That’s discouraging. So in community college when I was transferring to an undergrad school to get my bachelors, I had like a 2.0 GPA. Now that I’m taking college more seriously, I have close to a 4.0 GPA when I get my bachelors.
@BenKlesc when will you get your bachelors degree. Please answer this honesty
Dental schools have the same transcript reporting requirements as medical schools.
Report all institutions attended regardless of their relevance to the programs you are applying to. Failure to report an institution may cause your application to be undelivered. This can significantly delay the processing of your application. Report all institutions attended, including but not limited to:
- courses taken in high school for college or university credit
- summer courses
- community college courses
- US military academies (note that this does not include courses on SMART or JST transcripts)
- post-baccalaureate, graduate, and doctoral work
- study abroad, Canadian, and foreign work, etc.
- List all institutions on your application even if the coursework completed there was transferred to another institution.
- Report each institution only once, regardless of the number of degrees earned or gaps in the dates of attendance.
- Send official transcripts for each institution.
Source-- Filling out your ADEA AADSAS
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I have two semesters left. Then I get my bachelors of science, with focus in wetlands and conservation (environmental science) from SNHU online school. Not the greatest school, but would be very willing to study for a year to get a high score on an MCAT.
Looks like I may be moving to Mississippi for a few years if I’m serious about this. Lol.
Non-traditional students do have options to help overcome a poor start in college.
There are a few (very few) medical school that will only consider that last 35-40 credits earned in BCPM classes.
There are special programs call post-baccalaureate programs which can help a student improve their sGPA for the purpose of applying to medical school.
AMCAS has a searchable database of programs. Choose “Academic Record Enhancers” as the type.
And lastly, there are Special Masters Programs. A SMP is a special type of post bacc that simulated the difficulty and scope of first year of medical school. At the best ones SMP students will take classes side-by-side with first year med students and are graded on the same grading scale.
SMPs are high risk-high reward, last chance options. Do well in a SMP (top 20%, GPA>3.5) and you will have a chance of gaining an admission to medical school, Fall outside the top 20%, earn a single C or have a GPA <3.5 and you’ve kissed any chance of med school goodbye forever.
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Sustainability has huge applications in health care. Lots of emerging data on disease, nutrition, access to clean water, early childhood development, etc. in vulnerable environmental areas. The World Bank/UN are projecting massive human migrations over the next two decades as the water supply decreases in parts of the world increasing mortality and reducing quality of life/triggering a famine.
Why not explore some of the career paths that are open to you right now with a BS in environmental science- some of which will be health related, some not-- before you get tied up in knots about med/dental school?
You could be working in a cool job in your current field by the time you are still finishing up an SMP… with no guarantees of a med/dental admissions…
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um…most medical and dental schools will NOT accept online coursework to fulfill admission requirements.
Please consult MSAR to see what school will accept which–if any–online courses
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Will do. Is this just medical schools? I was interested in pursuing a masters in my current field at another university… since wetlands requires masters. Or even pursuing environmental law.
Acceptance of online coursework and degrees will vary by individual college. You will need to contact any grad program you’re interested in and ask. (Write to the graduate admissions liaison or department chair of the specific department you are hoping to enroll in to ask since policies will also vary by department.)
Most grad programs will require at least one letter from a undergrad advisor or a core curriculum professor who taught you in class.
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Okay. Another option if I’m very serious… take my last two semesters at a physical college and transfer. I may end up taking longer to graduate, but at least it won’t be from an online school.
Yeah… I was told that most places don’t care if your degree is online. I guess medical is the exception.
The required courses cannot be taken online. It’s not just where you get your degree
I thought they already took their required courses?
I’m confused.
Yikes. Well okay. I’m glad I went on here before pushing myself into this. So all of my prereqs for getting my bachelors I completed at Middlesex Community College which was a physical school. So Bio, Chem 1 & 2, Orgo etc. Then I transferred to SNHU to finish my electives for environmental science. Maybe I would still have a chance. If not, I would have to pursue a dental school that accepts online coursework. I think that would be the more sane option at this point.
Health profession* schools have many, many more applicants than they have seats. More than 15 applicants for every open seat at many medical and dental schools so the admissions officers can afford to be picky.
*Medicine, dentistry, physical therapy I know for sure all have restrictions about online coursework. I’m sure other health professions may have them as well.
Since you are unsure of your future career trajectory, you may want to take a look at this site: Explore HeathCareers
it describes all sort of health-related careers–including many you’ve probably never heard of. The site also has a searchable database of careers that you can explore by years of education required and salary range desired.
Dental schools are not any more willing to accept online coursework than medical schools.
All your science classes ideally should be done in person: gen chem, ochem, physics, intro bio, biochem. Most importantly the labs need to taken in person.
if you took bio, gen chem, and ochem at a in-person community college–that’s fine, but you’d still need to take biochem in person, plus any additional science classes required for dental school --like microbiology, anatomy & physiology, etc. (remember how I said that dental school admissions have more variation in admission pre-reqs? You need to look up each specific school you hope to apply to to see what they require.)
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I hardly ever recommend these, but if you do some actual shadowing of doctors/dentists and work in clinics to be SURE you want to go the med school route without having a set discipline you feel you must end up in, try the Caribbean. They are far more open to who they accept.
It is much more difficult to get residencies afterward, so “shop” carefully among schools - don’t just read their brochures, then do the best you can do there (can’t slouch and still make it), and be open to being a General Practitioner.
Otherwise, investigate other medical careers - technicians, etc. I know many kids who have gone that route and are perfectly happy as well as self-supporting income-wise.
Also from my understanding, the other careers related to healthcare involve the health science majors, not really environmental science correct? Pretty sure the only hands on career choice that really interests me in the health profession are the actual doctors and physicians who get to work directly with the patient. Nursing is great but doesn’t pay nearly as much. If I don’t end up pursuing this passion of mine, I may end up just focusing on my degree and getting into forestry, wetlands, etc.
I feel at this point based on all the responses here, choosing med would be close to starting over, even though I’m already close to a bachelors degree.
I doubt any US med school is going to want someone who is only interested in the doctor salary.
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Not all doctors are good docs, but I believe majority of doctors are worth what they are paid. I feel bad for nurses right now for all the work they do and going through the pandemic, long hours etc. I have great respect for them, but that’s a tough career choice. EMTs are also a tough career to choose. Doctors can have immensely stressful jobs, but at least they eventually are paid very well.