New Evalution Process for Academics

[clie88]

http://www.med.ubc.ca/education/md_ugrad/MD_Undergraduate_Admissions/Evaluation_Criteria.htm

 

Looks like they are dropping your worst academic year (up to 30 credits) and may be considering prereq and MCAT marks prior to the interview. Cwazy!

[in2bat0r]

Does the removal of the worst year apply only to degree holding applicants?

[thatonekid]

Does the removal of the worst year apply only to degree holding applicants?

In order to have the academic year with the lowest academic average dropped, applicants must have 90 credits with grades remaining by the application deadline.

Based on that, and the examples on the website, it seems like you have to have completed 120 credits (4 years) at the time of the application. So you don't have to have a degree (you can be in your 5th year) but you have to have finished 4 years.

[hking03]

http://www.med.ubc.ca/education/md_ugrad/MD_Undergraduate_Admissions/Evaluation_Criteria.htm

 

Looks like they are dropping your worst academic year (up to 30 credits) and may be considering prereq and MCAT marks prior to the interview. Cwazy!

 

This was covered in the 10 year rule thread, but thanks for posting it again in a different thread, people should be able to find the information a bit easier now.

 

Does the removal of the worst year apply only to degree holding applicants?

 

Based on that, and the examples on the website, it seems like you have to have completed 120 credits (4 years) at the time of the application. So you don't have to have a degree (you can be in your 5th year) but you have to have finished 4 years.

 

The idea is that you can have up to 30 credits removed from one year provided it leaves you with at least 90 credits after they are removed...

 

If your worst academic year was 22 credits and you have 112 credits by the application deadline they could remove those 22 credits and still leave you with 90. You don't have to have a degree, but like kid mentioned above, you will typically have to have finished 4 years just like UofT... The only difference is you don't have to carry a full 30 credit load each year. If however your worst year is the year with 30 credits and you have 112, you won't be able to apply the rule as it will drop you below 90 credits by the applcation deadline.

 

Hope that clarifies.

[ubcMDhopeful]

None of these changes are good for me as I will be a 3rd year applicant

[apoc01]

Me too! Man, I would be so happy to even get an interview this year. Us 3rd years get it tough.

[medisforme]

I have a unique situation, any comments welcome.

 

My worst year is only 9 credits, my second worst year is 30 credits.

Neither of these years is absolutely terrible (3.33 vs. 3.65 or something).

 

My ogpa is actually helped more by dropping my second worst year, any suggestions on whether ubc would go for this?

 

I will email this question myself to them, if I am not accepted on May 13th.

[Larrivee]

Me too! Man, I would be so happy to even get an interview this year. Us 3rd years get it tough.

 

Haha, is it the schools fault that you are applying in third year?

Sure there are typically higher expectations of 3rd years, but that's because they are typically younger, have less academic experience, and are probably less mature than the other applicants. You can't expect that they are going to bend over backwards to get you into medical school when there are people with undergrad and masters degrees who may have just as good grades as you and have had more time to build up their ECs. If you think they're being to "tough" on you then wait until next year to apply (but I wouldn't suggest that, go through with the application anyways, you may get a couple interviews. I am no superhuman and I landed a few this year as a third year).

[Genemo]

I have a unique situation, any comments welcome.

 

My worst year is only 9 credits, my second worst year is 30 credits.

Neither of these years is absolutely terrible (3.33 vs. 3.65 or something).

 

My ogpa is actually helped more by dropping my second worst year, any suggestions on whether ubc would go for this?

 

I will email this question myself to them, if I am not accepted on May 13th.

 

I have the same problem too. I was extremely upset when I saw the policy. I already emailed the admission office and will post the reply when I get one. However I don't feel positive on this

[hking03]

I have the same problem too. I was extremely upset when I saw the policy. I already emailed the admission office and will post the reply when I get one. However I don't feel positive on this

 

Unfortunately, I doubt very much that they will make an exception... if they did for one it would have to be applied to all students.

 

So, the rule would be: pick a year that you want to remove and we will take it off. Not, your worst overall year up to 30 credits.

 

However, given the unique nature of your situation you may get some different news.

 

Good luck.

