<p>I just finished my freshman year at Notre Dame. I am a mechanical engineering major (don't necessarily want to be an engineer, but I know this degree will set me up for a multitude of future careers that fit my interests, including engineering, business, and medicine). My freshman year cumulative GPA is not so good. I am wondering if I should bother filling my electives with premed prerequisites, on top of an already rigorous engineering curriculum--or if my poor grades this year have already basically excluded me from being accepted into a decent med school, and I should just focus on doing well in my engineering courses.</p>
<p>Freshman GPA: 2.82</p>
<p>Foundations of Theology: A-
Intro to Engineering I: B
Honors Seminar I: B-
Calculus III: B-
Intro to Chemistry: C+</p>
<p>Physics I: B+
Intro to Engineering II: C+
Honors Seminar II: B
Intro to Linear Algebra/Diff Equations: C</p>
<p>...Not my best work. However, I am not an idiot and I am well aware that I didn't put nearly enough effort into my studies this year. </p>
<p>Assume I actually put in the time & effort, and get good grades (mostly A's) in my classes from here on out (coincidentally, this is the same exact thing that happened to me in high school, and I managed to succeed at it)...do I have a chance of being accepted into a good med school?</p>
<p>I am in a special honors program that only 20 engineering students from my class were accepted into (based on high school performance). I work at an on-campus caf</p>
<p>Take one or two biology classes that are prerequisites because a lot of medical classes are like that. Do you like that sort of class? You can always repeat a former class to raise the grade point can’t you?</p>
<p>It’s only a year so you can certainly raise raise your GPA by a lot. Your chance of medical school is not shot. But you may be making the same mistakes I did in undergraduate by reaching for too much. I heard engineering at Notre Dame is ridiculous. </p>
<p>Medical admissions places unholy demands on your GPA regardless of your institute or rigor of study. Those help as do great MCATs but not enough to cover big GPA gaps. I think if you are seriously entertaining thoughts of medical school, you need to drop as many things as you feel you need to turn out as many As as possible next year.</p>
<p>You can always do research, volunteer, shadow at any time, even after school. The average age of matriculating medical students is rising and it would not look out of place at all if you focused on your studies and did research/volunteer only toward the end or after college and then applied. But you can NOT undo damaging grades (not for MD since there’s no replacement), you can only mitigate their effect by having good grades elsewhere. </p>
<p>To give an idea, not to discourage but to stress your road ahead. If you get full As in every class for the next 3 years, and assuming equal course distribution, your GPA would rise to a 3.7. For that effort of academic perfection, you would be just above the medical school average (about 3.6x) and STILL below the average for most top schools (3.8/3.9). That’s the fight you have in front of you and you do not want to be weighed down by so many other things. </p>
<p>Me: Many years older first time applicant, who just finished a year where 6 of my courses were directly with medical students where I sat for their exams. Received A- for one and A+ for other 5, which is roughly 1 pass/high pass and 5 honors. Yet in college, I couldn’t get As in the sciences when I was double majoring. </p>
<p>I believe you 100% when you say you have what it takes. I just want you to temper your optimism and think carefully about what you can realistically handle.</p>