Accumulating W's because of Online School/Pandemic

[Great_Wumbo]

I've accumulated up to 3 W's now on my transcript because of an accident (had my first Covid W because of this last semester), on top of struggling with online learning (various problems such as poor internet disconnecting me from zoom lectures, losing 50 minutes on an exam because a proctoring software wouldn't work, lack of resources such as proper office hours or tutoring, etc.) and so I'm basically withdrawing for the overall sake of my own health and because of how catastrophic online school is, even at part time.

I have been a straight A student (4 GPA) for 6 semesters up until COVID hit and only had the last 2 semesters at part time to finish up my degree requirements + do some science pre requisite courses for schools like McGill or in the U.S. I stayed enrolled in just 2 courses in my final semester despite really struggling with online learning because I had gotten an interview at McGill Med and was going to push through and finish them if I had gotten a conditional acceptance. However, after getting a soft reject (astronomically high waitlist), I decided to bow out of my science courses this semester and retake them when school is in person in the fall in order to take care of myself. I have still graduated with my bachelors degree and merely plan to do these last couple of requirements later on as an independent student/continuing studies. 

Basically, are the W's gained during the past year of online school going to negatively impact my app or require written explanations for applications to any Canadian Med schools when I reapply broadly? Or are W's going to matter less in terms of raising eyebrows if they occurred during the pandemic? I know that my physical and mental wellbeing takes precedence over these types of neurotic what-if scenarios, but I would still like to know what the impact of having this many W's are on an application in general? 

Cheers, 

[bearded frog]

I don't think spring 2020, fall 2020 or spring 2021 Ws are going to be fussed over too much (some schools are not counting them at all). But you may lose any GPA advantages for doing full time studies, if the school has it. Each school probably has their own policy in terms of if or how they count Ws and if it gets flagged or not.

[Great_Wumbo]

3 hours ago, bearded frog said:

I don't think spring 2020, fall 2020 or spring 2021 Ws are going to be fussed over too much (some schools are not counting them at all). But you may lose any GPA advantages for doing full time studies, if the school has it. Each school probably has their own policy in terms of if or how they count Ws and if it gets flagged or not.

Thank you for your response, I figured that COVID W's were ideally not going to raise flags compared to how a pattern of multiple normal semester W's would; as the former shouldn't. 

Luckily my GPA doesn't require any weighing formulas or anything to be competitive. I stand at a 4 without any dropped semesters so the W's do not affect that. 

However, my main concern is whether or not I should go out of my way to explain these W's on an application given that they aren't merely just Covid related instead of waiting for them to be brought up in say an interview or instead of getting a pre interview rejection and ruminating as to whether or not the W's were the detriment of my app. For instance, McGill has a section where one can briefly outline any Extenuating Circumstances. 

[bearded frog]

I don't know. I wouldn't devote too much time on it in general essays but if there's an extenuating circumstances prompt you can say something like "My personal circumstances during school year affected by the pandemic resulted in me having to adjust my course load throughout the year but I was able to maintain a X GPA"