Chance me for accelerated Bio-Dent programs

Pre-Dentistry & Dental School
1

I’m a senior applying to some 7-year dental programs: Upenn CAS/Upenn dental (and other sister schools like Lehigh, Villanova, etc.), NYU/NYU dental and Adelphi/NYU Dental, Case Western Reserve/ Case Western Reserve Dental, UoP dental. What are my chances?

Objective:

SAT I (breakdown): 1530 (English 730, Math 800), essay 19
ACT (breakdown): 35 (English: 32, Reading: 36, Math: 36, Science: 34) w/o essay (took the September ACT and waiting for the score, I took it hoping for a 36, but I highly doubt I’ll get 36 :smiley:)
SAT II: 800 Math II, 790 Chemistry
Unweighted GPA (out of 5.0): 5.0
Rank (percentile if rank is unavailable): 10% (100 students) (not sure about the % tho)
AP (place score in parenthesis): AP Cal BC (5), AP Micro (4), AP Macro (5), AP Physics 1 (4), AP Stat (5), AP Chem (5), AP Bio (5), AP Eng lang (5), AP Physics C:mechanics (5)
Major Awards (USAMO, Intel, etc.): Honor Roll, 2017 and 2018 WMTC individual silver medal (team placed 7th and 12th respectively)

Subjective:

Extracurriculars (place leadership in parenthesis): Varsity Soccer 2 years, Varsity Korean Archery 2 years, School Math Circle (president), School Rock Band community (played guitar for 3 years), MUN 2 years, Mock Trial 2 years, Biology lab club 2 years (co-founder)
Job/Work Experience: Dental Office (30ish hours of shadowing from time to time during winter/summer vacation)
Volunteer/Community service/summer activities: Volunteered at Seoul National University Dental Hospital (45 hours), went to Cambodia for medical service (5 days) during summer
Essays: Essay about my personality of trying new things, (supplements are in progress)
Teacher Recommendation: one from my cal, stat teacher another from my bio teacher
Counselor Rec: Counselor likes me a lot. (if that helps)

Other

State (if domestic applicant): international
Country (if international applicant): South Korea
School Type: Private high school
Ethnicity: Asian (Korean)
Gender: Male
Income Bracket: not sure
Hooks (URM, first-generation college, etc.): mom and dad both dentists, massive commitment to dentistry

Strengths: Commitment to dentistry, course load, standardized testing, GPA
Weaknesses: ECs and dental shadowing

General Comments: I’ve been aiming for dental schools since junior high so I am sure that I won’t digress(?) during the dental programs. Since both of my parents are practicing dentists, I was often exposed to dental settings which allowed me to develop this dream of mine. As an international applicant, I might be at some disadvantages, but I really want to become a dentist in the US.

2

I think you stand an excellent chance at the Lehigh accelerated program. Be sure to show demonstrated interest - you don’t necessarily need to visit since you are international, but it would help. Nail your Why Lehigh question. Good luck!

3

Did you ED this year? If yes, did you get into the Penn/Penn accelerated program?

4

Hey man, I did the exact same thing. I’m also South Korean too (high five!) and I also used to go to a private foreigner/international school in Korea before I moved to New Jersey in the start of high school. Best of luck to both of us!

5

@dbstjgus Unfortunately, I was deferred by Upenn CAS ;(
But on the bright side, I got accepted to 7 yr UDM and 5 yr UOP dental programs!
Right now, I’m waiting for Nyu/Nyu and Adelphi/Nyu. I also applied to CWRU and Temple accelerated programs

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@Jin1324 Wow! I hope we both get into dental schools ? What programs did you apply?

7

+edit
I did get a 36 (not superscored) on my September ACT so I submitted my ACT instead of my SAT.

8

Hi! I’m a current junior in South Korea and I want to apply to dentistry schools too. I have a few questions and do you mind answering them? Please reply when you see this!

9

Hi! sorry for the late reply. I’d love to answer your questions.
you could email me if you want thanatoscylla@gmail.com cheers

10

Did you end up getting accepted to the rest of schools(i.e.Upenn CAS/Upenn dental (and other sister schools like Lehigh, Villanova, etc.), NYU/NYU dental and Adelphi/NYU Dental, Case Western Reserve/ Case Western Reserve Dental)?

11

Hi, I was rejected to Upenn CAS/Upenn dental, Villanova/Upenn, Muhlenberg/Upenn, CWRU/CWRU, and waitlisted by Adelphi/NYU. I was accepted to UDM/UDM, UOP/UOP, NYU/NYU, and Temple/Temple. I committed to Temple’s 7-year program

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I am wondering what kind of guarantee do these accelerated dental school offer to the accepted students. I know the GPA/DAT condition to maintain to get into their dental school. However, I heard that some school only guarantee a seat in the interview, which only give you 30% chance of final admission. I heard only about 60 POP/POP students end up in the POP dental school. Do you have detailed info for those accelerated 7 year dental program you applied? I appreciate if you can share if you know anything with some reasonable certainty. Thank you.

