Application Cycle One: 06/23/2009

• Undergraduate college: usnwr top 5
• Undergraduate Area of study: Biological/Life Sciences

• Total MCAT SCORE: 520
• MCAT Section Scores: B/B 130, C/P 132, CARS 129   Detailed Breakdown
• Overall GPA: 3.20
• Science GPA: 3.26

Summary of Application Experience

Didn\'t know what chances I realistically had at anywhere before I started, especially with my super GPA, and no real excuse for it. But with a strong mcat score, good post-bacc grades and a large amount of community service and research, I was able to recover from past mistakes.

In retrospect, this is the extra advice I have for all you low GPAers out there, in addition to the advice of being sure of wanting to go into medicine, having passion for people and/or science and all that other good stuff.
1. Get the best MCAT score you possibly can. Take it again if you are only kind of satisfied. AND
2. Take some post-bacc classes if you can afford them and do really well. Then you can have an answer to your low GPA when your interviewers ask about it. You can say something about your MCAT score being in the top 3% or how you have more recently shown a passion for succeeding academically and then bring up your post-bacc grades. you might also be able to get some good recommendations from those teachers if you make an effort to get to know them. which you should since now you have a reason to. :)
3. When you read your own personal statement, do you feel emotional about it? If not, tweak it some, ask your english/literature friends for help if you\'re someone like me who got an N on the written portion of the mcat. It doesn\'t have to be a heartwrenching tale of loss etc. But if you can\'t feel the emotion that you put into writing it, then it\'s less likely that someone else who doesn\'t know you will feel it either. That paired with a bad GPA is two strikes. and most people with 0 strikes don\'t get an interview either.
4. Apply early - though people say this is less important now that schools can just screen you based on your numbers, you\'ll already have the added nervousness about your GPA in addition to the normal anxiety you have as a med school applicant. Might as well know as soon as you can.
5. If you really want something that you didn\'t get (yet) send in a letter or call. Appeal to schools that allow it. If you make it onto waitlists/deferred lists/not been told about where you stand, take some time to communicate with the school. If it helps, then great! If it doesn\'t do anything and you still get rejected (more likely), you will at least have known that you did what you could to help your own case. I think one of my biggest regrets was not sending updates to schools that accepted them, and letting them know how interested I was in starting my medical education there.
6. WHEN you get your interview, prepare like you were about to interview for a chance to win a billion dollars. Though what you know about the school, or a question about the current status of medicare may never come up, it only takes a few seconds of the interviewer thinking that what you\'re saying is slight BS or to feel like you are unprepared to be a doctor, no matter how irrelevant the question, to not really make a stand for you to the admissions committee. And again you\'ll leave the interview feeling like crap. Leave no doubt in that interviewer\'s mind that you are THE REAL DEAL.

YOU CAN DO IT!!