What Does the Average BS/MD Applicant Look Like? - Part 4

In today’s BS/MD admissions advice post I would like to discuss the profile of the average admissions applicant applying to the selective to highly selective programs. These would include schools with MD and DO schools with rankings in the top 100 of the US.

Historically, the average GPA for a competitive BS/MD applicant will be a 3.8 and a near-perfect science GPA. You may also want to consider having extensive honors/IB-SL/dual enrollment and AP/IB-HL courses in the sciences to show that your course rigor reflects your academic interests. For help calculating this GPA, I would use the GPA calculator available on our website (https://blog.collegevine.com/how-to-calculate-your-gpa-use-this-step-by-step-guide). The standardized test scores are also just as competitive with a minimum of 1520 (SAT) and 32 (ACT). If you do have subject test scores to report it would be helpful to submit those in Math II and/or Chemistry/Biology, usually with a minimum of 720 or in the 85th percentile or higher. These can only help, not hurt, your application chances. Before the SAT subject tests were phased out from admissions, many programs actually required you to include SAT tests to be considered for admissions. Now that the subject tests are gone, you should consider scoring well in the STEM courses that you are taking and, if possible, take them at more difficult course levels like AP and honors, without sacrificing your GPA.

In terms of extracurricular activities, I would refer you to my previous post about what the average EC composition is for competitive BS/MD applicants. You can find that linked at the bottom, it’s part #3. The best way to think about this is as a checklist of activities with your own personal story into why you are specifically pursuing medicine. Your aim is to try to meet as many of the criteria as possible in research, shadowing, clubs and clinical experiences.

In terms of essays, this is a place where you will likely differentiate yourself from a lot of other applicants. A strong BS/MD applicant will have their own personal and unique reason(s) for entering medicine and share it here. A childhood medical emergency, role-model, volunteering experience, fascination with medical research are just some of the many topics that have been written about by past applicants. Typically every school will ask you to respond to a prompt asking “why do you want to be a physician?” or “why medicine?”. With this in mind, treat that as your personal statement essay for BS/MD applications because the same one will likely go to many schools. This is why it is critical that it should be the most thought out and error-proof ones that you write. Additionally, you will have supplemental essays for each school asking why you want to apply to their program or other smaller questions about your relationship with medicine. These are harder to predict before you see the questions, so I would spend your time now drafting the BS/MD personal statement soon instead.

With all of this information in mind, the next question you may have is where to even apply! The answer to this subjective question may vary based on location, medical school selection, culture of the school and other personal preferences. We’ll cover more on this in our next post in this BS/MD series, so stay tuned!

Post #1: https://www.collegevine.com/questions/17347/expert-advice-on-bs-md-programs-part-1

Post #2: https://www.collegevine.com/questions/17523/expert-advice-on-bs-md-programs-part-2

Post #3: https://www.collegevine.com/questions/17849/how-i-applied-to-bs-md-programs-thinking-of-the-application-as-a-checklist-part-3