How will I be affected by one bad year?

[Guest tuncrypt]

My GPAs for years 1 and 2 were 3.74 and 3.60 respectively. In this recently completed 3rd year however, it was 1.81. I failed two courses, and got not a single A. lol, so awful. My piss-poor effort/achievement had to do with a multitude of reasons: extreme disinterest in my courses, if not my major; pessimism, self-doubt, as to whether it was worth trying; depression (because life in 3rd year really sucked, lol)... and so on.

 

But anyway, my question is how will this bad year affect my chances to get into medical school? Recent experiences and thinking have taken away the previously mentionned lack of focus and now I am definitely set on trying to get into med school. I am taking on a second major (Psyc; first is Biol) and subsequently a fifth year, leaving me two years that I will try my hardest to make great.

 

Yet that still leaves the 3rd year, and because of it my 5-year GPA cannot mathematically exceed 3.43. I will try the MCAT a 2nd time to compensate for it (1st time- 31O). But is that enough? Is that 3rd year a black hole and are my chances ruined? Or is there still some way out of this, a way to succeed?

 

 

(btw when the time comes I will be applying to not just Ontario, but all of Canada, the US, Aus, Caribb, Ireland, D.O.)

[Guest satsumargirl]

Hi there,

 

Your best bet is to have a look at how each school you want to apply to calculates GPA. They all use different methods. For example, MAC just uses a cummulative GPA for all undergrad courses ever taken. Ottawa will look at your last 3 years. In both these cases a bad 3rd year will affect you. However, at least at Ottawa, the first year of the 3 years used has less of a weighting...so that will help.

 

I am not sure how other schools work, U of T and UWO both have weighting schemes but I cannot give you the details.

 

You should be able to find the info on the school's webpages or on the OMSAS site (at least for Ontario).

 

Remember, you only have to meet the cut-off to have your application looked at

 

Best of luck

Sats

[Guest Talon01]

This is a hard question to answer. Each school looks at your GPA differently. For example, I believe UWO looks at your best 2 years so having 1 random bad year doesn't affect you. However, if you apply to Ottawa they look at the last 3 years you have completed (with the most recent year worth more) so a bad GPA the year before you apply could hurt but if it was 3 years ago it doesn't hurt as much.

 

Look at the requirements for each school you're interested in and you'll see for some schools it doesn't matter at all.

[Guest The Law]

It all depends really.

 

Western only looks at one year for the interview, and will give you conditional acceptance for having two successful years being over the cutoff.

 

Now, schools that take your cummulative GPA would be harder to get that interview. Currently your cummulative GPA is 3.05, but that's without using any of the weighting schemes of various schools. UoT drops your lowest 1.0 courses from each year, but I'm not sure if this marking scheme applies if you failed a course throughout your studies. I think Ottawa's cummulative GPA is

1x first year

2 x second year

3 x third year

4 x fourth year

etc...

 

since there is a lot of added weight to third year, it would be difficult to bring up your GPA for that school. Some schools use an average rather than a GPA, maybe that would help.

 

If all else fails and the GPA doesn't increase significantly after fourth year, you could do a "special year" and try to bring it up. You might also consider applying to schools in the USA.

 

I've read a few posts of people getting in with a cummulative undergrad GPA of around 3.3 and doing some grad work with a significantly higher GPA.

 

Hope this helps!

LK

[Guest smurfette99]

I'm not sure if this helps you, but I also had a bad year (my second) and worked my butt off to raise my grades in my last two years. I succeeded, and wrote in my application on how instead of giving up, I worked hard to turn my grades around. I think they appreciate good effort, and I got in this year So all is not lost! Don't give up! Just make sure to address this year in your application and don't excuse it, but explain how you were able to motivate yourself to do better.

 

Good luck

[Guest satsumargirl]

Unless Ottawa has changed something for next year, they will look at your last 3 years weighted as:

 

1 X year 1

2 X year 2

3 X year 3

 

Based on the post we are talking about 5 years in total. So your 3rd year in fact would only be weighted X1.

