THIS IS THE NON-TOPIC RELATED DISCUSSION FROM THE ORIGINAL AACOMAS GPA TOPIC IN A DIFFERENT FORUM. I have split the topic so that the original remains discussion about AACOMAS GPA and any further non-related talk can be continued here. Thank you for your cooperation.
QUOTE Just to clarify OldManDave’s mistatement here – AACOMAS has allowed a repeated course to replace the previous grade since at least 1992 (back when it was actually difficult to get into med school – only kidding!! sheesh, can’t you people take a joke? ). I know this because I applied to DO schools back then only because of this policy. You would be amazed at how much even a single grade change can increase your GPA.
I’m not pointing this out to be nitpicky, but just to let potential applicants who are considering retaking a course know that this is nothing new with the osteopathic application process, and that it will probably be around for some time. One of my concerns back then was that I would go through the trouble of retaking a course to increase my GPA, only to find out that they were phasing out this retake policy the next year. Just letting you know that this is not likely to be phased out anytime soon. Not only has this policy been around for more than a decade, but it helps the DO schools appear to be competitive with the MD schools (GPA-wise anyway). There is one guy on SDN (now at OSU Osteopathic) who retook 7 courses – now that’s some serious grade inflation. But I digress…
I decided to do some checking after reading this ‘strongly’ worded reply. 
I also sent AACOMAS an email asking what their procedure was in regards to repeat courses and GPA calculation. When I get a reply I will post it. However, after doing a search on Google here are two quotes from the following websites:
http://www.medadvising.ku.edu/retakeclass.htm
"The American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine Application Service (AACOMAS) does practice grade replacement, using the grade from the latest class. In general, receiving application services and graduate professional programs will follow their own rules to calculate a standardized GPA, regardless of the policies used to figure your GPA at KU. If you’re thinking about retaking a course to improve your GPA, it is important to check with admissions offices to see how this action will be received."
http://cnas.ucr.edu/health/appli.html
"Academic Record: Your science GPA consists of Biology/Zoology , Inorganic Chem (I), Organic Chem (O), Biochemistry (T), Other Science (S), and Physics §. Your non-science GPA consists of Math (M), English (E), Behavioral Science (H), and Other Non-Science (N). AACOMAS will calculate your science, non-science, and overall GPA, and break it down by academic year. For repeated courses, only the last grade will be used."
From what I can see, AACOMAS will use your last grade to calculate your GPA. However, the ad-coms will also have a copy of your transcript and will see a different GPA. I would suspect that an applicant should be prepared to answer questions in regards to repeat classes.
QUOTE BTW, OMD, I have noticed that you have posted this misconception several times, and I’m just really curious how you could have missed it when you were applying to KCOM, etc.? Not trying to pry, but if you completed a second BS degree magna cum laude from scratch, you could have applied to DO schools with nearly a 4.0. Not only would that, combined with a decent MCAT, have virtually guaranteed your acceptance to all of those schools, it probably would have netted you a very nice scholarship to boot. You don’t have to answer this; I was just a little amazed.
Forgive me if I misinterpreted your message, but to me personal comments such as this serve no positive purpose to OPM or our members. I would like to suggest that you take future communication of the sort to a private area (email, PM). Thank you.
Now, I would like to note that you have an interesting view towards applying to a DO school using the AACOMAS GPA. If the individual schools do take the AACOMAS GPA as the actual GPA then many people may be missing out on some great information. Does anyone have any experience with this?
| QUOTE (DoctorGeo2008 @ May 13 2003, 02:12 PM) |
| I decided to do some checking after reading this 'strongly' worded reply. <!--emo&<_ I also sent AACOMAS an email asking what their procedure was in regards to repeat courses and GPA calculation. When I get a reply I will post it. |
Holy Cow! Did I start off on the wrong foot, or what? "Strongly worded reply???" Where? I simply corrected his error. And I even used teeny tiny fonts and pretty colors and tried to make a joke and used make-nice words for the error such as "mistatement" and "misconception."
Note to newbies: Never, under any circumstances, point out the mistakes of any executive member of this board, without at least first posting a sob story on the intoductions board to score some sympathy points. -- Again, I'm only joking here, as you can see from the teeny tiny pretty words. Lighten-up there Geoff-o
| QUOTE (DoctorGeo2008 @ May 13 2003, 02:12 PM) |
| However, after doing a search on Google here are two quotes from the following websites: ... From what I can see, AACOMAS will use your last grade to calculate your GPA. However, the ad-coms will also have a copy of your transcript and will see a different GPA. I would suspect that an applicant should be prepared to answer questions in regards to repeat classes. |
Ok, thanks for the info Geoff. hmm... now isn't that what we just went over?
