if you are well connected to someone in authority in the admissions process, you can get it. But generally, just as the previous poster said, there are plenty of other candidates that don't need special consideration, and so more likely to get that spot.

If you can only take CC classes, then can you tailor your application more specifically towards their school? Does your EC's match up with the schools vision/mission? When you get ready to write your personal statement and secondary, let it flow towards the Wake Forest philosophy, while keeping true to yourself. Just some ideas.
Good Luck!

 

[mspeedwagon]

Based on what the John Hopkins director of admissions said at the old premeds conference:
- Hybrid classes / online classes or anything of that nature is a BIG NO NO for ALL schools.
- CC some schools care about more than others. If they do they tend to list it. JHU has only accepted one person in his time with admissions that had all CC classes (person happened to score a 40+ on the MCAT). I'd imagine if Wake Forest lists they discourage it, then it's likely similar. I know that is not what you wanted to hear. Granted, hopefully you hear directly from WF since they know best what they will and will not accept. A very high MCAT score might overcome it, but as someone stuck in the mid-20s after straight As, A-s in my post-bac, it can't be counted on.

Your situation sucks. I wish you the best of luck on your journey and hope it all works out.

 

[Pons Asinorum]

Just call their admissions office and ask to speak to someone about prerequisites. Briefly state your case and get the actual answer. All we can do is assume.

 

[LupaCupcake]

"your situation sucks" lol yep....I noticed

 

[hizziaips]

OP: I have a good friend who is a non-trad, lives in Winston-Salem, and was recently accepted to Wake Forest. He did his post-bacc work at UNC-Greensboro and seemed to be happy with it. Is that an option for you?

 

[LupaCupcake]

Greensboro is a hour drive for me. My boss is kind enough to let me take time off of work during the week for labs etc, and I make it by cutting lunch breaks or using PTO time, but Greensboro would not be an option. It has to be local. We do have Winston Salem State here , I may go that route just for the sake of not taking CC courses, I just have to suck it financially and get more loans *groan*

would your friend be willing to talk to me? It would be nice to have like minded friends and I would love to pick her/her brain about the admissions process to WF!

OP: I have a good friend who is a non-trad, lives in Winston-Salem, and was recently accepted to Wake Forest. He did his post-bacc work at UNC-Greensboro and seemed to be happy with it. Is that an option for you?

 

[StBernardsRule]

Just to give you some advice from my own personal experience that may help a bit:

I interviewed at one school where we basically had an "informal" (though of course it really isn't) group interview with the dean. We were a group of 5. We were asked to tell the dean a bit about ourselves and every single person other than myself currently had a job as a full time researcher. Each one of them spoke very clearly and confidently. Each one was well dressed and smiled throughout the conversation and laughed politely when it was appropriate to. Looking at the school's median MCAT and GPA, I'd be surprised if anyone in that group had an MCAT lower than 30 or a GPA lower than 3.5, and I'm sure at least a few of us had a 3.9+ GPA and/or 35+ MCAT. The school accepts about 20% it interviews (and less than 2% of all who apply).

The above is basically going to be your competition. It's very, very different than other interviews (say interviewing to volunteer at a hospital) where people won't show up on time, won't dress appropriately, won't speak clearly or seem enthusiastic, or anything else they can do to give you an edge on them for getting into school. Unless you're naturally brilliant (not just smart or very smart, but brilliant) or from a particularly lenient state or demographic, your competition to get into MD schools is very, very tough. There is basically a huge bottleneck doing on right now to get into MD school as we're at an education bubble and the other professional schools (such as most law schools and vet school) are now considered financial suicide. This is causing an arms race to get into MD schools with more research and volunteer time needed and a higher MCAT and GPA being required. Speaking of which, while I am from California, I just sold all my MCAT books yesterday to a girl re-taking a balanced 32 as she wasn't able to get into an MD school with it and it expired. So she's now re-taking a 32 after having spent the last two years further beefing up her resume. And you can bet she's going to be applying to Wake Forest too and this is the kind of competition you're going to be up against.

My point in all this isn't that it's impossible to get into an MD school or try to cause you any panic. It's just to realize how tough your competition is if you are applying right now, and I think it will be quite a bit harder if you're applying in 2-3 years from now as more overqualified applicants who are denied now continue to beef up their application. So if you are already taking classes at a community college with one school in mind and you know that school explicitly says they don't want CC credit, then I think you're off to a really bad start. You're at a big disadvantage from single 22 year olds with little responsibility (and often significant financial help from their parents) who just graduated college and plan to spend the next 2-3 years buffing up their resumes. If I were in your situation, unless I thought I was actually brilliant (and had this confirmed by others), I would not hope to get into one specific school and would realistically think if I'm going to spend all this time and money trying to get into school I'd also need to be willing to move and go to whatever DO schools are willing to accept me.

That said, best of luck in whatever you decide and we all of course how you get into your #1 choice.

 

[LupaCupcake]

I am well aware of the sharks fighting for med school. In undergrad it is as if we are all amidst a nice ocean and yes, there are cute fish that swim by nonchalantly and occasional sharks that would devour those dainty little fishy friends. The second we jump into the med school arena, the pretty fish are gone and that ocean has turned into a pond full of hungry sharks.

I have not started at the CC yet, I planned to start classes in fall, but with my latest life development (separation) I may need to postpone one more term because we are working that situation out and I don't know where my finances will be. I hate the idea of another postponement, but that is the hardship of being a 30 year old woman instead of a young single college student with parents paying my bills. I am not against DO schools, I will take what I can get because in the end, I still achieve the same goal. WF would be convenient, it always helps to have family support when a child is involved and not have to pick up our entire life here and move elsewhere. I know for sure that I will have custody and she will stay with me, but I don't know if they will put restrictions on it such as I can't move her out of state without his approval. I have to prepare for the worst and acknowledge my financial limitations and parental responsibilities as a single mother.

 

[LupaCupcake]

Interesting. They don't like CC, but they have no problem with online courses. Something useful to be aware of.

I was told this information by an admissions officer.

 

[sapphire86]

I am well aware of the sharks fighting for med school. In undergrad it is as if we are all amidst a nice ocean and yes, there are cute fish that swim by nonchalantly and occasional sharks that would devour those dainty little fishy friends. The second we jump into the med school arena, the pretty fish are gone and that ocean has turned into a pond full of hungry sharks.

Interesting. They don't like CC, but they have no problem with online courses. Something useful to be aware of.

I was told this information by an admissions officer.

How will you fulfill your lab requirements through online courses?

 

[LupaCupcake]

I am not saying that I will do online, just that it is handy to know if push comes to shove I could do some online. Typically in my experience, online science courses are more hybrid in nature and they do labs in person and usually have proctored exams for midterm and finals.

To edit in...I personally believe that anyone who has to take science courses online should do it with an accredited school that offers proctored exams and in person labs. That makes it more legit IMO