 

Just be sure your 5th year is part of a degree. Ottawa will only look at undergrad years leading to a degree...ie no special student years that you do after you graduate.

 

Sats

[Guest Lurkergonepublic]

UofM puts a 50% weight on MCAT (good if you bring that up higher) and only 10% on grades - plus they drop a lot (don't remember how much) of your lowest courses. Unfortunately they don't take a lot of OOP, but they do have a fairly rapidly moving OOP waitlist most years as I understand it.

[Guest sunE]

If you have 90 credit hours, U of M drops your lowest 15.

[Guest siobhansiobhan]

UofM has a caveat that i learned the hard way.

 

out of province applicants have a much higher cut-off than in-provinces for gpa. the out-of-province cut-off is not easily found in the literature - there was a page that had a bar chart of accepted oops with various stats. you can determine the cut-off, because nobody below that figure is accepted. confirmation of this oop cut-off can be had by calling, which is what i had to do when i first heard of this, not in the literature where it should be, but on ezboard, in passing. it was true. careful.

 

however, when i called, sounds like uofm is reconsidering how much weight they put on mcat as well. i'll be calling the various schools and being a bit pushy about policy to determine whether i'll apply. sometimes stuff is not in the literature immediately.

[Guest daryn]

U of T doesn't drop your lowest mark from every year. In your case, if you have had a full course load every year for those five years, you can drop your 5 of your lowest marks.

 

Siobhan: It was 3.9ish this year for U of M wasn't it? I'm sitting at a 3.88. Le sigh. Should I even bother?

[Guest aktpkb]

Hey guys, I am in a similar situation of one bad year. Here's my situation. I obtained 4.0 in both first and second year. However, my marks for third year were ~3.65 OMSAS scale :\ (a few bad course selections...). Anyway, my adjusted UofT GPA will still be >3.9 and I still qualify for Western and Queens.

 

However, my concern is admissions may look at this "trend" (if you can even call it a trend) very negatively and assume that I cannot handle more advanced material, which is not true at all.

 

I am just concerned this will raise an eyebrow amongst the selection committee since they will not have access to 4th year marks to prove that third year was just a fluke.

 

I appreciate any comments you guys have, thx!!

[Guest daryn]

I think it depends on the school. But for the first few rounds of cuts, I don't think it comes into play.

 

.....but argh. How do I wish I have your problem.

[Guest muchdutch]

no doubt! you should have/could have applied after first year with those 4.0's and probably be accepted to several schools (assuming you had solid EC's etc.)

[Guest aktpkb]

apply after first year??

[Guest muchdutch]

Yes. There are a few schools that only require two years of undergrad. So you can apply after first year then get accepted and enter med after second year.

[Guest aktpkb]

The only school I know where you can apply after 1st year is U of Alberta.

 

I just hope that this won't affect me too much...

[Guest Lurkergonepublic]

Siobhan: It was 3.9ish this year for U of M wasn't it? I'm sitting at a 3.88. Le sigh. Should I even bother?

 

I applied to UofM this year as an OOP and was given an interview. My cGPA (unadjusted) is about 3.6/4.0, so unless that's the 4.5 UofM scale you're refering to, I would say that's not right. My highest semester was only 3.74. MCAT was 36S, which is good, but not enough to get me past the GPA cutoffs at most Ontario schools, so I don't think I fell below any UofM cutoff. Better look into it more before deciding not to apply based on GPA.

[Guest ComplacentTragedy]

USaskatchewan only looks at your best two years.

 

And they also require a PHOTOGRAPH of you.. so uh... I guess you have to be like, beautiful or something.

[Guest tuncrypt]

"I'm not sure if this helps you, but I also had a bad year (my second) and worked my butt off to raise my grades in my last two years. I succeeded, and wrote in my application on how instead of giving up, I worked hard to turn my grades around. I think they appreciate good effort, and I got in this year So all is not lost! Don't give up! Just make sure to address this year in your application and don't excuse it, but explain how you were able to motivate yourself to do better."

 

 

how bad did you do? and which school(s) accepted you? lol