Second Bachelor's

Applying to College
1

Hi all,

I’ll try to keep it short. I’m an international student and hold a Bachelor’s degree in Arts. However my overall marks are pathetic. I plan to study MD in USA and the universities with whom I had correspondence have prerequisite that international students should study for few years in a USA university. Hence i am thinking of studying a second bachelor’s in science. Would this be an appropriate decision? Would be second degree be given importance during selection or it would not be given importance. I’m 23 running into 24 in May next year. Advice of this community would be greatly appreciated.

I am not converting my marks into GPA as I am not sure how it would be done.

Thank you for reading my thread.

2

Any advice?

3

I think the problem is that even if you get a second BS degree, you would still need to apply to medical school as an international student. It is extremely difficult for international students and is very expensive.

@WayOutWestMom and @mom2collegekids have great insight into how this will impact medical school admissions.

4

Yes, you could consider completing a second bachelor’s degree. You will need to pay the entire cost of that yourself. How much money do you have available? If some of your previous credits transfer and are used to cover general education requirements, you might only need to take courses in your new major, and you might be able to finish in three years or so. You also need to have your English skills evaluated, and you should be prepared to pay the cost of a semester or two of intensive English if your scores are not good enough for admission into academic classes.

If you were a US applicant, I would recommend that you complete a Post-Bac Pre-Med program instead of a full second bachelor’s degree. However, you will need to be enrolled in a degree program in order to get a student visa, so the Post-Bac programs might not qualify you for a visa.

Is it necessary for you to study in a US program for your MD? There may be better options for you in your home country or elsewhere.

5

Admission to US medical schools is extremely difficult for international students.

  1. US medical schools do not accept credits earned at most international colleges. At a minimum, applicants must take all their pre-reqs at accredited US or Canadian colleges. Additionally, many med school require a minimum of 90 credits be earned at US or Canadian schools for admission.

  2. very, very few international students (i.e. non US citizens or green card holders) are accepted into US medical school each year. Last year only about 200 internationals were accepted at all US med schools combined; of those 200, 85% were Canadian citizens. There are only a very limited number (<40) of US med schools that will even consider internationals for admission. Preference is given to Canadian applicants.

  3. there is no financial aid for med school available for internationals. You must be able to demonstrate the ability to pay for all 4 years of your education in advance by either presenting a letter guaranteeing financial responsibility from your home country’s government or place into escrow in a US bank an amount equal to 4 years of tuition (and for some schools 4 years of living expenses)–which is typically in the $250,000 to $350,000 range.

  4. med school admission will include ALL your grades when computing your GPA and sGPA so your current “pathetic” grades will be included. This will damage your GPA and, depending on just how poor your grades are, may place you in a position where you cannot raise your GPA high enough to be competitive applicant for med school admission.

6

Thank you so much aunt bea for your reply.

7

@happymomof1 Thank you so much for your reply. Cost would not be a problem and as you rightly pointed out that post baccalaureate would not be a wise option for me as I would be having a problem in getting the visa. Hence second Bachelor’s the only option for me. I’ll definitely get the English skills evaluated. Tha k for pointing that out.

There are quite a few problems in my home country because of which I am planning to either apply to USA. I won’t state the problem in detail as that would make the reply too lengthy.

8

@WayOutWestMom Thank you so much for your extremely detailed reply. I’ll try to answer the points you mentioned one by one.

  1. I totally agree that credits earned from international universities are not accepted by medical universities as nearly all of them require that international students study for few years at a US university. And for this reason I consider of applying for a second Bachelor's from a US university.
  2. State medical universities don't consider international applicants at all. But private medical universities I had a talk to, said they do consider international students. And certainly private ones are more expensive than state medical universities. Few of my friends are studying at private medical schools in the US and the counsellor I am consulting too suggested me that though admission is tough but not impossible and only requirement is to maintain high GPA in the second Bachelor's and good MCAT score. Now I'm not too sure how correct the above information is and would appreciate your views regarding this.
  3. Finance would not be a problem.
  4. That is a point to ponder upon. I would definitely be giving my best to have best possible GPA that I can achieve. And by pathetic I meant my marks in my first bachelor are not competitive enough. But I did ask a medical college about what would they consider more and they replied that they would give more importance to coursework completed in the US.

Thank you once again for your reply and correct me if i am wrong in any of the above.

Praveer

9

RE; #2 This isn’t entirely true. There are some state medical schools that will consider international applicants so long as they have met the state residency requirements and have demonstrated an affiliation with the state and desire to remain in the state and serve as physician to its population.

In the most recent incoming class at the local state med school, there were 2 international students (both from Mexico but who are long term residents of the state).

10

Thank you so much once again for your valuable advice. But I still feel that though it’s difficult but not entirely impossible to get admission if we maintain a high GPA, in my case second bachelor’s.

Thanking you
Praveer