Students often wonder how to get into medical school with a low GPA. Well, buckle up, because
you are about to get some very honest advice! All of the extracurricular activities in the
world won't grant you access to medical school if your grades are not up to snuff. Do you
want to learn how to get into medical school with a low GPA? Then keep watching this video
for our tips. Hi! My name is Chris and I am an admissions
associates here at BeMo. Before we get started, please be sure to subscribe on whichever social
media channel you're watching this from now so you won't miss
any of our upcoming videos. If you would like us to help you get into medical school, visit
BeMoMedSchool.com to schedule a free initial consultation. As a quick tip, check
out the time stamps in the description of this video to navigate to specific sections
of the video that you are interested in. Here's what we're going to cover today:
* Why GPA is Important * Reflecting on What's Holding You Back
* Getting into Medical School with Low GPA (First Year)
* Getting into Medical School with Low GPA (Second Year)
* Getting into Medical School with Low GPA (Third Year/Applying to Med School)
* Getting into Medical School with Low GPA (After undergraduate degree)
* Addressing a Low GPA in Medical School Application
By the way, we re giving away $50 Amazon gift cards every week to the best comments and
questions. Comment below for your chance to win. There's one thing that will dramatically
increase your chances to being accepted into medical school with a low GPA and I'll explain
at the end of the video. Make sure you watch the entire thing to find the answer.
Now let's get started!
Why is GPA Important? We need to start with a couple of important
notes about GPAs. First of all, your GPA demonstrates your academic history and ability for improvement.
Other than the MCAT, your GPA is the only indicator of your academic prowess in the
med school application. But that's not all. Most importantly, meeting
the GPA and MCAT score thresholds of the schools you re applying to eliminates the chance that
you will be removed from the applicant pool at the very beginning. While med schools boast
about their holistic admissions review, most weed out applicants with lower GPA and MCAT
scores right away to make the pool of applicants more manageable. This means that even if the
rest of your application is absolutely stellar, your extracurriculars and essays will not
be looked at. This is why students are encouraged to at least meet the set expectations when
they apply this way, the admissions committee might still look at the rest of the application
and be impressed. Reflect on What's Holding You Back
The first thing you need to do is figure out why your GPA is low in the first place. This
is an important step, especially for those who still have time to greatly improve their
academic standing. If you are still in your undergrad, take a moment to sit down and brainstorm
a list of all the factors that are affecting your grades. Ask yourself the following questions:
1. Do I have issues with time management? Are you always up late the night before a
test, trying to cram in your studying? Are you struggling to complete assignments on
time, or even handing them in late? Do you often feel overwhelmed by your workload? The
solution to time management issues is better organization. Buy yourself an agenda or even
a wall calendar, and start planning out when you will complete each task on your To Do
list. Mark down important deadlines in your agenda and/or in your phone calendar for easy
reference. But recording deadlines alone isn t enough. For each assignment, work out when
you will set aside time to complete it, and create an actionable timeline for doing each
step, e.g.: Tuesday: Start research for Biology assignment. Wednesday: Start first draft of
assignment. Thursday: Do draft revisions . 2. Do I struggle to understand the course
material? A low GPA may be a sign that you are finding your courses too hard. If you
often feel lost during your lectures and struggle with your assignments due to a lack of understanding,
then you need to take action. Consult with your professors and TAs during their office
hours to get extra help and advice for material that confuses you. Set aside time in your
agenda for doing extra reading and review for subjects you find challenging. Seek out
a tutor or peer mentoring if you require more one-on-one guidance. Consider finding a study
buddy or group for your courses so that you have someone you can regularly discuss the
course material with sometimes discussion can help make difficult concepts easier to
grasp. 3. Are my study habits poor? Bad time management
isn t the only ineffective study habit that can hold your GPA back. Do you know how to
take good notes, how to study effectively for tests and exams, how to properly review
material? These are all essential skills you need in order to have good study habits. Check
out the academic advising department or writing center at your school to see if there are
workshops available to help you develop these skills. You can also speak to your academic
mentors, such as professors and TAs, for tips. 4. Do I feel unmotivated/uninterested in what
I am studying? Maybe you are capable of getting high grades when you re interested in a particular
course, but find your grades drop the minute you feel bored or detached from what you re
studying. If that s the case for you, you need to review the courses you re taking and
even the program you re in. While you do have to pay attention to the medical school prerequisites
your schools of choice require, you should aim to play to your strengths as much as possible
during your Bachelor s. Make sure you are studying subjects you are genuinely interested
in whenever possible. Motivation is an essential ingredient for a high GPA!
