WAMC - Second time applicant, Lower GPA. Need advice!

[dogtormanda25]

Hi! I am a second year applicant with a low GPA and looking for some feedback and any advice for this year's application. PS: I am new to SDN so bare with me lol

I am 21 and just recently graduated in May from Penn State with a Bachelor's in Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences. I applied to about 6-7 schools last cycle and was rejected from all of them but I had an Interview with Ross U. I will admit last year I kind of rushed my application because I was not confident in my experiences, and I have a low GPA but I applied anyway.

A little background: During my freshman and sophomore year I got mostly C's. I had term GPA's of 2.3, 2.0's and even 1.9. I basically got my life together my junior year and I started to get A's and B's, and had term GPA's of 3.650, 3.630, 3.280 and 3.580 (fall junior year to senior spring).

I currently have a 2.810 overall GPA from undergrad which I know is low. I am applying to Cornell, Western, Tufts, Upenn, Wisconsin, Virginia-Maryland, and LIU (Cornell and LIU are my IS).

My experiences:

Veterinary Experience:
- Currently I work full time as a veterinary assistant and kennel attendant at a small animal practice. I have worked here since mid may so I have around 300 hours right now.
- Shadow Experience: at a 24 hour animal hospital during summer 2019, I have about 200+ hours
- Internship/ Shadow Experience (a class I took in high school required you to get an internship at place in your future career field): This was at a 24 hour veterinary specialist hospital, I got to do a lot of hands on work here, it was more of a teaching/learning opportunity. I have about 100 hours there.

Animal Experience (No Veterinarian Involved):
- Currently I volunteer at a Farm Sanctuary. They have a variety of farm/food animals (Chickens, cows, sheep, goats, alpacas, turkeys, peacocks). I just started so I only have 10 hours
- Last summer I volunteered at a Therapeutic Equestrian Center, I have about 50 hours there
- I volunteered at a Humane society when I was on vacation for a couple of hours in Cayman Islands
- Volunteer work at Centre Country PAWS shelter at school for a few hours


Extracurricular:
- Was involved in the Pre-Vet Club during undergrad (all 4 years)
- A member of THON organization for 2 years during undergrad ( THON raises money toward a cure for pediatric cancer)
- Varsity Softball Team Captain during my senior year of high school. I played softball since I was 8 years old and played all through middle school and high school.

Achievements:
- Dean's list: Fall Junior year
- National Honor Society in High school
- All division softball player for my league in high school

- I also was a hostess/cashier at a pizzeria/italian restaurant for 4 years.

After all of that, I am asking for any advice on where to improve and how to strengthen my candidacy going forward. I have talked to Tufts already about my file review, and I have a meeting with Cornell next week. I wanted to get perspectives from different schools that I applied to. I am also retaking Physics this fall at a community college and I am thinking of taking more upper level science classes to show that I can continue to do well in advanced classes. Should I look for more experience in other areas? Continue to take classes? Pursue a masters? I have been told a variety of things but I would like more opinions.

I would appreciate complete honesty! Thank you

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[EngrSC]

I was a lower GPA student and felt like I needed to make every other aspect of my application strong. It looks like all of your vet experience hours are small animal. If that’s true, I would try to diversify and get experience in large animal, food animal, equine, exotics, wildlife, etc.

Also, did you use the explanation statement to explain your poor grades? Any extenuating circumstances?

There are a couple schools that allow you to have your first year “forgiven” (Illinois and Mizzou I think?). Have you looked into one of those options?

 

[dogtormanda25]

I was a lower GPA student and felt like I needed to make every other aspect of my application strong. It looks like all of your vet experience hours are small animal. If that’s true, I would try to diversify and get experience in large animal, food animal, equine, exotics, wildlife, etc.

Also, did you use the explanation statement to explain your poor grades? Any extenuating circumstances?

There are a couple schools that allow you to have your first year “forgiven” (Illinois and Mizzou I think?). Have you looked into one of those options?

I didn't know much about the application process last year so I did not use the explanation statement but I am using it this year! Where I live it is mostly small animal practices, there isn't much land for large animals unless its about an hour from me. I volunteer at a non profit barn and did last summer at a non profit equestrian center.

I looked into Mizzou and Illinois, they require a minimum 3.0 GPA :/

 

[EngrSC]

I didn't know much about the application process last year so I did not use the explanation statement but I am using it this year! Where I live it is mostly small animal practices, there isn't much land for large animals unless its about an hour from me. I volunteer at a non profit barn and did last summer at a non profit equestrian center.

I looked into Mizzou and Illinois, they require a minimum 3.0 GPA :/

I believe they’re the 2 schools that do freshman grade forgiveness. If you qualified for forgiveness your cumulative GPA may be above 3.0. I’m not sure what’s entailed in forgiveness though so it’s something you’d have to research.