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FAQ: What are my chances?


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Many thanks to whoever looks at my WAMC:

  • State/Country of Residence: Canada (Ontario) 

  • Ties to other States/Regions: None 

  • URM? (Y/N): N 

  • Year in School: Will graduate BSc in 2022 

  • Undergraduate Major(s)/Minor(s): Life Sciences 

  • Graduate Degrees (if applicable): None 

  • Cumulative GPA: 3.93 (Upwards Trend) 

  • Science GPA: 3.94 

  • MCAT Score(s): 517 - 129/128/130/130 (CP/CARS/Bio/PS) 

  • Research Experience: 200 hours in medical research at a US state university 

  • Publications/Abstracts/Posters (include how you were credited e.g. first author, second author, etc.): Second author on a published biology research study 

  • Clinical Experience (paid or volunteer): 300 hours hospital volunteering 

  • Physician Shadowing: 100 hours observership/shadowing with a doctor in the US 

  • Non-Clinical Volunteering: 200 hours 

  • Other Extracurricular Activities: Teaching assistant for 2 semesters 

  • Other Employment History: Lifeguard (5 Years so far) 

  • Immediate family members in medicine? (Y/N): Y (But does not practice in Canada or the US) 

  • Specialty of Interest (if applicable): Interest in Orthopedics 

  • Interest in Primary Care (Y/N): Y 

  • Interest in Rural Health (Y/N): Y 

  • Medical School List: Dartmouth, UVA, Michigan State, George Washington, Maryland, Virginia Commonwealth, Wayne State, Boston, Emory, Georgetown, New York Medical College, Medical College of Wisconsin, Penn State, Pittsburgh, SLU, Jefferson, SUNY Upstate, SUNY Stony Brook, Tulane, Hawaii, UCLA, Case Western, Kentucky 

 

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On 4/19/2021 at 5:22 PM, HopefulMD786 said:

EC's are excellent and so you have an excellent chance at UBC with your GPA. There is no chance at UofT with a 3.65 OMSAS GPA. You have a good CARS score so I would def shoot for Mac as well, but again the 3.65 leaves you at a very slim chance. Great chance at Queens and decent chances at the other schools as well. Good luck!

Didn't see this reply until today, my apologies.

I agree, NOSM + Mac + UofT are just my donation schools honestly (i.e. based on my low GPA, my application will likely be thrown out the window ASAP). The other 7 are the ones I have more concrete hopes for.

Thank you!

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On 5/4/2021 at 1:45 PM, sam1423 said:

Hey guys. I'm just wondering what others think of my situation for applying this summer since im quite nervous.

I'm going to be a third year applicant. I have a 3.89 CGPA (3.81 first year where I had medical issues making me go part-time for a little, then 3.97 this year). but I spoke with u of T where they will only look at my second year GPA since they dont look at any year with part time.

Im writing the mcat in august and I am aiming for a 510-515 and have been doing well in my practice thus far (my diagnostic test score was 502 (125/126/126/125).

For extracurriculars, I have worked as a tutor, am a campus tour guide, and was a musical theatre class instructor. I have close to 2000 volunteer hours from the time that you can start recording hours from either animal shelter volunteering, kids help phone, and some work with people with disabilities. I also am a club executive at my school for health equity. I have a little research experience with my local hospitals clinical research team this year but no pubs or anything.

Im applying to mac, u of t and queens this year and Mac is my dream school.

Any suggestions people have or really any comments people have would be nice. Good luck to everyone as well who's applying this year.

Hey,

So, your GPA has an upward trend which is great and looks like a solid MCAT diagnostic! There's one thing I think you may be mistaken on.

"I'm going to be a third year applicant. I have a 3.89 CGPA (3.81 first year where I had medical issues making me go part-time for a little, then 3.97 this year). but I spoke with u of T where they will only look at my second year GPA since they dont look at any year with part time."

