What to do?!

[AnatomyGrey12]

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Correct me if I am wrong, but GPA and MCAT are by far the most important aspects of an application. My GPA is not too great, and the MCAT is the one thing I can do to show my Medical School preparedness in a short amount of time. If I go from a 512 score to even a 516, I go from an 88 percentile to a 95 percentile, setting me way further than a lot of competitive pre-meds. Why would the admissions officers not be impressed by that? They want to see if I am ready for medical school right?

As for EC's, I have enough clinical exp to show how much I want to pursue a career in medicine. I have already shown my altruistic personality through homeless outreach. I have over 200 hours of research, and I am looking for more clinical research already. And my personal statement will definitely set me apart (lets just say May 23rd, 2014 is a date I wont ever forget).

A 516 is about a 35 on the MCAT, giving me a Lizzy M score of about 69, which can be a good chance of getting me into at least one MD school am I wrong?

I dont want to look back on this and regret thinking about what I should have done, thats all.


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The bolded here is such poor logic. Yes a 3.4 and a 516 gives you about a 60% chance of acceptance. But this is with only one MCAT score. If you retake and get a 515+ any good that score will do will be offset by the fact that it is a retake. I would dare say your chances with a 3.4/512 are better than a 3.4/516 with a retake. The inly way this is OK is if you were averaging like 524s on the practice test and somehow got a 512. And even then you would still have to remedy the GPA.

Go ahead and retake, you deserve the consequence if you fail to head everyone's advice here

 

[Lawpy]

Many state schools are perfectly ok with a 7 in verbal, especially with a compensatory elevation in science scores.

Agree 100% with the wise gyngyn. VR scores get cut the most slack.

Doesnt have to be VR. It can be like a 7 in bio or chem. Its a really crappy situation i know because a balanced 32 retake is no better than an unbalanced 32. In fact, it looks worse.

 

[Goro]

Dangerous ignorance here! Bio is, subsection, as it is, in my opinion, the most important subsection as it's closest in content to med school material.

Do poorly in Bio and no matter how good the other subsections are, you will be at a serious disadvantage.

Doesnt have to be VR. It can be like a 7 in bio or chem. Its a really crappy situation i know because a balanced 32 retake is no better than an unbalanced 32. In fact, it looks worse.

 

[GrapesofRath]

The whole "which subsection is most important" discussion is one where the answers are going to vary significantly from evaluator to evaluator and school to school.

There are schools like LSU Shrevenport or Miami that will tell you on their website specifically is the section that's given particular attention. There are definitely evaluators I happen to know personally who I've talked to who say they put the most weight in the VR section and consider it the most important section on the MCAT. Years back(think like 2009) I remember seeing LizzyM post that at her school it was actually the physical sciences her school's dean found to correlate most with success at their school. And then you'll have those who are echoing what Goro are saying; bio has the most correlation to medicine so that's what theyll look at closest. There's no point trying to rank which sections are most important or assume one is more important than the other; you just wont get any good consensus.

What I will say is that even if there is variation in how much weight evaluators give each section, it does seem like you are more likely to get a little more slack for a lower verbal score than the sciences. There are schools like G'town which on their websites list "unofficial" cut offs for what scores are and arent competitive and anything <9 for sciences but <8 for verbal are what are designated as such for them.

 

[Lawpy]

Dangerous ignorance here! Bio is, subsection, as it is, in my opinion, the most important subsection as it's closest in content to med school material.

Do poorly in Bio and no matter how good the other subsections are, you will be at a serious disadvantage.

The whole "which subsection is most important" discussion is one where the answers are going to vary significantly from evaluator to evaluator and school to school.

There are schools like LSU Shrevenport or Miami that will tell you on their website specifically is the section that's given particular attention. There are definitely evaluators I happen to know personally who I've talked to who say they put the most weight in the VR section and consider it the most important section on the MCAT. Years back(think like 2009) I remember seeing LizzyM post that at her school it was actually the physical sciences her school's dean found to correlate most with success at their school. And then you'll have those who are echoing what Goro are saying; bio has the most correlation to medicine so that's what theyll look at closest. There's no point trying to rank which sections are most important or assume one is more important than the other; you just wont get any good consensus.

What I will say is that even if there is variation in how much weight evaluators give each section, it does seem like you are more likely to get a little more slack for a lower verbal score than the sciences. There are schools like G'town which on their websites list "unofficial" cut offs for what scores are and arent competitive and anything <9 for sciences but <8 for verbal are what are designated as such for them.

Well I'm simply wondering in a case of a 32 being 15/15/2 (extreme example) and retaken to get a new 32 as a 11/10/11. Is this a severe red flag, even though the latter score is more balanced than the former score?

I don't think OP specified his subsection scores, which are important to assess whether he should retake. No one should retake a balanced 30s score.

 

[Goro]

That would be OK. I have seen such things!

Well I'm simply wondering in a case of a 32 being 15/15/2 (extreme example) and retaken to get a new 32 as a 11/10/11. Is this a severe red flag, even though the latter score is more balanced than the former score?

I don't think OP specified his subsection scores, which are important to assess whether he should retake. No one should retake a balanced 30s score.

 

[efle]

I wonder how Azor Ahai is doing with his cycle (retook a 35 and hit 39)! But it sounds like OP has made up their mind regardless

 

[LoveDocMD]

About May 23rd, 2014, I was a first responder (not yet en EMT) doing compressions and putting wound pressure, and I wont go into details but all that definitely intensified my urge to pursue medicine. I didnt say a boohoo story was going to carry me, I just tried to give everyone an overview of my entire app. But yeah thanks for all these reality checks guys.

I am really hearing you guys out and I know all of you are just trying to help. I am now considering a post-bacc or Masters or something now. As for my MCAT, my subscores are PS: 130 CARS: 126 Bio:130 and Psych/Soc: 126, which is a 13, 9, and 13 respectively. You think ADCOMS would maybe see these scores in terms of the old version at all? If so, the 35 can really help. I just had the itch to retake it because of the dang Psych/Soc that I know is the most easy to improve upon. So OK, I probably will not retake the MCAT.

But dou guys think I should apply this year still though? I can maybe get my GPA to a 3.45 at most.

 

[ThoracicGuy]

About May 23rd, 2014, I was a first responder (not yet en EMT) doing compressions and putting wound pressure, and I wont go into details but all that definitely intensified my urge to pursue medicine. I didnt say a boohoo story was going to carry me, I just tried to give everyone an overview of my entire app. But yeah thanks for all these reality checks guys.

I am really hearing you guys out and I know all of you are just trying to help. I am now considering a post-bacc or Masters or something now. As for my MCAT, my subscores are PS: 130 CARS: 126 Bio:130 and Psych/Soc: 126, which is a 13, 9, and 13 respectively. You think ADCOMS would maybe see these scores in terms of the old version at all? If so, the 35 can really help. I just had the itch to retake it because of the dang Psych/Soc that I know is the most easy to improve upon. So OK, I probably will not retake the MCAT.

But dou guys think I should apply this year still though? I can maybe get my GPA to a 3.45 at most.

If you are open to DO programs, you could probably match to one of them with your grades/mcat.