What to do in my year off?

[Plaqueman]

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Hey everyone, I’ve been an avid reader of the forums for a couple weeks , and I am now in need of some advice. I am graduating from UCLA this spring with a BS in Biology, and applying for the 2007 cycle. These are my numbers: 20 AA/ 20 TS/ 18 PAT CGPA: 3.4 SGPA 3.3. I have tons of EC, both in the dental field and community service, and my LOR’s are pretty good too. My top choices are UCLA, UCSF and UoP (I know that as of right now, my numbers are not good enough for those schools, I am just hoping to get lucky). I am having trouble deciding what to do in my year off. I don’t know if I should re-take the DAT, do research in the UCLA dental school and shadow a dentist (I shadowed another dentist for 2 years) OR do some sort of post-bacc, possibly do research depending on where the post-bacc will be, and shadow a dentist. I am thinking that if I do a post-bacc, the grades will not be out for a while and that it would be too late for it to have any effect on my app. On the other hand, I am wondering if my DAT scores are good enough and I should just show the dental schools that I am committed to doing well in science courses by doing a post-bacc. Any other suggestions of what I could do in my year off would also be appreciated, thanks guys.

 

[xylashellx]

i personally think your scores are good enough to get into ucsf. look at my scores and i got an interview. uop basically wants all 20s from what i hear. the best way of being confident going into this next year would be to retake the DAT. your gpa is fine. i hate to tell you to retake the dat because you could get into 10 schools with your scores. but if you REALLY want a CA school then go ahead and retake it. from my personal experience (going through two application cycles) the DAT is the most important.

my advice to you is to have a relaxing year. study for the dat for a couple months and then become a substitut teacher. its an awsome job and its really easy. this last year "off" has been one of the best years of my life. i starred in a movie, became a substitute teacher ($$$$) got to hang out with my friends at home, and am moving to germany for 4 months.

good luck!

 

[Rezdawg]

Hey everyone, I’ve been an avid reader of the forums for a couple weeks , and I am now in need of some advice. I am graduating from UCLA this spring with a BS in Biology, and applying for the 2007 cycle. These are my numbers: 20 AA/ 20 TS/ 18 PAT CGPA: 3.4 SGPA 3.3. I have tons of EC, both in the dental field and community service, and my LOR’s are pretty good too. My top choices are UCLA, UCSF and UoP (I know that as of right now, my numbers are not good enough for those schools, I am just hoping to get lucky). I am having trouble deciding what to do in my year off. I don’t know if I should re-take the DAT, do research in the UCLA dental school and shadow a dentist (I shadowed another dentist for 2 years) OR do some sort of post-bacc, possibly do research depending on where the post-bacc will be, and shadow a dentist. I am thinking that if I do a post-bacc, the grades will not be out for a while and that it would be too late for it to have any effect on my app. On the other hand, I am wondering if my DAT scores are good enough and I should just show the dental schools that I am committed to doing well in science courses by doing a post-bacc. Any other suggestions of what I could do in my year off would also be appreciated, thanks guys.

Just get your application ready as soon as possible. Have your recommendations ready, finish your personal statement, etc... When the applications are available, get done with it as soon as possible and you will be good to go.

 

[Plaqueman]

thanks for your responses guys, much appreciated. I was wondering if anyone knows if it is too late to even do a post-bacc in your year off and have the grades count for anything.