I'm an accepted pre-dent and will be giving up my seat Monday or Tuesday. Hopefully, someone on hold will get my seat! May 15th is when some forms are due so if you are on hold you may hear before June if anyone doesn't submit their forms. Anyway, I remember being a silent sdn'er last cycle and want to give my 2 cents for pre-dents currently on "hold" or future applicants that may stumble on this later. For starters I applied relatively late last cycle but was still in Interview #2 thereafter I was placed on "hold" and was very optimistic that I would be admitted, mostly because people would always share their story they got accepted the day before etc. Well that one person is never me! Long story short I was left on hold..meaning admissions never rejected or accepted me because the class was full. This was a very confusing place to be in as I really felt lost and that my life was in limbo; I had put all my eggs in one basket and I had failed. Quite frankly I was angry with admissions for leaving me and others on hold (including pre-meds).
My interview went great both cycles (because both times my interviewee told me it went great and I'm a strong interviewee)..if you get rejected post- interview I believe it's because of your interview. I believe for pre-dents the msms program wants a certain DAT score and if you haven't taken yours, if its expired or will be expired by MSMS graduation, or not up to their minimum (which they don't say what the minimum is) then you may not get in.
Long story short I retook my DAT (main things holding me back) and scored average but much better than the first time. Applied late to dental school but early to MSMS. To my surprise I received 4 dental school interviews with my first acceptance recently, wl at 3 others, and my MSMS acceptance early on. As you can see for pre-dents that's how close you have to be to get accepted--a hair away from an acceptance. They only accept around 6 pre-dents a yr (varies each yr) but this program is an informal guarantee for pre-dents and not that many people know about it to even apply. Dental school competition is high and a lot of people are doing this program as a non-accept back-up when they may not wholeheartedly need it. Make sure you apply early! The program has pros and cons..pros: its an informal guarantee with no gap year. Everyone I know who did the sfsu post-bacc had a gap yr or more (please don't do it)..and the MWU-AZ master's is better but the majority having a gap yr stay silent until they get in (make sure your DAT is solid before starting beginning a non-guarantee master's). In my opinion, the MSMS program is more difficult and time consuming than other master's/post bacc from what I heard at interviews and friends in varied programs. I mean we are talking 8am-5pm class Mon-Fri for 12 months and for pre-dents you take ISAC and have to learn the entire body in a lot of depth; whereas most dental schools focus on head and neck. Given tuition isn't too bad I think its awesome that WesternU provides cadavers and awesome teachers for the price of the MSMS. Its the best master's for a pre-dent and a part of me feels sad giving up my seat because I've wanted it for 2 cycles now.
For pre-med..the little that I know is when I went to interviews this cycle I recognized a lot of pre-med re-applicants. Obviously, they too had applied early and were holding out for this program; if you are reading this I hope you all got accepted! Talking to students there is def. some competition amongst other students and in terms of pre-meds getting a certain percentage to be guaranteed admittance with no gap year. Its something they worry about though they all sounded confident that eventually they would get in.
Overall, its an awesome but tough program--for those that don't realllly need it you can prob. find an easier route into d school or even DO school--and for those who know they really do need it--it can change your future. Good luck.