UofT looks at all courses taken between September to April, regardless of whether they were taken full-time or part-time. It's just you can't have a wGPA applied to a year that is part-time. They are not going to look only at your second year lol. 

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On 5/9/2021 at 3:39 AM, scaredofceilings said:

Hey,

So, your GPA has an upward trend which is great and looks like a solid MCAT diagnostic! There's one thing I think you may be mistaken on.

"I'm going to be a third year applicant. I have a 3.89 CGPA (3.81 first year where I had medical issues making me go part-time for a little, then 3.97 this year). but I spoke with u of T where they will only look at my second year GPA since they dont look at any year with part time."

UofT looks at all courses taken between September to April, regardless of whether they were taken full-time or part-time. It's just you can't have a wGPA applied to a year that is part-time. They are not going to look only at your second year lol. 

Really? on their admissions page it says part time study is only used towards pre req and degree credit requirements and not GPA. thats what i was thinking when i said that! But i could be 100% wrong haha

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  • 1 month later...

I’m looking for some advice on which schools I best have a chance at (aka where is it worth applying) I don’t have access to a lot of funds for applying to medical school so I really want to at least narrow my options to where I have a chance. About me: from Labrador/NL, Métis status (I have a lot of respect for Indigenous culture but I do not have any personal connections to Indigenous culture and have not previously applied for an Indigenous seat). 
Grades: 

- Cumulative: 85%, on OMSAS scale: 3.72

- Last 2yr GPA (OMSAS): 3.88

- First year, 82 (OMSAS: 3.59), second year, 82 (OMSAS: 3.57), third year, 89 (OMSAS: 3.85), fourth year, 89 (OMSAS: 3.90) 

-I am also starting my MPH in September

-MCAT is only a 500 (124/125/124/127) but I am re-writing this summer and thinking I can get it to at least a 510 (based on practice tests)

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  • 1 month later...
6 hours ago, GraceScott said:

500 on mcat is not that bad actually

Uh...

No shade to previous poster, but objectively, yes it is. Notwithstanding it is 45th percentile, in terms of actual Canadian acceptances using 2019 data (the latest available), only 13.5% of Canadian applicants (649/4792) applied with an MCAT < 500 (the buckets are 496-499 and 500-503, but we can assume the difference between 499 and 500 is negligible), and only 0.7% of applicants (34/4792) with an MCAT < 500 received at least one offer of admission. Put another way, the at least one admission offer of acceptance rate was 19.2% (924/4792) for MCAT ≥ 500, compared to that 0.7% rate for MCAT <500.

So yes, it's bad, and they are smart to rewrite to get to 510 (78th percentile and an exponentially higher acceptance rate of 8.3% for MCAT ≤ 511).

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  • 1 month later...

Hey guys! I'm in a weird spot where I could be competitive, but might not be...

cGPA: 3.58

2YGPA: 3.88

MCAT: 514 (127/127/128/132)

Extracurriculars:

- Masters degree

- Non profit leadership

- Teaching assistant

- RA in a few labs

- 2 publications

- 1,000+ hours hospital volunteering

 

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

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  • 5 months later...

Hey guys! I'm wondering if I'll be competitive this cycle, and what I might be able to improve! I'm planning to apply to Queens and Western. 

cGPA: 3.58

2YGPA: 3.88

MCAT: 514 (127/127/128/132)

Extracurriculars:

- Masters degree

- Non profit leadership

- Teaching assistant

- RA in a few labs

- 2 publications

- 1,000+ hours hospital volunteering

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 months later...

To anyone looking at this, thank you for your time <3

Educational Stage: CEGEP degree (DEC), 3rd year trad undergrad with minor at Carleton U (3 years completed). Fluent in french, so applying to french streams if possible. Woman, low SES

GPA:

  • Y1: 3.9+, 5 courses each term with one P/F

  • Y2: 3.7~ 4 courses and 1 P/F for each term

  • havent taken orgo II. P/F orgo I, which was a grade below B (thus making me ineligible for uottawa I believe?)