[ubcMDhopeful]

Haha, is it the schools fault that you are applying in third year?

Sure there are typically higher expectations of 3rd years, but that's because they are typically younger, have less academic experience, and are probably less mature than the other applicants. You can't expect that they are going to bend over backwards to get you into medical school when there are people with undergrad and masters degrees who may have just as good grades as you and have had more time to build up their ECs. If you think they're being to "tough" on you then wait until next year to apply (but I wouldn't suggest that, go through with the application anyways, you may get a couple interviews. I am no superhuman and I landed a few this year as a third year).

 

 

Agreed but still this rule has just made it harder for younger applicants as it will boost up the competetion. I agree that there are students with masters that have better EC but that could just be because they have had more time.

[Premeditated]

Agreed but still this rule has just made it harder for younger applicants as it will boost up the competetion. I agree that there are students with masters that have better EC but that could just be because they have had more time.

 

I have to side with Jake. If a 3rd year student got to drop a year they would be down to their best 2 years. Look at this year interim statistics, last 60 credits are traditionally a few percent above cGPA. Though it is not an advantage to 3rd year applicants, the UBC system is dropping a year for you, the 4th year you have yet to complete. No it doesn't put you on equal footing with full-degree students, but either way one group is disadvantaged and UBC is choosing the students with more education in favor of 3rd year applicants.

[ubcMDhopeful]

One other issue I have with this recent change is that it doesn’t give credit to people who have maintained high consistent averages throughout.

 

Although I completely agree that qualified students who have had a bad year due to being undecided as they started university or other personal factors should be given a boost, being consistent should also be taken into account. As of now it seems that the system is unbalanced and the latter group is not getting the credit they deserve.

[Genemo]

Unfortunately, I doubt very much that they will make an exception... if they did for one it would have to be applied to all students.

 

So, the rule would be: pick a year that you want to remove and we will take it off. Not, your worst overall year up to 30 credits.

 

However, given the unique nature of your situation you may get some different news.

 

Good luck.

 

Thanks for the input. I didn't put much hope on this either, although this put students with particular co-op schedule into huge disadvantage. I had only 12 credits in my third year because of co-op and dropping this year will do pretty much no help on me. Well but I guess I'm not the only person who has this problem.

 

But if they say they cannot make exception for this, I will have to suggest people not to choose the co-op option if they are thinking of ubc medicine.

[TankMasterFlex]

Thanks for the input. I didn't put much hope on this either, although this put students with particular co-op schedule into huge disadvantage. I had only 12 credits in my third year because of co-op and dropping this year will do pretty much no help on me. Well but I guess I'm not the only person who has this problem.

 

But if they say they cannot make exception for this, I will have to suggest people not to choose the co-op option if they are thinking of ubc medicine.

 

Yeah, I was thinking about that. For students still doing undergrad it may make sense to lump all hard/gpa lowering courses together in one year. I think coop will work out fine, just so long as you make sure that the average in the semester's courses is high. And if it's not... go knock off a bunch of harder courses in the summer.

 

This just introduced a lot of strategy into selecting undergrad courses and organizing semesters.

[cbfc]

Yeah, I was thinking about that. For students still doing undergrad it may make sense to lump all hard/gpa lowering courses together in one year. I think coop will work out fine, just so long as you make sure that the average in the semester's courses is high. And if it's not... go knock off a bunch of harder courses in the summer.

 

This just introduced a lot of strategy into selecting undergrad courses and organizing semesters.

 

if this system of evaluation holds; if it changes you might find yourself on the really crappy end of things

[iwh333]

i guess the big question is how much are pre reqs worth when factored into the AQ. we should find out in early May.

 

it's about 1 year worth of marks essentially, so maybe 20-30%?

[hking03]

i guess the big question is how much are pre reqs worth when factored into the AQ. we should find out in early May.

 

it's about 1 year worth of marks essentially, so maybe 20-30%?

 

Yeah, it would seem reasonable to suggest that the pre-req average would be worth about 1/3 of the overall/adjusted gpa.

 

It may be the case where the AQ is solely based on your overall/adjusted gpa. Then you have MCAT and Pre-req's as flags... with NAQ to wrap it up.