13

Hi, I’ll try to answer as accurately as possible, but there’s a limit to how certain my answers may be since I haven’t even started school yet. First of all, these dental programs only guarantee an interview with the designated dental school. Then you might ask “Is there any preference for program students?” The answer is it varies by the school (at least from what I researched).

According to (I think you meant UOP instead of POP) an email sent to me by the pre-dental advisor at UOP, "The DDS class in the UOP’s Dugoni School of Dentistry has ~142 seats. About 1/3 of them are filled each year with our students. The other 2/3 are filled with candidates selected from a pool of about 2700 applicants from other institutions. You already passed through a harsh selection when you were accepted into the Pre-Dental Program. Now that you are in, you have to study to meet the academic and non-academic marks that the program requires, and if you do, you are guaranteed an interview at Dugoni. Last year we had 82 students from the Pre-Dental Program apply to our Dental School, 71 were interviewed and 65 were admitted. On average, 92% of our students who interview at Dugoni are accepted into the DDS program. The interview is a verification instead of a selection for our Pre-Dental students. " As you can see, the email tells us quite straightforwardly that UOP’s pre-dental program almost guarantees a spot in UOP’s dental school.

However, if we look at another case with Temple’s PPHS 7 year dental program, not all dental programs are like UOP’s. I asked them via email whether there is a preference for the program students and this was their response. “Thank you for your email. The number of students accepted in the accelerated program vary from cohort to cohort. Because the 3+4 Program does not guarantee acceptance to Kornberg School of Dentistry, the number/percentage of students accepted to Temple’s Dental School each year varies as well. The 3+4 students are presented individually to the Dental School by Pre-Professional Health Studies and will apply with a Committee Letter to support their application to Kornberg School of Dentistry.” Also, this was written in my agreement form. “There is no guarantee to College of Science & Technology students that they will be given preferential consideration by Maurice H. Kornberg School of Dentistry. Final decisions will be solely at the discretion of Maurice H. Kornberg School of Dentistry.” Seems like there is less guarantee for the Temple program students than the UOP program students.

In conclusion, there really isn’t a definite answer to your question. Although I generally think that most dental programs will somewhat guarantee more than just “a seat in the interview”, it’s best to just try and research as much as you can. This is a long comment, but if you read it thoroughly, I think you’ll kinda get the idea.

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14

Thank you for your detailed answer. I really appreciate that.
Here is my thought. It appears that there is no point of going to “an accelerated dental” or “guaranteed dental program” at least for those guaranteed dental programs, which do not give preference to their students in dental school admission such as Temple’s PPHS 7 year dental program.

“An accelerated dental” or “guaranteed dental programs” are as competitive as Ivy if not more. Arguably more competitive because accelerated professional programs such as BS/DDS or BS/MD emphasize more on objective stats particularly standardized scores not EC bs or “holistic” bs.

Paradoxically, students in an accelerated dental can be disadvantageous to their application to dental school because they have to compete amongst extremely competitive pre screened students to achieve high GPA. This would be particularly true for a small school such as UDM or UOP. Those predental students will take almost same classes throughout 3 years. Other students in Ivy league schools can easily achieve high GPA. I know that a lot of private Ivy league schools have rampant GPA inflations. All they have to do is acing DAT, which is only objective judgment test. This means that pre dental students from Ivy league potentially have better chance of getting into dental schools because they may have higher GPA with a bonus prestigious name value of their Ivy school. It does not stop there. If students from UDM or UOP accelerated dental program somehow fail to secure admission to any dental school after 3 years, it can be disastrous because their lesser known name value of its undergraduate. On the other hand, those self directed predental students in Ivy league can get a job easily even if they fail to secure admission to any dental school.

As far as I know UOP admits 200 accelerated dental students. That means that good portion of 135 predental student( you said 65 students successfully got into their dental program) failed to get into any dental school even if some portion of them ended up getting into other dental school.

In order to curve this kind of dilemma, Northwestern’s HPME Program (BS/MD) not only guarantees admission to MD program but also allow exemption of MCAT. Do you have any thought on this?
Why did you choose Temple over other 3 universities on predental?

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15

Hi, I see that you have thought a lot about this. I, too, thought about applying to Ivy league/Ivy plus schools and following the traditional 8-year route when I was a junior. But in the end, I decided that accelerated programs were more economical and efficient. Here are my reasons.

First, it is cost-efficient. You save a year of tuition, and that’s very big. You can also save time, which allows you to practice early.

Second, it is a less rigorous process than the traditional 8-year system (and has a higher chance of landing an admission to a dental school). Generally, pre-dent students who are not in the pre-dental advantage program would need to complete hours of shadowing, spend time doing additional research, etc. Meanwhile, students in the pre-dental advantage program would just have to maintain GPA and score the minimum DAT score.

I guess these are the two main reasons why I chose accelerated dental programs.

Now, some points I want to mention after reading your comment.

  1. "An accelerated dental" or "guaranteed dental programs" are as competitive as Ivy if not more. Arguably more competitive because accelerated professional programs such as BS/DDS or BS/MD emphasize more on objective stats particularly standardized scores not EC bs or "holistic" bs.

