I went to community college and with my new found freedom at age 18, I didn't focus on school as much as I should've. I very rarely studied and my grades (mainly B's and C's) showed that. The past 2 years, I've been a stay-at-home mom, and I'm more mature and disciplined than I used to be. My original plan was to become an RN, but my whole life I've wanted to be a OB/GYN but I was intimidated by the whole medical school process and I didn't feel smart enough. I want to re-dedicate myself and try to reach my goal of getting into medical school, but I'm afraid of failure and then wishing I'd just went to nursing school. If I transfer to a 4-year and get A's in all of my pre-reqs, will I have a shot at getting into a medical school? Also, should I re-take the courses that I did bad in? I've talked about that with some advisors, but they have said I didn't need to.
Did bad my first two years of college, what are my chances?
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This is my first post on SDN. I am inspired to respond to you because I too had two poor years in junior college after high school, bad grades and legal trouble. After a couple years of working hard though I am doing great and in a position I never thought I would be in. You don't even need to get straight A's, just work hard and it will all work itself out. Take it one quarter/semester at a time, give back to your community, and before you know it you will be an excellent candidate for med school. Overcoming this obstacle will look impressive to anyone. Be confident.
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What is your current gpa? If it is too low, it may be impossible to salvage for MD. If not, you may be fine.
And retaking courses will help with DO schools, but not MD schools.
And retaking courses will help with DO schools, but not MD schools.
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play around with this link: http://www.image-ination.com/test_maker/gpa.html
You can see that depending on the number of credits, you are going to need about 120-130 credits to bring yourself up to a 3.4 which is still low, but put with an upward trend and all those credits at 4.0, it should suffice. you have a long uphill battle if you are looking to go MD.
Another option would be to go DO. You are still a fully licensed physician, the practice rights in America are exactly the same, the pay is exactly the same, and for all practical purposes, MD=DO. They also have a grade replacement which allows you to retake bad grades and DO schools will take the replacement grade. MD schools won't they will consider it two separate classes. For example a Chem 1 D and retake of an A will be both be considered as Chem 1 A at DO schools (the D will be completely ignored for consideration of GPA and for admission), whereas for MD they consider a Chem 1 D and a Chem 1 A.
So in short, gpa repair for DO schools can shave off a lot of time. It really depends on how hard you want to work. If you are willing to put in the time for MD schools, it is possible but it is going to be the equivalent of an entire degree done with a 4.0. If you get up to a 3.0ish and do well on the MCAT, you can do an SMP. That is another route.
Long story short, you aren't too far gone, but you are close. You only have two years done. If you had a degree completed or more credits, I would probably tell you to find something else to do. You need to make a drastic change.
You can see that depending on the number of credits, you are going to need about 120-130 credits to bring yourself up to a 3.4 which is still low, but put with an upward trend and all those credits at 4.0, it should suffice. you have a long uphill battle if you are looking to go MD.
Another option would be to go DO. You are still a fully licensed physician, the practice rights in America are exactly the same, the pay is exactly the same, and for all practical purposes, MD=DO. They also have a grade replacement which allows you to retake bad grades and DO schools will take the replacement grade. MD schools won't they will consider it two separate classes. For example a Chem 1 D and retake of an A will be both be considered as Chem 1 A at DO schools (the D will be completely ignored for consideration of GPA and for admission), whereas for MD they consider a Chem 1 D and a Chem 1 A.
So in short, gpa repair for DO schools can shave off a lot of time. It really depends on how hard you want to work. If you are willing to put in the time for MD schools, it is possible but it is going to be the equivalent of an entire degree done with a 4.0. If you get up to a 3.0ish and do well on the MCAT, you can do an SMP. That is another route.
Long story short, you aren't too far gone, but you are close. You only have two years done. If you had a degree completed or more credits, I would probably tell you to find something else to do. You need to make a drastic change.
Thank you! Would you advise re-doing my first two years of college?
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i don't know about redoing them. i am sure you took classes that aren't going to be valuable. and having a couple Cs aren't going to hurt. If you are interested in DO, I would retake anything you got below a C in and maybe some of the Cs that are science related (if you have a lot of Cs).
Thanks everybody 
Do you all think it's a good idea for me to go on and study biology and have a PA program or an accelerated BSN program as a back-up, just in case I'm not accepted into med school? Or would it be better for me just to try to get my BSN and then go back for my pre-reqs for med school?
Do you all think it's a good idea for me to go on and study biology and have a PA program or an accelerated BSN program as a back-up, just in case I'm not accepted into med school? Or would it be better for me just to try to get my BSN and then go back for my pre-reqs for med school?- Joined
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If you want to be a nurse then get a BSN. If you want to be a PA then do that. Whatever you do decide is your route, you need to give that 100% of your focus. Don't treat these all these health professions as back up plans, they have great applicants who have been working a long time to get into those jobs. If you give your all to getting into med school, then you will do your try your absolute hardest, and you will end up with better stats and better extracurriculars than you would have if you went through this long journey acting like you have all these backup plans. And if after you are far along in the process and it doesn't work out for med school, then you will at least have worked your hardest, ended up with a great resume, and will have far more options career-wise than had you taken on this process half-heartedly.
I used to think like you because of my rough start in junior college. But upon getting some great advice from my instructors, I realized that if I'm going to go for something, give it everything you've got, and at the end you will have no reservations. And honestly if you end up with 3 years with 3.7+ GPA with great ECs, it's not going to be too difficult for adcoms to look past your earlier transgressions. And you will have great life experience and a hell of a story to talk about in your personal statements/secondaries.
I used to think like you because of my rough start in junior college. But upon getting some great advice from my instructors, I realized that if I'm going to go for something, give it everything you've got, and at the end you will have no reservations. And honestly if you end up with 3 years with 3.7+ GPA with great ECs, it's not going to be too difficult for adcoms to look past your earlier transgressions. And you will have great life experience and a hell of a story to talk about in your personal statements/secondaries.
Thank you
I'm going to put my all into getting into medical school. I've read some promising success stories on the internet and on SDN and while I know it will be hard and I have a long road ahead of me, I think I can do it 
