I think
@Scumbag_Steve and I agree on a lot of things.
😉 Between the two options, I would take a 3.0 GPA / 25 DAT.
First of all, a 3.0 could be straight B's rather than A's balanced with C-'s, and that is good enough to get into many dental schools. Secondly, the whole point of the DAT is to give adcoms a
standard measurement of academic ability. Someone with a high GPA and average DAT scores most likely received a mediocre education, benefited from unjustified grade-inflation, or grubbed for exam grades without actually absorbing the material. There's not necessarily something wrong with that--this person may be a driven student who is making the best of the opportunities he/she has. But I should think that DAT scores, if they serve their intended purpose, better reflect academic ability relevant to dental education than undergrad GPA.
However, I have a hypothesis that the most complete answer depends on the type of dental school. Based on anecdotal evidence and differences in admissions criteria between different types of schools, I think the low GPA / high DAT gives you a better chance of getting accepted to the most competitive private schools, but high GPA / average (accepted) DAT gets you into more schools on the whole.
This is because a few schools (since I applied to schools in the Northeast, e.g. Harvard, Columbia, Penn) list the rigor/reputation of your undergrad program as an admissions criterion, but most other schools will explicitly say that they do not consider major or "school name." Therefore, the most competitive private schools can be more forgiving of low GPA in their "holistic" assessment of a particular kind of applicant, especially because they recruit for intellectual and racial diversity moreso than state and regional-private schools. Specifically, I know for a fact that the three schools I listed here favor liberal arts students who 'think outside the box.' They also like hardcore engineering students, people devoted to humanitarianism, promising URMs, etc., all of whom may have lower GPAs due to their calculated educational choices. The average dental school, on the other hand, likes 'normal' applicants who are personable and academically consistent--but not necessarily geniuses--because they won't 'rock the boat' too much in dental school and it is a safe bet that they will become good general dentists.
Of course, this is a hypothesis, not a theory, and it is probably impossible to generalize in a meaningful way. I'm just throwing my thoughts out there for comment.
