OP’s son would have had to take the MCAT in 2014 if his score is 34. The new MCAT started in 2015. Most (if not all) schools for this cycle require the new MCAT. Also, most schools look for extensive experience in a clinical setting, and often with underserved or rural populations, which is very difficult to get while an undergrad. I’ve heard that the average age for a first-year is around 24. The first year my DD applied, she was told by one school that she didn’t give the impression that she knew what it was like to be a doctor. She took a few years off and worked in a hospital and got accepted her next try. Getting into med school is tough!
I don’t want to confuse people his MCAT score was 504
504 is pretty low for med schools… it’s only around the 65% percentile. The premed thread, link posted above, would be a good place for OP to get up to date information on what med schools are looking for.
504? That is not a MCAT 34!
That is equivalent to a MCAT 27/28.
He should apply to DO schools.
Not only are all specialties open to both MDs and DOs, but as of 2020, all US med graduates (MD and DO) will go through the same Match process and every US medical residency will be open to grads from either program. The unification process started 2 years ago and will be complete in 2020.
And to reiterate what mom2 and thumper have said, DOs certainly can become ER docs. My daughter is an emergency medicine physician and some of her medical colleagues in the ER are DOs. (But it’s too soon to be picking out specialties. He needs to get into med school first. BTW, the average med student changes his/her mind 3-4 times during med school about their future specialty.)
DO schools have been sending out acceptances since late October. It’s really late to start for this cycle. And he definitely needs to shadow a DO.
Some DO schools sent acceptances closer to the beginning of October!
It’s not too late for a number of DO schools.
However, now that we know that his MCAT is much lower than previously stated, he should study and retake the MCAT to get his score up to at least a 513 and reapply.
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My son said his MCAT score was too high to apply at a DO school is this true?
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Absolutely not true. His MCAT is actually low for MD med schools. Your son grossly misled you about his MCAT score.
IM sorry I may have it wrong his score was in the top 10% with the MCAT I know that I may be thinking of the sat.
He did not get a 504 on the SAT either!
This information is getting confusing. You don’t know his GPA, and you don’t know his MCAT score…and you don’t know which schools he actually applied to in total.
I hate to say it…but hard to help with this lack of info.
Please ask him what his MCAT score was.
In your OP, you said it was a 34, which would be the old MCAT scoring. Then much later you said that it was a 504, which would be the new MCAT, but likely too low for MD schools, without a significant hook. .
And there’s no such thing as a 504 on the SAT
BTW…what is the Direct Entry program for NEOMED? How does that differ from simply applying to be a med student there?
Is it a shorter program for primary care? Or what?
It looks like th direct entry program is one whereby there are “partner” schools where applicants can get their bachelors degrees. It seems like these students have perhaps some preference in terms of admission consideration, but they still need to meet the require,wants for admission.
It looks like NEOMED has both a 2+4 BS/MD program and a more typical admission MD program. “Direct Entry” refers to the latter.
http://www.neomed.edu/admissions/medicine/bsmd
http://www.neomed.edu/admissions/medicine/direct
Even assuming his MCAT was a 34, that’s far from a guaranteed admission to any med school, especially if one’s application is submitted close to the deadline.
Med school admissions were less competitive when I was in college in the mid-late '90s…and even then…I personally knew 3 friends with higher MCAT scores(one scored in the 40s) and cumulative GPAs between 3.68-3.85+ from colleges with reasonably strong reputable pre-med programs including Berkeley and Tufts who ended up getting shut out for med school admissions despite applying widely not once…but as many as 4-5 times in a row.
In their cases, it was a mix of submitting applications close to the deadline and being extremely unlucky. One former post-college roommate who was a med school Prof and involved in their admissions mentioned that it was very possible they were shut out because the adcoms managed to fill the entire incoming med school class seats before they arrived at my friends’ apps simply because they receive a deluge of med school applications each year.
However, with persistence and continuing to have new positive things to add to their subsequent apps, when they were finally admitted, they were admitted to multiple med schools including some topflight ones such as UChicago-Pritzker School of Medicine along with receiving full-rides from others.
And the friend with the highest cumulative GPA and MCAT score ended up taking the full ride from another med school despite being seriously tempted by the UChicago-Pritzker admission offer.
All 3 have now been working as medical doctors for ~a decade or more.
Someone with a high GPA (3.75+) and a MCAT 34 has to essentially screw up in order to not get one MD admission.
Missteps like poor PS/essays, submitting to AMCAS or TMDSAS in August or later, late secondaries, weak LORs, ridiculous app list, and/or few/no medically-related ECs/shadowing/research will usually sink an unhooked applicant. Applicants should begin filling out the app in May and submit in June, if possible. TMDSAS (Texas meds) may have slightly earlier dates.
Posts saying that 50% of applicants are shut out does not apply to high GPA and MCAT 34 applicants. All applicants are not alike. Many applications are non-starters from the get-go (GPA/grade issues, low MCAT, submitted late, etc.). That said, even an unhooked traditional applicant with a sub 3.7 cum/science GPA and/or sub 509 MCAT, with an otherwise very good application, can have problems getting an acceptance.
The applications with insufficient stats are often filtered-out automatically…human eyes never see them. Those apps essentially have 100% chance of rejection…and there are many of these! That’s why suggesting that every applicant has a 50/50 chance of an acceptance simply isn’t true. The qualified applicants have a much higher chance of acceptance.
That said, the OP’s child doesn’t have a MCAT 34 (old scoring). He has a 504 (new scoring), which is low for a MD med school…essentially too low for an unhooked, non-URM applicant.
I think someone could really screw up the interview portion too.
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It looks like NEOMED has both a 2+4 BS/MD program and a more typical admission MD program. "Direct Entry" refers to the latter.
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http://www.neomed.edu/admissions/medicine/bsmd
http://www.neomed.edu/admissions/medicine/direct
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thanks, I saw that, but wasn’t sure if using that name, “direct entry,” implied something unique. I see that the 2016 MS1 class is made from 3 groups: BSMD (their largest group 89), Direct Entry (35), and CSU (24 Urban-area mission).
35 seats for DE isn’t many.
And the OP’s son’s undergrad isn’t listed as a school that had more than 1 students enrolled in the entire 2016 MS1 class. Only Ohio State, Pitt, Xavier, Akron, and Case were listed as schools that had more than 1 student in the entire class.
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think someone could really screw up the interview portion too.
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True, that is another way one could screw up. The point is that when a strong applicant ends up with no acceptances, it’s often because they messed-up somewhere.