Will mid to top-tier schools still consider you if you had one really bad year?

[studentdoctor08]

For example, if you made a 2.7 one semester and a 3.1 the next (sophomore year), but your grades showed an upward trend for the rest of college and ended up with a 3.6 cumulative GPA?

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[Mountaineer12]

I'm not an expert but I think 3.6 is a little low for top-tier MD schools. With an excellent MCAT and ECs you may have a shot with mid-tiers though. The strong upward trend will help a lot.

 

[mmmcdowe]

I'm not an expert but I think 3.6 is a little low for top-tier MD schools. With an excellent MCAT and ECs you may have a shot with mid-tiers though. The strong upward trend will help a lot.

Agreed, a 3.6 with a very good MCAT score and a good explanation for why your grades were poor at the start of things would keep you in the pool for top 50 schools and at least a few of the top 20. Don't count on that MCAT score though until you have it.

 

[Snappl]

For example, if you made a 2.7 one semester and a 3.1 the next (sophomore year), but your grades showed an upward trend for the rest of college and ended up with a 3.6 cumulative GPA?

It's always more difficult to say in the case of a top-tier school, but I would say that many mid-tier schools are surprisingly forgiving of a bad semester or two, especially if it happens very early on in your college career. I had one bad semester (2.6) freshmen year and ended up with about a 3.7 by graduation because of a consistent upward trend. I was only asked (briefly) about the bad semester in one interview.