Medical What Can I Do?

[MusicDOc124]

I’m currently going in to my second year of college in the DC area. My first year (I have taken the past year off), I did very poorly, especially in science, where I got a C in first semester and an F in second semester in general chem 1 and 2. As a result, my GPA was 3.11 in the first semester, and 2.11 in the second semester. However, I really want to go to medical school and I recognize that I just didn’t study hard enough to do well and I’m ready to put in the effort to succeed. But I’m worried that my terrible performance will continue to weigh me down no matter what I do. Is there any hope for me to get accepted into a medical school? What should I be doing to get there, given my academic record? Thanks for the feedback

I feel there may be more to the story you're not mentioning here. You only mention 1 C and 1 F after 1 year of college with a GPA of 2.11. I entered in a few grades to get an estimate of what your other grades might be (assuming 1 year is about 30 credits). You'd have to have mostly B's and C's in addition to the 1 mentioned C and the F.

How are your grades overall and with how many credits? Can you tell us what your sGPA is in addition to cumulative?

Your GPA is very low, but fortunately you have a lot of time and credits to make up for it. 1 year of school with that GPA is very different than that GPA with a degree in hand.

You need to identify what went wrong. Just not studying hard enough is rarely the actual answer. Did you not grasp the material and should have gotten a tutor? Did you not study at all or minimally? Were you not going to class when going may have helped? Did you not turn in homework or some other part of the class grade, or was it only on exams, or a combo of both/all? Is there a learning disability involved? Are you putting in the time and just not retaining? Is it the TYPE of studying you're doing - meaning do you read notes and move on, or do you do practice questions, discuss things with someone else, etc?

Identify the root of what caused the grades and do what you need to do to fix it. Without the grades, med school isn't an option, but again, there is plenty of time.

Goro's advice for pre-meds who need reinvention

So you want to be a doctor, but your GPA is terrible. Is that the end? Rule #1: Take a deep breath, and stop fussing. The sky is not falling. But you are going to need to reinvent yourself. This will take both time and money. And always remember that you’re in a marathon now, not a sprint...

forums.studentdoctor.net

 

[Goro]

Rising GPA trends are always good

 

[MusicDOc124]

I appreciate the advice! I’ve attached a copy of my unofficial transcript. You’re right about my grades, it’s generally a mix of B’s and C’s with one A. I do have ADHD and testing anxiety which slightly makes it difficult to focus, so I basically didn’t study at all, and rarely did any homework. I was a really bad student, and in addition, I’ve never been naturally good at science/math even though I’m very interested in medicine, so going forward I’m definitely going to get a tutor to help me out. I think that in terms of fixing it, I need to just focus and do all my homework and go to all the lectures and go over material with a tutor and hopefully that will help me do better this time around.
But even if I somehow get 4.0 every semester going forward, I’m only going to graduate with about a 3.6 which seems a bit low for med school but maybe with an upward trend it can be overlooked?

Looking at the sheet you posted, it looks like you have a 2.62, not a 2.11. That the 2.11 was just that 1 semester alone.

You have opportunity to overcome the GPA with an upward trend that gets BOTH of your cumulative GPA AND science GPA over 3.0 at minimum, and if you additionally do well on the MCAT.