According to my experience, Ivy League schools are way harder to get in than these accelerated dental programs. My stats were enough to get into NYU/NYU program, but I was rejected by Duke, Johns Hopkins, Brown, and Upenn. If you show some interest in dentistry and strength in bio/chem, then that’s enough to get into these programs imo. (but there are accelerated dental programs that are very competitive, one of which is the CWRU/CWRU program.)

  1. Paradoxically, students in an accelerated dental can be disadvantageous to their application to dental school because they have to compete amongst extremely competitive pre screened students to achieve high GPA. This would be particularly true for a small school such as UDM or UOP. Those predental students will take almost same classes throughout 3 years.

For this part, read this from the pre-dental program advisor of UOP. “We usually have about 60 students starting in the Pre-Dental Advantage Program every year. You do not take all classes together. Many of our classes are also taken by pre-med, pre-pharm, biology and sports science students in addition to other majors. Most classes have multiple lectures and lab sections to choose from. In addition, our pre-dental program is very versatile, and while some classes are required, many others are elective, allowing our students to come up with a great diversity of course work trajectories.” (I highlighted the important parts with stars) But of course, you do have a point. It might be harder to maintain a high GPA in this kind of environment, and Ivy League students might benefit from GPA inflation. Yet, I believe it won’t be that hard to maintain the “minimum GPA” required for the interview.

  1. As far as I know UOP admits 200 accelerated dental students. That means that good portion of 135 predental student( you said 65 students successfully got into their dental program) failed to get into any dental school even if some portion of them ended up getting into other dental school.

Well, as you read in the earlier mail, UOP has approximately 60 new pre-dent students every year. And if you reread my first reply, it said, “Last year we had 82 students from the Pre-Dental Program apply to our Dental School, 71 were interviewed and 65 were admitted. On average, 92% of our students who interview at Dugoni are accepted into the DDS program.” So, not that many students face the “disastrous situation” you talk about.

  1. Why I chose Temple It's easy; I received full tuition during my undergraduate years. When it comes to dental school, the name value is not that important. Cost becomes more critical. Being able to graduate dental school with less debt is probably the best choice. It doesn't matter if you graduated Upenn or NYU school of dentistry if you have to repay your debts for more than ten years. Obviously, for me, Temple was the cheapest option. UOP and NYU were way too expensive. And yes, Temple might provide me the highest guarantee, but that's something up to me. If I do well, then that's it.
  2. In order to curve this kind of dilemma, Northwestern's HPME Program (BS/MD) not only guarantees admission to MD program but also allow exemption of MCAT.

Wow, I never heard of this. This must be a very tough program to get into.

Overall, I think the trend of “accelerated dental programs” is slowly fading away. Schools like BU and USC once had these programs, but now they are gone. More and more people realize that the merits might not outweigh the risks. But for an international student who wants to become a US dentist like me, 7-year programs helps me out a lot. Anyways, sorry for this late long reply. Have a good day. :smiley:

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16

Thank you very much for your informative comment. It helps me a lot.

Congratulations on the full ride scholarship to Temple undergraduate. As far as I know, a lot of international students are reluctant to ask financial aid / scholarship because they worry that will reduce odd of getting accepted to selective universities. Some international students openly say on YouTube that they were rejected because they asked financial aid. One guy that I watched on YouTube said he received the rejection letter specifically noted the reason of rejection being international student requesting financial aid.

In common app section, there is a question asking applicants for application for financial aid. I am wondering if I should answer yes to that question, saying I am seeking financial aid or not.

My question is the following. Did you request the final aid? Or, Temple granted the full ride scholarship on need blind base even absent of your request. Did you request financial aid to all Ivy schools?

Your objective stats ,particularly standard test scores are Ivy League caliber without a question. If you requested the financial aid that might be the reason you got rejected. What do you think?

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No, I did not apply for financial aid at all. Every scholarship I received was in the form of a merit scholarship (even Temple’s full-tuition scholarship). So, financial aid is not one of the reasons why I was rejected by Ivy schools. I guess I wasn’t desperate enough when I was writing my Ivy supples.

I also think that applying for FA significantly reduces the chances of being admitted (unless you have US citizenship). But there are exceptions. One of my friends was accepted to Notre Dame even after applying to FA. Still, I think the best way is to earn merit scholarships by showing that you are academically proficient.

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Thank you very much for all of your info.
I wish all the best in your future endeavor of becoming a dentist in US.
I really want to know how you are doing in predental year of Temple’s PPHS 7 year dental program. Do you mind emailing you about predental in the future?
Thank you.

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No, not at all. Ask me anytime. GL to you as well :slight_smile:

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Update

I know the pre-dentistry forum is getting less and less attention, but just wanted to come by and say hi. This past august, I started dental school as a D1 at Kornberg School of Dentistry (super exciting). Now, I can answer questions beyond pre-dental scope as I further progress into dental school. But, I’m also hoping to gain advice from other dental students. I hope you guys are all doing well :slight_smile: