Medical Education US

Hey Dr.Admin,
I will be applying to med schools this summer for fall of 2005. I have GPA of 3.85, two years of research experiences in two fields (Molecular Bio and Psychology), two years of volunteer work at various settings (i.e., hospital, temple, students) and numerous extracurricular activities. However, my MCAT scores are disappointing: PS-9 VR-8 BS-10 (Total=27). I am not a native-English speaker. I have been here in US for about 6 years. What do you think are my chances of getting into MD schools, if any? Thanks for your time and advise. Have a great weeK!

I think you have included most of the important information that will go into a decision making process - except letters of recommendation, which I assume will be good to excellent.

I don't know how much more difficult it is to get into medical school being from another country. One factor would be where you went for college - in the US or elsewhere? If in the US, it might depend on which school. After re-rereading your post, it appears you are probably in your junior or senior year of college? And if you had graduated before, the question would be what you've been doing and why you've postponed applying to med-school, etc.

For the vast majority of colleges, your GPA is excellent, as is your research and volunteer experience. MCAT scores are not great, but they are not terrible either. Having another language as your primary language can explain the verbal score, which I would guess is not as important as the science scores anyway. A 9 and a 10 are probably okay. I've known people with lower scores and lower GPA's get into medical school - but they grew up and went to college in the US.

Overall, I'd say you'd have a pretty good chance of getting into medical school - especially if you are graduating college from a decent US school.

Dear Sir,
Thanks for your advise. Infact, I am a sophmore at University of Illinois at Chicago. I am applying 1 year early. Is that ok?

Sorry to bother you again sir. But, I forgot to say that I am only 19 years old. Do you think that will put me at great disadvantage? Oh yea, I have received letters of recomendations from some well-known professors. Also, do you know anyone who got into University of Chicago or Northwestern with that kind of GPA, MCAT, and the experiences I have explained above? I greatly appreciate your help. Thanks again.

A few other comments based on what you've added -

I'm assuming you'll be graduating a year early - in which case it's not a problem. Your age is not a problem either. I would not recommend going to medical school without graduating undergrad - even though some med schools will accept people who have completed all requirements but do not have an undergrad degree.

I know several people who graduated after 3 years (myself included), and I also know several people who weren't old enough to drink when they started med-school. I don't think age is much of a factor if you are a solid applicant.

As far as your quesions about University of Chicago and Northwestern go - I'm not sure if your MCAT scores are high enough to get interviews there. I honestly don't know how much weight they place on the MCAT and what their cutoffs are, but I'm guessing most people at those schools will have higher MCAT's. The rest of your stuff looks like it'd probably be pretty typical for their students. Of course, at both schools you'd have to have a good interview to actually get accepted - the raw numbers in the application are mainly to get you the interview.

I'd put both Northwestern and University of Chicago in the "more competitive" category as far as medical schools go.

I know when I applied to med schools, there was one book that listed the average MCAT scores for each medical school - I can't remember if it was a Barron's book on med school, or some other book about differences of the different med-schools. It might be worthwhile to check out your library to see if they have a book there about medical school admissions and see if they have the data in there.