5. Are there external factors impacting my performance? Sometimes there are non-academic
factors in your life that can have a negative impact upon your performance at school. Things
like illnesses, personal problems, or struggling to adjust to new circumstances can make it
harder to concentrate on your studies. If any of these factors are affecting you, it
is important to address them. Seek support from friends, family, and counselling services
when necessary. Sometimes academic accommodation is also available for students dealing with
factors beyond their control, so speak to your professors. You should also keep in mind
that you can address any external factors that impacted your performance in your personal
statement for your medical school applications. You can check out some of the best medical
school personal statement examples to learn more about making the most of your essay.
Available Finding out what is the root causes of your
low GPA is the first step to addressing whatever issues may be holding you back. Be honest
with yourself and commit yourself to proactively addressing the issues you are facing.
We will now take a closer look at what your game plan for improvement should be depending
on where you are in your Bachelor s degree. How to get into medical school with a low
GPA: After first year It s still early in your academic career,
so you re going to be ok if you make the right changes. If you rolled out of first year with
a 3.5 or below, you ve got to really settle in and alter your priorities. Here is what
you need to do: Time Diary
Spend a week recording how many hours in a typical week you spend working on formal academic
work. Then figure out how many hours you spend on other things: sports, job, research, volunteering,
socializing, sleeping, etc. Now you need to make more time for studying and less for socializing.
You need to get better at sorting out how to better prioritize academic work. Refer
back to your handy To Do list of your responsibilities for each week and follow through with your
tasks for each day. Tutor
For your poorest courses, you need to consider hiring someone to help improve your skills.
But you can spend a lot of time on a tutor and not improve if you don t know how to use
one. Ideally, find a graduate student in the field. Then meet regularly with the tutor
and ensure each session has clear objectives. For every assignment and lab report, try the
entire thing yourself in advance of meeting with the tutor. For the questions you cannot
figure out, go to the textbook to see if there is something you re missing, then go to the
regular office hours for your class and then take what you still don t understand to your
tutor. Spend time only going over the questions you do not understand so you can keep learning
at the edge of your knowledge gap. Better Use of Time
Using your tutor(s) in the ways described is a great way to make more efficient use
of the same number of study hours. The other best way is to constantly test yourself. So
if you have eight hours to prepare for two midterms, do you think you re better off reviewing
chapters of text books or doing practice tests and questions? Definitely the practice tests
and questions, without a doubt. Tear through the questions in the back of your textbook
and samples ones offered in the syllabus. Redo the questions you got wrong on your assignment.
This is the highest yield work you can do with limited hours. Passive review is not
going to be enough to ace your courses. Consider a Major Change and Following Your
Passion If you are a science major and are pulling
Bs in all of your science courses even though you paid attention and studied, then you may
need to reflect seriously on whether or not a science degree is the right one for you
and if you are following your passion academically. Science degrees classically test in the form
of multiple choice and even if you understand the concepts, it may not capture your knowledge.
This does not bode well for your MCAT performance because it is also multiple choice nor for
medical school, to be honest. But if you need more space in your schedule to devote more
time to your science courses because you can t actually drop them even if you switch majors
then switching majors might work out for you, but you have to do this in first year. Don
t switch majors if you aren t a strong writer. Getting As in essay-based humanities or social
sciences courses is extremely hard if you aren t a good writer.
Lastly, don t switch majors if you got mediocre grades in first year because you didn t actually
try that hard. Change your attitude and work harder.
How to get into medical school with a low GPA: After second year
If you re still hanging out in the 3.5 to 3.6 region, there is even more pressure for
you to do well on your MCAT. So that s our first piece of advice. And I would like to
reiterate the importance of the time diary, the tutor and improving your efficiency. Changing
majors is less appealing at this juncture. Review our medical school GPA requirements
blog so you know what you should be aiming for.
At this point, you need to start taking a very serious look at how you re spending your
time. You can t pare down too much on your extra-curricular activities because they are
important and schools need to see that you can manage a high volume of disparate activities.
