MD & DO WAMC - Medical School List - Masters 4.0 cGPA, Undergrad 2.51s/3.01s GPA, MCAT 506, Re-applicant

[Sunny82]

Hi Everyone, I just received my disappointing MCAT score and I truly don't know what to do in terms of whether to take another year and polish up my MCAT score (for a third attempt, which I don't know if that is even a good idea?) or just go for 2023 application cycle with more emphasis on DO schools (I don't have any DO shadowing, just MD LOR). If anyone can give me some advice or insight on what schools (MD and DO) I am better off applying to or more of what to do with my situation, I will be grateful!

1. cGPA and sGPA
   1. Undergraduate (UC Davis) + Post-bac program (Private college in Illinois) = 2.51 sGPA, 3.01 cGPA
   2. Master's program (Case Western Reserve MSMP) = 4.0 cGPA
2. MCAT score(s) and breakdown
   1. First attempt: 501 (124, 126, 124, 127)
   2. Second attempt: 506 (126, 126, 126, 128)
3. State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US)
   1. CA
4. Ethnicity and/or race
   1. Chinese (ORM), Female, 25 y/o
5. Undergraduate institution or category
   1. UC Davis
6. Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer)
   1. Psychiatric scribe (unpaid) - 200+ hours
   2. Student-Run Clinic volunteer (unpaid) - 192 hours
   3. Children's hospital intern (unpaid) - 80 hours
7. Research experience and productivity
   1. Study Co-Author - 100 hours (paper and poster but name is not listed since we were grouped into one title)
   2. Autism Phenome Project Research Assistant - 200 hours
8. Shadowing experience and specialties represented
   1. Shadowing at Rush Oak Park Hospital - 20 hours
9. Non-clinical volunteering
   1. Secretary at Queer campus student organization - 110 hours
   2. Group leader at a Taiwanese American conference - 28 hours
10. Other extracurricular activities (including athletics, military service, gap year activities, leadership, teaching, etc)
    1. Obtained California Real Estate Sales license during my gap year to start working
11. Relevant honors or awards
    1. Dean's List during post-bac year
12. Anything else not listed you think might be important
    1. Moved to USA during middle school (was in low-income social bracket during this period and had state-sponsored school lunches, I'm not sure if this counts as disadvantaged?)
    2. Raised by a single parent

Current MD School List:

California University of Science and Medicine (SOM)

Cali Northstate Univ COM

Chicago Med School at Rosalind Franklin Univ

CWRU SOM

Geisinger Commonwealth SOM

George Washington Univ SOM

Georgetown Univ SOM

Lewis Katz SOM Temple Univ

Loyola Univ Stritch SOM

Medical College of Wisconsin

Northeast Ohio Med Univ

Oakland Univ William Beaumont SOM

OSU College of Med

Penn State SOM

Robert Larner COM Univ Vermont

Rush COM

SUNY Upstate COM

Tufts Univ SOM

Tulane Univ SOM

UC Davis

UC Irvine

UC Riverside

UC San Diego

Univ of Illinois SOM

Univ of Miami Leonard M Miller SOM

Univ of Toledo COM

Wake Forest Univ SOM

Western Michigan Univ Homer Stryker SOM

Wright State Univ Boonshoft SOM

Current DO Schools:

None

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[Faha]

I suggest these DO schools with your stats:
TUNCOM
ATSU-SOMA
UIWSOM
NYIT-AR
ACOM
WCU-COM
PCOM (all schools)
LECOM (all schools)
WVSOM
UP-KYCOM
LMU-DCOM
BCOM
ARCOM
Noorda-COM
ICOM
KHSC-COM (new school)
@Goro could comment if there are any MD schools you could apply to with your MSMP of 4.0 .

 

[Goro]

I suggest these DO schools with your stats:
TUNCOM
ATSU-SOMA
UIWSOM
NYIT-AR
ACOM
WCU-COM
PCOM (all schools)
LECOM (all schools)
WVSOM
UP-KYCOM
LMU-DCOM
BCOM
ARCOM
Noorda-COM
ICOM
KHSC-COM (new school)
@Goro could comment if there are any MD schools you could apply to with your MSMP of 4.0 .

I think MD is a nonstarter.

 

[Sunny82]

I think MD is a nonstarter.

Does this mean I should prepare to only apply to DO school or at least focus my efforts on those first?

p.s. Thank you for the list Faha! I will definitely go and look at each school.

 

[chilly_md]

I agree with Goro. You should apply DO only.

 

[Sunny82]

I agree with Goro. You should apply DO only.

I see, thank you!

If I take another year to retake my MCAT and increase my experiences, would there be a chance to apply for MD the next cycle or are my chances slim regardless with my stats?

 

[chilly_md]

I see, thank you!

If I take another year to retake my MCAT and increase my experiences, would there be a chance to apply for MD the next cycle or are my chances slim regardless with my stats?

I would not recommend taking the MCAT a third time. Chances are very slim regardless at MD.

