I have concerns about her AP scores. Only one is a 5? Scores of 3 and 4 indicate significant deficits in mastery of the material. Even if her chosen college will allow her credit for 3s and 4s, it would be a bad idea to accept the credits and begin with UL coursework. Having a weak foundation in the material means she’s going to struggle with UL material. And for pre-meds. GPA is key.
My questions:
- Will a lesser known, smaller state school still make her look competitive if she pulls off a 4.0 GPA or close, providing she does the added shadowing, internships, etc to boost her application?
Normally I would say yes, but since your daughter is a California resident, this changes my answer. California is the largest producer of pre-meds in the US. Med school applicants from UCB alone could fill every single seat in every public and private CA med school and still have applicants left over. Those 4.0 UCB/UCLA grads are going to be your daughter’s competition for those California med school seats. CA med schools demonstrate a strong preference for UC grads.
RE: out of state med schools. Unfortunately your daughter will still be competing with those UC grads for those OOS med school seats too. (More than 2/3rd of CA residents accepted to med school end up matriculating OOS.) While the UC preference will be less prevalent at OOS med schools, the UCs are known commodities for med schools which tend to be risk adverse when it comes to admitting students. Your daughter’s CV would need to be killer in order to stand out against those UCB/UCLA/UCSD grads.
NOTE: ALL premeds are expected to have significant amounts of physician shadowing, clinical volunteering with patients, community service with disadvantaged communities, leadership roles in their activities and clinical or lab research. A few hundred hours of community service and of clinical volunteering at a minimum. Your daughter has to have all those ECs or her application will get round filed. Having a internship or maybe some shadowing just isn’t enough and hasn’t been for a couple of decades now. Med school admission has gotten super, super competitive. Last application cycle only 36% of applicants were accepted.
Not at all. Neither a dual major nor a year round sport will get your daughter any brownie points/special recognition with med school adcomms. Strong time management skills are a baseline expectation for every applicant.
And I’ll note here that speaking a foreign language fluently is a plus, but it is never enough to tip the scales in favor of an acceptance. If she’s taking Spanish only because she thinks it looks good on a med school application–then she should rethink her plans.
Generally speaking, it doesn’t, but the undergrad one attends is not of zero importance either. It’s just much less important than GPA, sGPA, MCAT scores, LORs, ECs. Students coming from unknown/unfamiliar-to-adcomms schools need to have really, really strong application portfolios. (Which mean a high GPA reinforced by a very strong MCAT score plus outstanding LORs from her professors.)
[quote]*She would love to hear suggestions for backup plans for Bio major. She’s especially interested in Radiology, genetics, DNA.
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Have your daughter look through this site. It’s a database of other healthcare careers. She can search by the years of education required for entry and by salary ranges.
Note most of these careers I’m listing below require additional training beyond a basic BS/BA biology degree
Radiology-- radiation therapist, health/medical physicist, medical dosimetrist, nuclear medicine technologist
Genetics/DNA-- genetic counselor, clinical laboratory scientist/medical technologist, cytotechnologist, research lab technician
I have a friend who makes designer mice for medical and pharmaceutical research. She manipulates their DNA and breeding so the mice have certain genetic characteristics. Her job requires a PhD.