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Official "What are my chances for McMaster" Thread


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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi everyone.

 

I'm a Canadian citizen who goes to school at Johns Hopkins, senior right now. My mom is an alumnus* of Mac Med, and my cGPA is 3.2.

 

ECs

Tutoring/caring for able bodied and disabled sudanese and afghani refugee children for past 5 years, absolutely lots of fun.

Neurosurgery shadowing (2 years, clinic surgery and research)

Alzheimer's Research (1 year)

Pediatric Oncology research (6 months)

2 first author publications with same neurosurgeon (also presented at international Neuro disorder conference in Oct.)

3 second author with same (bad coin flip with research associate)

1 psych 2nd author

Volunteering at elementary school teaching intro neuroscience to K-8th grade, Mentoring robotics competition with local Baltimore middle schools.

 

11V MCAT

 

Anyways, people are saying you need a cGPA of 3.8... But I want to go to Mac. Chances? a cGPA of 3.8 is unattainable for me at this point.

 

PS if it matters this is my first time posting on a board like this... a little nervous.

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Hi everyone.

 

I'm a Canadian citizen who goes to school at Johns Hopkins, senior right now. My mom is an alumnus* of Mac Med, and my cGPA is 3.2.

 

ECs

Tutoring/caring for able bodied and disabled sudanese and afghani refugee children for past 5 years, absolutely lots of fun.

Neurosurgery shadowing (2 years, clinic surgery and research)

Alzheimer's Research (1 year)

Pediatric Oncology research (6 months)

2 first author publications with same neurosurgeon (also presented at international Neuro disorder conference in Oct.)

3 second author with same (bad coin flip with research associate)

1 psych 2nd author

Volunteering at elementary school teaching intro neuroscience to K-8th grade, Mentoring robotics competition with local Baltimore middle schools.

 

11V MCAT

 

Anyways, people are saying you need a cGPA of 3.8... But I want to go to Mac. Chances? a cGPA of 3.8 is unattainable for me at this point.

 

PS if it matters this is my first time posting on a board like this... a little nervous.

 

Hi Tintinabelum,

 

Your extra-curricular background is impressive. In the old days, it would have carried sway at McMaster. Unfortunately, they decided to now completely ignore extra-curricular activities (at least according to their stated formula) and replace that part of the formula with a test that measures typing speed (called CASPer).

 

The official formula is:

32% GPA, 32% VR, 32% typing speed, with an additional 1% for a Master's degree and 4% for a PhD.

 

Among matriculants, your VR score is a bit better than average, but your GPA is well below the average. So, the only way to be competitive at McMaster is to be an extremely fast typist and score in the highest percentile on the typing speed test.

 

Again, all of this is assuming there aren't some additional factors relied upon that aren't explicitly stated in their admissions formula.

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Thanks for the replies, ah well I guess it doesn't hurt to toss my name in the ring. I'm getting my masters in biochem/reprod. bio from Hop so I guess I'll look into other options too.

 

The reason I mentioned my mom going is because her and a few people from her graduating class that I've met say that there is still a component that considers "legacy" points (I hate saying that it sounds so pretentious). Ah well though!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi All!

 

I've heard from a lot of people that Mac prefers applicants with diverse backgrounds, however I have yet to hear how much this actually factors into their decision making. I'm a civil engineering graduate who has been working professionally for almost two years now.

 

cGPA = 3.51

VR = 10

 

I felt pretty good about CASPer, but I'll probably know how good by whether I get an interview or not.

 

I'm trying to decide if I should go back to school to improve my grades/get pre-reqs and/or rewrite the MCAT (I was consistently getting a 12 or above in VR on the practice tests). There is also more incentive seeing as how they got rid of the writing sample, which I happened to bomb.

 

Thanks!

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verbal= 9

GPA = 3.98

what are my chances?

 

do great on CASPER and you got a decent chance for an interview.

 

your GPA is high so I suggest an MCAT rewrite to make yourself competitive for other med schools like queens and western.

 

what are your PS and BS section scores?

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Does any one know how much of an impact having a Master's degree actually has? I understand the +1% to the formula, but I'm not clear how much of a difference that actually makes.

 

no one really knows. it can make you or break you (in regards to threshold). I'd say it has little effect with Mac, but more with UofT and Queens.

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Does any one know how much of an impact having a Master's degree actually has? I understand the +1% to the formula, but I'm not clear how much of a difference that actually makes.

 

If I'm correct about how they calculate the formula, if you have a 3.8 and a masters, you will be equal (GPA-weight wise, which is 25% of the formula) as someone with a 3.95 GPA without a masters. This is just for GPA, so not taking into account the MCAT and CASPER. But you can basically make the same case with any of the 3 variables (MCAT, GPA, CASPER)(not so much for CAPSER since nobody knows what their score will be). I could be wrong though.

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