 

[candbgirl]

Your uGPA combined with the post bacc is very low for MD. Did your SMP have any sort of linkage / guaranteed interview/etc with their med school? If so did you have an interview?
You uGPA will not get through any auto screening that might be set by any school. How many post bacc hours did you take? What were your GPAS before your post bacc.
You probably have a shot at a DO school, but from what you have responded it sounds like you really want MD. If that is the case then don’t apply DO. It’s a waste of your money and their time and resources. At some point you are going to have to decide how badly you want to be a doctor. Good luck as you decide.,

 

[deleted314957]

50% C’s and 50% B’s in undergrad sciences will not cut it for MD and probably not D.O. You’re supposed to LIKE science and be pretty darned good at it. Just a little reality check.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

I'm interested in what your advisors at your postbac have told you regarding applying. When were your MCAT attempts? Also where is your community service? What you list as "non-clinical volunteering" sounds more like leadership.

 

[Goro]

I see, thank you!

If I take another year to retake my MCAT and increase my experiences, would there be a chance to apply for MD the next cycle or are my chances slim regardless with my stats?

Your MCAT is hindering your chances at reinvention for MD schools. Most successful reinventors I've advised on SDN have 513+.

I don't think that an MCAT retake will get you into that strata. So, my advice is apply DO only.

I suggest:
Any DO program. Include UNECOM if you’re from the NE, OSUCOM if you’re from the Plains states and PacNW if you’re from that region. I can't recommend LMU, ARCOM, RVU, BCOM, ICOM and LUCOM, for different reasons. Avoid those new schools that haven't graduated a class yet, if at all possible.

 

[Sunny82]

50% C’s and 50% B’s in undergrad sciences will not cut it for MD and probably not D.O. You’re supposed to LIKE science and be pretty darned good at it. Just a little reality check.

Yeah I had a really bad freshman and sophomore year where I didn't know what I wanted to do. I started getting my stuff together junior and senior year as I actually went out to shadow and get myself involved with healthcare related opportunities. I only took a year at post-bacc since I knew I wouldn't be able to make up for my undergraduate GPA and opt for going to MSMP to hopefully try to show that I can actually handle my stuff. All the classes in my MSMP are physiology courses.

 

[Sunny82]

I'm interested in what your advisors at your postbac have told you regarding applying. When were your MCAT attempts? Also where is your community service? What you list as "non-clinical volunteering" sounds more like leadership.

Honestly not much. At post-bac, they recommended that I either take more classes and spend time trying to offset my bad 2.79 cGPA from undergraduate (I was at 3.96 cGPA at post-bac with mostly science classes) or do master's program and re-take MCAT (first attempt was 2019). I opted for the second option. But seeing how everyone here is nice enough to let me know, it feels like I should've gone with the first option.

I didn't have much community service as I wasted most of my freshman and sophomore year of undergraduate. I spent the years of junior and senior year doing two research positions and most of the activities listed on top. For my post-bac that is grouped with my undergraduate GPA, I did shadowing but was mostly trying to get my GPA up. For my MSMP years, I did scribing.

 

[Sunny82]

Your uGPA combined with the post bacc is very low for MD. Did your SMP have any sort of linkage / guaranteed interview/etc with their med school? If so did you have an interview?
You uGPA will not get through any auto screening that might be set by any school. How many post bacc hours did you take? What were your GPAS before your post bacc.
You probably have a shot at a DO school, but from what you have responded it sounds like you really want MD. If that is the case then don’t apply DO. It’s a waste of your money and their time and resources. At some point you are going to have to decide how badly you want to be a doctor. Good luck as you decide.,

My SMP does have a linkage with their medical school but my MCAT score wouldn't make the cut for automatic interviews. They wanted a 515.
My post bacc hours are 37 since I only took a year with the program. Before my post bac I had a 2.79 GPA.

I was really set on MD since I wanted to go for psychiatry but after doing some research for DO psychiatry, it was actually more in-line with what I wanted to do.

 

[deleted314957]

The D.O. will not limit your medical career.

 

[Bwesternn]

Aside from your scores, the most glaring deficiency in your application would be your nonclinical volunteering hours. How many years do those 138hours span? Those hours also don't show a willingness to go out of your comfort zone to help others. Unfortunately, I think you're going to have a difficult time receiving interviews from service-focused schools, but I'd like to see what the others think about this.

 

[Sunny82]

Aside from your scores, the most glaring deficiency in your application would be your nonclinical volunteering hours. How many years do those 138hours span? Those hours also don't show a willingness to go out of your comfort zone to help others. Unfortunately, I think you're going to have a difficult time receiving interviews from service-focused schools, but I'd like to see what the others think about this.

1 year of secretary position and 1 week of shadowing. The shadowing was done through my post bac program and they didn't allow a student to have more than 3 sessions to shadow a physician.

I am currently signed up for volunteer tutoring that will start in June. This will probably not make it into my 2023 application for osteopathic schools but I will follow up with these schools if they ask for updates of what I am currently doing.