| QUOTE (DoctorGeo2008 @ May 13 2003, 02:12 PM) |
| Forgive me if I misinterpreted your message, but to me personal comments such as this serve no positive purpose to OPM or our members. I would like to suggest that you take future communication of the sort to a private area (email, PM). Thank you. |
Serve no purpose? They serve the primary purpose of forums like this -- to learn from others, whether they be others' mistakes or others' good deeds. OMD has been extremely successful, determined, and open about sharing the road he travelled to med school. He has overcome nearly every obstacle in his path to get into and excel in med school. Now he has landed an extremely prestigious residency at an Ivy league school and will finish that program with an Ivy league masters degree. Through all of this he has been a beacon of hope and light to those of us embarking on this career.
For you to insinuate that questioning his judgment at an early point in his career is a personal attack in any way on him is absolutely ludicrous! And it's an insult to him for you to make such a comment! He may have a number of reasons for not knowing that his courses could have been counted as repeats: he may have had a professional service complete his application for him (an AMCAS service may not have been aware of this policy); he may have simply copied his transcript from his AMCAS application over to the AACOMAS application without bothering to read the instructions; he may have started a new BS degree from scratch in a completely different field that had little to no course overlap; he may have used preliminary coursework from a community college in combination with the new coursework, such that there was no overlap; he may simply have been unaware of the policy; he may not have cared about the policy because he knew he was a strong applicant without it; or a dozen other excuses... The point is, I don't know what the reason was, but he probably had one, and if he cares to share it then we'll all be that much wiser!
| QUOTE (DoctorGeo2008 @ May 13 2003, 02:12 PM) |
| Now, I would like to note that you have an interesting view towards applying to a DO school using the AACOMAS GPA. If the individual schools do take the AACOMAS GPA as the actual GPA then many people may be missing out on some great information. Does anyone have any experience of this? |
Thanks for climbing down off of that high horse to notice, Geoff. Don't you think that that was probably the reason for my post in the first place? I already knew that information, and now I've shared it with everyone here. See how that works?
"Does anyone have any experience of this?" Umm... yea, Geoff, I have some experience of this...
Again, good luck to us all!
att(looks like it's time to create a new username -- now, where did i put that sob story?)y
Hey atty, the problem is that since the ONLY two posts you have EVER put on OPM are these two above, we have no idea what you “sound” like or what your sense of humor might be.
It seems to me you doth protest a bit too much at Geoff’s remarks. His point was that you didn’t use a particularly sporting way to point out another member’s error, by making a sarcastic comment. Doesn’t matter if it was OMD or someone whose face isn’t well known in this community - the crack about “magna cum laude” was a completely unnecessary comment and did not help to shed any light on the issue being discussed.
The question about “do-overs” is an important one and we’re glad to discuss it. It looks like maybe this question may unfortunately have the dreaded “It depends” or “check with individual schools” answer, at least in part… which means that one person’s conversation with an admissions officer at one school may not jibe with the information someone gleans at another school. Which means that we certainly won’t want to cast aspersions on anyone’s qualifications or intelligence for passing on what they’ve learned in their own research.
So as my mom has always said, “Be nice!” 
| QUOTE (Mary Renard @ May 13 2003, 01:56 PM) |
| It seems to me you doth protest a bit too much at Geoff's remarks. His point was that you didn't use a particularly sporting way to point out another member's error, by making a sarcastic comment. Doesn't matter if it was OMD or someone whose face isn't well known in this community - the crack about "magna cum laude" was a completely unnecessary comment and did not help to shed any light on the issue being discussed. |
I wasn't trying to be "sporting" in pointing out his error. He may very well have had a good reason for not knowing about the repeats. He may not have even needed to use them. And the magna cum laude description was not, in any way, a "crack." OMD did, indeed, graduate magna cum laude. I pointed it out, because that is the only way I know that he must have had close to a 4.0 GPA. And a 4.0 GPA, along with an MCAT >24, virtually guarantees admission to any DO school. A better MCAT (and I don't know what OMD's was) may have landed him a very nice (potentially full ride) scholarship to many osteopathic schools. Or maybe he got a scholarship without using the repeats?!? If I knew the answer, I wouldn't have asked. We shall await his response...
