Doing an exchange during undergrad

[verycaffeinated]

Hello, 

I was just wondering if there are any applicants who went away for exchange during their undergrad? I'm considering applying for exchange to Australia or maybe Europe but I don't know if that would affect my future application to MDCM or not.. I tried searching for prior posts on this forum but nothing recent came up..

Do you guys think doing an exchange would be a good idea? 

Thanks!

[rmorelan]

15 minutes ago, verycaffeinated said:

Hello, 

I was just wondering if there are any applicants who went away for exchange during their undergrad? I'm considering applying for exchange to Australia or maybe Europe but I don't know if that would affect my future application to MDCM or not.. I tried searching for prior posts on this forum but nothing recent came up..

Do you guys think doing an exchange would be a good idea? 

Thanks!

I mean it can be difficult so you have to be careful etc - some schools won't count the year, others will convert the grades from that year to a GPA value here using a service called WES. That means you have to know what sort grades you need to get, and ideally how likely that would actually be before you go. 

I hate the idea that some of these cool opportunities can be somewhat challenging - the point of university is some form of exploration - but you have to live within the rules etc. I always recommend contract your target schools for medicine in advance to find out their thoughts on how things would work. 

[this_process_is_death]

I’ve been on exchange in Australia and I got an interview last year. I don’t think it’s an issue 

[verycaffeinated]

2 hours ago, this_process_is_death said:

I’ve been on exchange in Australia and I got an interview last year. I don’t think it’s an issue 

How did McGill Med end up counting the courses you took in Australia?

[Bambi]

Is it a risk worth taking, i.e., short term gain vs potential long term loss?

I would weigh it very, very carefully. Because it worked out for one poster does not guarantee you anything. In my view, you have more to lose than you have to gain if medicine in Canada is the goal.

[this_process_is_death]

On 12/23/2018 at 3:34 AM, verycaffeinated said:

How did McGill Med end up counting the courses you took in Australia?

 It was evaluated as Pass/Fail on my transcript, but I declared my grades for the academic workbook. Not sure how McGill evaluates it for the McGill GPA

[starstar1790]

I've been on exchange to UK. If you only go for one semester, you don't need to disclose the grades you get there in McGill's academic workbook, and you don't need to send them the foreign transcript, so it's basically a free pass. However, if it's more than one semester, you will have to email the admission office for the GPA conversion chart specifically for the school you went to and provide your original and converted grades in the workbook. My recommendation would be to only go on exchange for one semester because the GPA conversion chart is actually quite harsh, e.g. an upper second score in UK is actually converted to a B+ = 3.3 at McGill, not A-. 

[verycaffeinated]

46 minutes ago, starstar1790 said:

I've been on exchange to UK. If you only go for one semester, you don't need to disclose the grades you get there in McGill's academic workbook, and you don't need to send them the foreign transcript, so it's basically a free pass. However, if it's more than one semester, you will have to email the admission office for the GPA conversion chart specifically for the school you went to and provide your original and converted grades in the workbook. My recommendation would be to only go on exchange for one semester because the GPA conversion chart is actually quite harsh, e.g. an upper second score in UK is actually converted to a B+ = 3.3 at McGill, not A-. 

That's helpful, thank you!

I ultimately decided to apply for exchange in another Canadian province so I don't think the conversion chart will be different but do you know if I'll have the option to disclose my grades from my exchange regardless in case I end up getting good grades?

[starstar1790]

Yeah, you can definitely do that. 

[starstar1790]

1 hour ago, verycaffeinated said:

That's helpful, thank you!

I ultimately decided to apply for exchange in another Canadian province so I don't think the conversion chart will be different but do you know if I'll have the option to disclose my grades from my exchange regardless in case I end up getting good grades?

Yeah, you can definitely do that.