Does graduate admissions take undergrad work experience into consideration?

juillet
Wed, 08 Jun 2016 19:46:06 +0000

Your work experience may be taken into account if it’s directly related to your graduate program. For a PhD program, research experience in chemistry (paid or not) would be favorable. For a DDS program, either scientific/research-related work or work that exposes you to to the dental field would be advantageous. If you’re working food service or retail, those are less relevant and most programs won’t really care about that.

If you’re asking if the fact that you have to work will mitigate your lower GPA…no, not really. There are many students who work and/or balance many extracurriculars that take up equal time outside of school and still have high GPAs. (Research shows that 70-80 percent of college-educated people have worked at least some of the time they were in college, and they average about 19 hours a week. So you’re not alone.)

It’d be different if you had a compelling story about it - like you have younger siblings you are the sole provider for, or are caring for elderly parents who cannot work themselves. But simply being a traditional student who has chosen to work - or even has to, in order to maintain a certain standard of living - won’t be the kind of excuse programs would take favorably when looking at your GPA.

PhD programs are going to expect you to have a high GPA, high GRE scores AND research experience in chemistry. DDS programs, much like medical schools, will expect a high GPA, high DAT scores AND good evidence of your desire to be a dentist (like through shadowing or research experience or summer programs or something).