But, at any rate, I still do not see any problem with me asking a question like this (although, obviously, with the backlash that I've so far encountered, I think he is going to be much more likely to dismiss the question entirely). And if he doesn't want to answer it, that's his prerogative. But there's no harm (or, at least, should be no harm) in asking...
| QUOTE (Mary Renard @ May 13 2003, 01:56 PM) |
| The question about "do-overs" is an important one and we're glad to discuss it. It looks like maybe this question may unfortunately have the dreaded "It depends" or "check with individual schools" answer, at least in part.... which means that one person's conversation with an admissions officer at one school may not jibe with the information someone gleans at another school. |
That's my point -- DO schools do not have individual school policies with regard to GPA calculations. They all receive the GPA that AACOMAS has calculated. And for more than a decade AACOMAS has used the last grade of a repeated series in their calculations. My comments were not gleaned from an admissions officer, but from personal experience with each and every osteopathic school in existence a decade ago.
| QUOTE (Mary Renard @ May 13 2003, 01:56 PM) |
| Which means that we certainly won't want to cast aspersions on anyone's qualifications or intelligence for passing on what they've learned in their own research. |
That's all I'm doing -- passing on what I've learned.
att( ok, now this has seriously interfered with my nap time )y
| QUOTE |
| ust to clarify OldManDave's mistatement BTW, OMD, I have noticed that you have posted this misconception several times. |
It's all about how you say it.
You're not an attorney - are you? I only ask because it seems your username coul dbe an abbreviation for 'attorney'.
- Tae
atty,
First of all, I would like to know what happened with your relationship with the DO schools a decade ago? Were you accepted? Did you go the allopathic route? Are you now finished with med school; or are you still struggling to gain acceptance?
Second, wording your replies in the manner which you do serves no useful purpose, and the little comments in small colored type appear to be rather obnoxious.
I think it is time for your style of posting to change. If you wish to participate, please do so in a polite and positive manner.
| QUOTE (taehyongkim @ May 13 2003, 03:37 PM) |
| It's all about how you say it. You're not an attorney - are you? I only ask because it seems your username coul dbe an abbreviation for 'attorney'. - Tae |
| QUOTE (Linda Wilson @ May 13 2003, 04:10 PM) |
| atty, First of all, I would like to know what happened with your relationship with the DO schools a decade ago? Were you accepted? Did you go the allopathic route? Are you now finished with med school; or are you still struggling to gain acceptance? Second, wording your replies in the manner which you do serves no useful purpose, and the little comments in small colored type appear to be rather obnoxious. If you wish to participate, please do so in a polite and positive manner. |
yes, yes, no, no, and no, ...whew. oh, and i find the colors rather appealing. now, i don't mean to get us back on track, but didn't this thread have something to do with class retakes, or something like that?
att(oh no, here come the DOs...a little help over here? anyone?)y
Hmmm - attorney, some kind of involvement with DO schools ten years ago …
Ah - could you be ‘mdjd’ from SDN? You sound quite a bit like him:
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread…=osu#post504599
Note that mdjd edited his posts to reflect the date of his DO school admission to '99 - while all of the posts that quoted his post show that mdjd had previously reported a DO admission in '93 - ten years ago. Other posts by him indicate his being an attorney …
Atty, if you are indeed mdjd from SDN, I hope your hiatus from SDN has caused you to reevaluate the way you interact with other posters. Though your initial posts here seem to indicate otherwise …
IIRC, mdjd also thought osteopaths to be inferior to allopaths …
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/search.php…rder=descending
- Tae
| QUOTE |
| Holy Cow! Did I start off on the wrong foot, or what? "Strongly worded reply???" Where? I simply corrected his error. And I even used teeny tiny fonts and pretty colors and tried to make a joke and used make-nice words for the error such as "mistatement" and "misconception." Note to newbies: Never, under any circumstances, point out the mistakes of any executive member of this board, without at least first posting a sob story on the intoductions board to score some sympathy points. -- Again, I'm only joking here, as you can see from the teeny tiny pretty words. Lighten-up there Geoff-o |
Yes, you did start off on the wrong foot. "Strongly worded reply" is in reference to the whole post which I feel could have been stated in other ways that don't sound so negative.
"Jokes" as your comments to newbies won't be tolerated. Period. I won't lighten-up and I won't let this board become a pissing match, insult ridden, childish board like certain others.
| QUOTE |
| QUOTE (DoctorGeo2008 @ May 13 2003, 02:12 PM) However, after doing a search on Google here are two quotes from the following websites: ... From what I can see, AACOMAS will use your last grade to calculate your GPA. However, the ad-coms will also have a copy of your transcript and will see a different GPA. I would suspect that an applicant should be prepared to answer questions in regards to repeat classes. Ok, thanks for the info Geoff. hmm... now isn't that what we just went over? |
Yep, sure is, that's what we do here. We provide information to pre-med students to help them through the process of applying to medical school.