But you need to cut away the fat and make sure every hour you spend has a purpose. Now
more than ever, make sure that you are creating an efficient schedule for getting all of your
tasks done per week, and that you are sticking to it.
The other thing you need to do is start looking at which schools fit the bill for your GPA.
For those applying to the US, learn how to use MSAR to find the right school for you.
The schools that have lower GPA requirements should start to become your target. Figure
out which ones work for you. In Canada, your options will start to get
limited to schools with very low GPA requirements, such as McMaster Medical School and the Cumming
School of Medicine. But, in reality, those schools take very few people with GPAs under
3.7 but you won t be excluded from the pool right away.
Canadian students with lower GPAs need to start considering taking medical training
in the US or overseas. This comes with its own set of complications, but if you re committed
and driven, it is possible to get back to Canada to practice medicine. It is, however,
getting more and more difficult to do so. Available
How to get into medical school with a low GPA: After third year/applying to med school
during this cycle You re applying to medical school this summer/fall,
depending on whether you are in the US or Canada, and your GPA is 3.5. You must prepare
yourself to put in a lot of applications to a lot of schools. And make sure that you have
a fantastic application so you are not giving the heartless admissions committees any more
reason to reject you. You should also consider your back-up plans,
which could involve post-bacc programs, special master s programs, graduate degrees, a second
undergraduate degree, and additional courses. The additional courses option needs to be
considered specifically at this juncture, because the extra courses will not be considered
in your GPA calculation once you complete your undergraduate degree.
If you choose to do extra courses, consider turning this into a Minor specialization or
even better a second Major. You must get all As. Otherwise, it s barely worth it. Ensure
the school knows your plan to defer graduation until the next year, and discuss your options
with an academic counsellor so you don t make any fatal errors with your course selection.
Limited Spots Available How to get into medical school with a low
GPA: After a completed undergraduate degree/applying to med school during this cycle
These back-up plans don t take away from the fact that you need to also ace your final
year. If you have a 3.6 GPA in your first three years and your fourth year is awesome,
you have a much better chance of sneaking in with an offer after 4th year than if you
just keep humming along getting the same grades as before. Many medical schools pay attention
to progress and GPA increase over the years, so make sure to demonstrate improvements in
your transcript. Take our study advice above. Again, you'll have to make sure that your
application is outstanding. Consider scheduling a session with an academic advisor or a medical
school advisor to make your application as strong as it can be.
All of the same advice about back-up plans still applies when considering what to do
after your undergraduate degree. You can also consider post-bac programs if they don t include
courses you ve already taken and if you re interested in taking the program on its own
merits, not just to get into medical school. We speak about these programs in a recent
post on how to avoid medical school rejection. The only difference is that your window to
make an academic impression is going to be more limited, as most post-bac programs only
last one or two years. This is the year of reckoning. If your GPA
and MCAT aren t great, but not terrible, overseas options may be your best bet if you don t
want to wait to rebuild your GPA in country or if you are willing to risk the uncertainty
of residency and employment after. Keep in mind there are some medical schools that don't
require the MCAT, so this could also be an option
Final Tips: How to address a low GPA in med school applications
Finally, if you re worried about how to deal with a low GPA in your med school applications
or interviews, we have some tips for you. While a low GPA is never ideal, it can become
less of a disadvantage if you know how to talk about it in a way that benefits you.
Turn your story of initial academic disappointment into a narrative about growth and resilience.
If you have taken the remedial steps outlined above and gained better grades as a result,
you have demonstrated the ability to address problems in a mature and responsible way.
What you need to emphasize is what you have learned from these challenges: talk about
what improving your academic performance has taught you in terms of self-improvement, better
time management, good study habits, etc. Showing the admissions committee or interviewer that
you are capable of both self-reflection and of taking the necessary corrective action
reveals your determination to succeed. Make sure that these are the qualities you draw
attention to when discussing a low GPA. Check out our blog to learn more about how
to get into medical school with low GPA. I have included a link in the description of
this video so you can find the blog easily. If you would like us to help you get into
medical school, visit BeMoMedSchool.com[BeMo2] to schedule your free initial consultation.
Hopefully you enjoyed this video and received answers you were looking for. Please subscribe,
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gift cards. If you have further questions that were not covered in this video, let me
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