MCAT: taking in a few days, averaging 509 (most recent FL 126/128/128/127)

CASPer: not yet taken

Non-Academic (Extracurriculars & Volunteering):

  • Founder of club (started 2021)

  • 2 scholarships & 2 bursaries awarded through 2 years of undergrad

  • lived abroad for three months during the winter semester to help my aunt care for her newborn (not sure how to frame this in the context of the application, sure made my third semester much more difficult)

  • not sure if work is counted as an EC, but due to financial reasons I was never able to stop working and this affected my grades/ECs/MCAT: I’ve been working a part time job in the region throughout my degree, and throughout studying for the MCAT (full-time)

  • run a secondhand and hand painted clothing page whose proceeds go to a children’s hospital (since last summer)

 

  • volunteer graphics and opinion contributor to campus newspaper

  • volunteered at a palliative care center kitchen during one semester (probably omitting)

  • creativity prize at a hackathon (2017), honourable mention at Model UN convention (2018)

  • several ECs in cegep including executive with philosophy club, amnesty international and video editor for the college’s YT channel.

  • Free time: videogames, arts and crafts, climate change & human rights activism, politics & debate, fashion.

Research: lol none, I’ve been trying ...

Schools of interest: QC (IP), Ontario, and anywhere I have a bloody chance

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Wondering how my application looks. I graduated from nursing school in 2020. 

Cumulative GPA (OMSAS): 3.88 (3.89 w/ summer courses). First year was low (3.78) because they gave us a heavy course load, but all other years are over 3.9 (3.95 2nd, 3.91 3rd, 3.98 4th). My course load is low in 4th year (6 courses, one of which was pass/fail), because most of my time was spent in clinical placements. 

I still need to do the MCAT, which I'm dreading

Research: I've worked as a contract research assistant for a nurse researcher at U of T since 2019. Coauthored 3 publications (2nd author of two, 3rd author of 1). Hopefully we'll be publishing 2 more in the near future. 

Employment: RN since June of 2020. 1 years as a full-time ICU RN, certified to work in Level 3 critical care. There's the aforementioned research assistant job, which I work about 10 hours per week on.  I also work as a relief RN for an overdose prevention site in Toronto (I pick up a few shifts, about 15 hours total, every month). 

Volunteering: I have experience both as a tutor and managing said tutoring organization while I was in school. I was also elected to the school's Senate in my last year of school, but that was just meeting for a few hours each month). Since graduating I've also been volunteering in LTC (150 hours in the last year), and doing social media and political advocacy work for a professional RN organization. A lot of that is secretarial work like attending and scheduling meetings, but I spend a few hours each week on it and the chapter president would verify that. 

I also have a volunteer project I'm working on for my hospital unit, where I'm helping redesign website content for the Critical Care webpage on our website, to be more accessible and informative. This project was my own initiative: I came up with the idea, connected the relevant stakeholders, and I'm currently developing the content alongside a graphic designer. We actually won an innovative project award from a nursing organization recently, but unfortunately I don't have any other noteworthy awards or scholarships to list. 

I'm worried that my ECs are a bit weak, but on the other hand my hope is that my employment experience will balance that out. I took the overdose prevention job because I've always wanted to volunteer with marginalized communities, and I can do far more working as an RN than I could as a volunteer. Many of our patients are homeless or precariously housed, and in addition to overdose prevention I often help connect clients with other medical services and perform assessments on them for injuries and infections. But I don't how schools look at volunteer experience vs. employment experience. 

I'm also considering moving out west or up north for a few years, and then applying to schools out west as an in-Province applicant. Because of their weighted GPA formulas, my GPA would be more competitive in BC (92%) or Alberta (3.92 cumulative/3.97 weighted) than it is in Ontario. The nice thing about a nursing license is that you can take it anywhere. 

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