WAMC/School list, CA resident 3.96/511

[Slowbutsteady00]

cGPA and sGPA as calculated by AMCAS or AACOMAS:
3.96 / I haven't calculated sGPA but somewhere ~3.94-3.95

MCAT score(s) and breakdown:
511 (131/123/129/128)

State of residence or country of citizenship (if non-US):
California

Ethnicity and/or race:
ORM male

Undergraduate institution + Major :
UCLA - Psychobiology

Clinical experience (volunteer and non-volunteer):
1000 paid hours as medical assistant --> Was first medical office intern(no payment) for 3 months, paid medical office intern for another 6 months, and then medical assistant for 3 months. Role changed over the year as I went from intake in the beginning to intake + phone call + observing surgeries/procedures.
Under the supervision of my doctor, I learned and vaccinated ~20 patients with covid vaccine during the pandemic.

Research experience and productivity:
600 hours of research. One summer internship on CRISPR-Cas9 and powerpoint presentation at the end. I've been acknowledged on one paper but no co-authorship.

Shadowing experience and specialties represented:
100 hours of shadowing ENT procedures and surgeries


Other extracurricular activities (including athletics, military service, gap year activities, leadership, teaching, etc).
200 hours of Crisis Text Line
mentored a middle school student for 2 years during covid through online
Was a club outreach chair for 1 year --> organized events to go to homeless shelters and food banks

I'm a little defeated to see my cars score really low. I've heard that there are some med schools that screen low cars score so I'm worried about that and not entirely sure about which schools to apply to with my stats.

Any help is much appreciated!

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[Faha]

I suggest these schools with your stats:
Vermont
Quinnipiac
Albany
New York Medical College
Hackensack
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Penn State
George Washington
Virginia Commonwealth
Eastern Virginia
Wake Forest
NOVA MD
Belmont
Tulane
TCU
Creighton
St. Louis
Rosalind Franklin
Medical College Wisconsin
Western Michigan
Oakland Beaumont
Wayne State
Alice Walton (when it opens)
California University
Loma Linda (if you fit their mission)
UC Davis
UC Riverside (if you are from that region)
UC Irvine

 

[Angler]

MSAR gets granular with 10 - 90 percentile ranges for each of the four components of the MCAT score. You could do your own screening of schools to weed out those with 10th percentiles greater than 123.

Was a club outreach chair for 1 year --> organized events to go to homeless shelters and food banks

ideally this is over 150 to 200 hours.

 

[ClashRoyaleKing]

Creighton, Georgetown, and Emory, to my knowledge, screen subsection scores. However, you might want to look into that as it might have changed over the recent years. They all have average MCATs around 515-516 which, for low yield schools, might not even be worth applying too if they screen. I also have a 123 cars and can confirm that the schools on Faha's list (minus Creighton) sent me secondaries in their first waves.

 

[Slowbutsteady00]

Thank you all for your replies!

I suggest these schools with your stats:
Vermont
Quinnipiac
Albany
New York Medical College
Hackensack
Drexel
Temple
Jefferson
Penn State
George Washington
Virginia Commonwealth
Eastern Virginia
Wake Forest
NOVA MD
Belmont
Tulane
TCU
Creighton
St. Louis
Rosalind Franklin
Medical College Wisconsin
Western Michigan
Oakland Beaumont
Wayne State
Alice Walton (when it opens)
California University
Loma Linda (if you fit their mission)
UC Davis
UC Riverside (if you are from that region)
UC Irvine

Thank you for the list! A question about this is do these schools not consider the cars subsection score individually? On MSAR for example, UC Irvine had a 10th percentile of 125 so I assumed I was screened out.

MSAR gets granular with 10 - 90 percentile ranges for each of the four components of the MCAT score. You could do your own screening of schools to weed out those with 10th percentiles greater than 123.


ideally this is over 150 to 200 hours.

I see. Yea, I've been looking at the MSAR and there were many schools where the 10th percentile was 124 but wasn't sure if that screened me out since they don't discuss about that in the MSAR except minimum cumulative MCAT score.

Unfortunately, it is closer to 30-40 hours because we did it once a month on Saturdays for 6-7 hours.

Creighton, Georgetown, and Emory, to my knowledge, screen subsection scores. However, you might want to look into that as it might have changed over the recent years. They all have average MCATs around 515-516 which, for low yield schools, might not even be worth applying too if they screen. I also have a 123 cars and can confirm that the schools on Faha's list (minus Creighton) sent me secondaries in their first waves.

Got it. Thank you for the valuable information. Since you had the same cars subsection score, I was wondering, if you had any success with getting into MD?

 

[Faha]

UC Irvine is a reach but if you want to stay in CA your options are few.

 

[ClashRoyaleKing]

Thank you all for your replies!


Thank you for the list! A question about this is do these schools not consider the cars subsection score individually? On MSAR for example, UC Irvine had a 10th percentile of 125 so I assumed I was screened out.


I see. Yea, I've been looking at the MSAR and there were many schools where the 10th percentile was 124 but wasn't sure if that screened me out since they don't discuss about that in the MSAR except minimum cumulative MCAT score.

Unfortunately, it is closer to 30-40 hours because we did it once a month on Saturdays for 6-7 hours.


Got it. Thank you for the valuable information. Since you had the same cars subsection score, I was wondering, if you had any success with getting into MD?

I have one interview invite to Belmont (Frist College of Medicine) which I will attend later this week. I have not had any success elsewhere, unfortunately. I did have some aspects of my application that were lacking at time of submission (hours of nonclinical volunteering) and perhaps showed too much interest in psychiatry/psychology in my application (alienating some ADCOMs, perhaps). However, my MCAT was lower than yours 509 and also could have played a significant role in my lack of success. Regardless, I am grateful for my interview and hope that it works out for me so I do not have to reapply.

 

[Slowbutsteady00]

UC Irvine is a reach but if you want to stay in CA your options are few.

Got it. Thank you. I appreciate your help!

I have one interview invite to Belmont (Frist College of Medicine) which I will attend later this week. I have not had any success elsewhere, unfortunately. I did have some aspects of my application that were lacking at time of submission (hours of nonclinical volunteering) and perhaps showed too much interest in psychiatry/psychology in my application (alienating some ADCOMs, perhaps). However, my MCAT was lower than yours 509 and also could have played a significant role in my lack of success. Regardless, I am grateful for my interview and hope that it works out for me so I do not have to reapply.

I see. I wish you the best of luck on this interview! You got this.

 

[Angler]

Unfortunately, it is closer to 30-40 hours because we did it once a month on Saturdays for 6-7 hours.

In person non clinical volunteering is far more valuable than crisis text volunteering. If you can possibly do more food bank or homeless volunteering (doesn't have to be leadership related) it would be much better.

 

[Slowbutsteady00]

In person non clinical volunteering is far more valuable than crisis text volunteering. If you can possibly do more food bank or homeless volunteering (doesn't have to be leadership related) it would be much better.

Got it. I'll look into more activities regarding that. I appreciate your help!