What was you're cumulative GPA and MCAT scores, if you don't mind my asking. I've been considering Med school and have heard/known people get in with anywhere from a 4.0 to a 3.25 and MCAT scores all oiver the place and just want to get a feel for what to expect.

If med school falls through for you, be a pharmacist!

http://honors.tamu.edu/opsa/pdf_files/medchart.pdf

Ihad a 3.82 and was admitted everywhere I applied (went after my Junior year). Old MCAT, so that doesnt apply equally.

Thanks Vet

some guy got into UT-San Antonio with just over a 3.0 in political science. wow.

I had a sub-3.0 GPA at A&M. I do have a really high MCAT though and that probably helped a lot. I received 9 interviews, went to 8, accepted at 5, waitlisted at 3.

My biggest thing in my interviews was I just told them I didn't give a rat's ass about grades when I was in college. I just wanted to have fun. You'd be surprised, most of my interviewers warmed up to the honesty.

Again, though it doesn't hurt to have a slammin' MCAT. When they come at you in the interview with I'm not sure if your grades are good enough to cut it you just whip out your MCAT score that they rarely see and they focus their attention elsewhere.

I don't want to think about getting a high GPR or MCAT score right now its kind of depressing to think about all the work still ahead of you

Holden, I wish that worked for nursing school. I didn't even get an interview because of my gpa.

btw, all you people who got into medical school, congrats and I'm jealous.

quote:

---

I didn't even get an interview because of my gpa.

---

I know what you are talking about.

The Mrs. is a nurse and when she was applying to Nursing School is was straight up GPA. It was almost like there were no other factors considered.

Most med schools will take a long look at your entire application thankfully. It really helps these days to have unusual things on your application. The more unique you are, the better off you will be. They look at so many 3.5, 30 MCATs, BIOL majors, 21 years old, getting ready to go straight from college to med school, etc.

A lot of the people I've seen having success lately have actually spent a little time out in the real world, many working in the medical field in some capacity. It lends them credence when they get to an interview and are asked the question "Do you know what you are getting into?". There is such a difference when they meet these people vs. the 21 year old kid who's greatest exposure to the medical field was a 1 month volunteer stint in patient transportation.

There are a couple of other posters on this board in school right now as well. One is at A&M and the other is in Houston. They both graduated undergrad from A&M recently so they might be able to shed some light from the other side of this coin.

Holden, just out of curiosity, what did you get on your MCAT?

90th %ile.

Quick story for ya...

I was in Chicago volunteering at this free health clinic. All of the volunteers were made up of Chicago's finest, most elite pre-med applicants sans myself. They were collectively the biggest group of d-bags in the midwest.

Impossible to talk to socially.

One day I was trying to ask this girl about her volunteering schedule so we could make sure someone was going to be there to work the lab. So I ask "What are your hours going to be on Monday?". She responds "41". I say "come again?". She says "Wait what did you ask?". I repeated my question and she says "OMG, I just told you my MCAT score!".

Only time in my life I have had homicidal thoughts.

BMED,

make sure you purchase this book for the Verbal portion of the test:



I know a couple of 14 VR people who solely used that book.

FYI, a 14 on VR will open a lot of doors for you.

A 41??? Torbush.

A GPR higher than 3.5 and a 30+ on the MCAT will get you in almost 100% of the time, I think it was like 97% or something to get into a Texas Medical school

Honestly, you should be a Pharmacist even if it doesn't fall through for you. Much easier and awesome hours.

quote:

---

Much easier

---

My aunt is a pharmacist, and she busted her ass

Make sure that you visit with the people in the OPSA office. They can help you out with figuring out what types of things you should be doing now so that you'll have a strong application when it's time to apply.

^^^^^^^^^^

Good advice

Yeah, good advice.

Definitely go visit OPSA. I was always afraid to go b/c you have to write your GPA on this little card before someone sees you. Its a way for them to know what they're working with before they meet with you. Can't tell you how painful it is to lead off with a 2 point something. The whole time you are talking to the adviser you know they are thinking in their head "what is this kid thinking?". With that said they were always really nice and they sit in on a lot of adcom decision-making meetings so they know what you need to do and not do.

Also I met a kid today at our school who got in with a 23 MCAT and he matched a few weeks ago into Radiation Oncology. One of the most difficult specialties. It can be done...

Hey Holden what's going on.

I'm in med school at UT Houston. My scores are on that med chart somewhere

Keep that GPA up, and study a pretty good amount for the MCAT. You'll be fine.

Yo!

What you got planned for the summer?

I landed a sweet research position in a Cardiology Lab and I'm going to try and study for Step I a little.

Yes, visit with Karen Hudson, the OPSA Pre-Med/Pre-Dent advisor. She's a very valuable resource. Make sure you go to the file workshop and do everything to get them to write your composite letter, I've heard the schools really like that.

[This message has been edited by barkerwr (edited 4/27/2008 9:24p).]

I second the Karen Hudson advice. Obviously, you can get in without the help of the OPSA office, but they make it so much easier to get your application organized, and the letter they write for you is money.

Just try to do the best you can on three things:
1. GPA
2. MCAT
3. Extracurricular Activities. Quality over quantity.

quote:

---

What you got planned for the summer?

I landed a sweet research position in a Cardiology Lab and I'm going to try and study for Step I a little.

---

SCORE!

I'm in a Cardiology lab also! What are the details of your project? I'm doing something related to the reversal of cardiac hypertrophy...cool stuff.

Our lab is studying a possible Factor that helps lower chol/eliminates plaques/etc. Last week I was pinning mouse aortas, split open, to wax plates and then staining with a stain that attaches to the plaques. Then we use photoshop/imagepro with the aortas and see how successful our Factor is.

Are you thinking about Cardiology? I don't have much of an idea but Cards sounds as good as anything else.

That'd be pretty cool if we wind up at residency in the same place. Small world...

At this point we don't know anything.

I'll probably do some sort of internal med though...not sure.