 

It just seems redundant to have a system where the same grade is calculated twice to get an AQ score. If that were the case it would have made sense to leave the last 60 credits in the AQ calculation. I think they may be shifting away from this type of calculation and just being straight up with your overall/adjusted average being the score you get on your AQ...

 

Just my thoughts though.

[rburgundy]

Yeah, it would seem reasonable to suggest that the pre-req average would be worth about 1/3 of the overall/adjusted gpa.

 

It may be the case where the AQ is solely based on your overall/adjusted gpa. Then you have MCAT and Pre-req's as flags... with NAQ to wrap it up.

 

It just seems redundant to have a system where the same grade is calculated twice to get an AQ score. If that were the case it would have made sense to leave the last 60 credits in the AQ calculation. I think they may be shifting away from this type of calculation and just being straight up with your overall/adjusted average being the score you get on your AQ...

 

Just my thoughts though.

 

Either way..I get raped (I'm sure many are in the same boat as well). C'est la vie I guess..

[Larrivee]

Either way..I get raped .

 

That doesn't sound fun

[Genemo]

Yeah, I was thinking about that. For students still doing undergrad it may make sense to lump all hard/gpa lowering courses together in one year. I think coop will work out fine, just so long as you make sure that the average in the semester's courses is high. And if it's not... go knock off a bunch of harder courses in the summer.

 

This just introduced a lot of strategy into selecting undergrad courses and organizing semesters.

 

But this is so unfair for people who already did co-op and got lowest in that year....>.<

 

And btw the adcom replied me:

 

 

No, we will only drop the lowest academic year, regardless of the number of credits taken.

[kylamonkey]

So who wants to speculate on how the accepted average will change because of this?

 

I'm kind of bummed that I'll only have a GPA of 78% at this point, but I'm grateful that I can drop my annus horribilus. My pre-req and everything is not too bad in the grand scheme.

 

I wonder if they will look at pre-reqs and MCAT in tandem? I mean, I have a 73% in 1st yr chem, 1997, but my PS on the MCAT is 13, I also have 73% from 1st yr English, same year, but MCAT WS S and R and VR 10...

 

I mean, a few of the pre-reqs and MCAT sections correspond nicely.

[Genemo]

So who wants to speculate on how the accepted average will change because of this?

 

I'm kind of bummed that I'll only have a GPA of 78% at this point, but I'm grateful that I can drop my annus horribilus. My pre-req and everything is not too bad in the grand scheme.

 

I wonder if they will look at pre-reqs and MCAT in tandem? I mean, I have a 73% in 1st yr chem, 1997, but my PS on the MCAT is 13, I also have 73% from 1st yr English, same year, but MCAT WS S and R and VR 10...

 

I mean, a few of the pre-reqs and MCAT sections correspond nicely.

 

I think this will help many people and the cutoff will go higher.

However I'm one of those who doesnt get anything out of the policy other than sadness T.T

If they would take my second lowest year away then my adjusted GPA will go up 2%, but now it doesnt even change...

[kylamonkey]

 

I mean, a few of the pre-reqs and MCAT sections correspond nicely.

 

Actually, I just wanted to comment because probably not many people on here know about Saskatchewan's system- the "prereq/MCAT" average is a minimum that has to be met, but you can meet it either through MCAT or prerequs.

[MarathonRunner]

So who wants to speculate on how the accepted average will change because of this?

 

I'm kind of bummed that I'll only have a GPA of 78% at this point, but I'm grateful that I can drop my annus horribilus. My pre-req and everything is not too bad in the grand scheme.

 

I wonder if they will look at pre-reqs and MCAT in tandem? I mean, I have a 73% in 1st yr chem, 1997, but my PS on the MCAT is 13, I also have 73% from 1st yr English, same year, but MCAT WS S and R and VR 10...

 

I mean, a few of the pre-reqs and MCAT sections correspond nicely.

 

Sorry to hear that although dropping your lowest year helps you, it doesn't help you as much as the 10-year rule did. I did notice you changed your signature - I do like what you've put there.

 

It would certainly be nice, for people like you, if they looked at the MCAT and pre-req average in tandem. I mean, it's pretty clear that those marks from the first year courses don't reflect your current knowledge or ability in chem or English.