| QUOTE |
| Serve no purpose? They serve the primary purpose of forums like this -- to learn from others, whether they be others' mistakes or others' good deeds. OMD has been extremely successful, determined, and open about sharing the road he travelled to med school. He has overcome nearly every obstacle in his path to get into and excel in med school. Now he has landed an extremely prestigious residency at an Ivy league school and will finish that program with an Ivy league masters degree. Through all of this he has been a beacon of hope and light to those of us embarking on this career. For you to insinuate that questioning his judgment at an early point in his career is a personal attack in any way on him is absolutely ludicrous! And it's an insult to him for you to make such a comment! He may have a number of reasons for not knowing that his courses could have been counted as repeats: he may have had a professional service complete his application for him (an AMCAS service may not have been aware of this policy); he may have simply copied his transcript from his AMCAS application over to the AACOMAS application without bothering to read the instructions; he may have started a new BS degree from scratch in a completely different field that had little to no course overlap; he may have used preliminary coursework from a community college in combination with the new coursework, such that there was no overlap; he may simply have been unaware of the policy; he may not have cared about the policy because he knew he was a strong applicant without it; or a dozen other excuses... The point is, I don't know what the reason was, but he probably had one, and if he cares to share it then we'll all be that much wiser! |
The fact is, your post could have been written differently so as not to sound so negative. For instance, "OMD, from what I have experienced and read, AACOMAS does NOT factor in the original grades for repeated courses. Here are some references."
| QUOTE |
| QUOTE (DoctorGeo2008 @ May 13 2003, 02:12 PM) Now, I would like to note that you have an interesting view towards applying to a DO school using the AACOMAS GPA. If the individual schools do take the AACOMAS GPA as the actual GPA then many people may be missing out on some great information. Does anyone have any experience of this? Thanks for climbing down off of that high horse to notice, Geoff. Don't you think that that was probably the reason for my post in the first place? I already knew that information, and now I've shared it with everyone here. See how that works? "Does anyone have any experience of this?" Umm... yea, Geoff, I have some experience of this... |
Honestly? No. I do not think that was the reason for your post. However, I can't say for sure since it was your first post and I have no other way to judge. I guess I probably should have said "Does anyone ELSE have any experience of this to add?"
Finally, you can see that replies to your post(s) generally portray the same thoughts that I have-- that they are not what we want here in our forums. I am going to 'climb back on my high horse' now and tell you that this simply won't be allowed here. It's not 'free speech' here, it's OldPreMed's way or the highway and since I'm a very big part of OldPreMed's way then 'I' can and will decide what is appropriate. Basically, contribute in a positive, non-obnoxious way or move on to another forum.
In defense of Atty I did not perceive his post as negative at all. I have the feeling that some times OPM'ers take things a tad too seriously and potential posters are scared away. If we cannot state our opinions even though some times they may not be PC what is the point of this forum? Atty I did not find your comments demeaning of OMD at all, keep posting, your actually living things up, he he.
Not to jump into the fray here but it is also very easy to misjudge each other's tone because of the nature of the medium itself – it's hard (even with different sized text and smileys) to convey tone of voice as in a conversation.
We should be good to each other – dang, we have enough worries and stresses to be adding them…
| QUOTE (efex101 @ May 14 2003, 08:17 AM) |
| In defense of Atty I did not perceive his post as negative at all. I have the feeling that some times OPM'ers take things a tad too seriously and potential posters are scared away. If we cannot state our opinions even though some times they may not be PC what is the point of this forum? Atty I did not find your comments demeaning of OMD at all, keep posting, your actually living things up, he he. |
Nobody said ANYTHING about not stating an opinion!
Here is a direct quote from OMD's post:
| QUOTE |
| Now, I have heard in several circles that the AACOMAS service has reformed thier policy on retakes in that only the most recent attempt counts in the GPA & I believe that this is irrespective of where the retake occured. I have not heard any such information regarding the AMCAS service. As I said, this is second-hand info. Therefore, before you or anyone else gets all excited about it, I would strongly suggest that you visit both the AMCAS & AACOMAS web sites and get the straight poop from the horse's mouths. In fact, once you know the truth, come back here & post it. I can only imagine how many others would find the correct answers very interesting. |
Obviously, OMD has heard that most recent attemps MAY be the policy of AACOMAS. Atty ignored that part of OMD's message and replied with this quote from his original message:
| QUOTE |
| From OMD's post: All I can relate is how it was when I applied thru both ACMAS & AACOMAS --then, both of them required that you enter and utilize every single grade in the calculation of your GPA. It did not matter if it was a retake - all attempts counted. It did not matter whether it was the same or a different school you retook a course at - all attempts counted. From Atty's post: Just to clarify OldManDave's mistatement here -- AACOMAS has allowed a repeated course to replace the previous grade since at least 1992 (back when it was actually difficult to get into med school -- only kidding!! sheesh, can't you people take a joke? ). I know this because I applied to DO schools back then only because of this policy. You would be amazed at how much even a single grade change can increase your GPA. |
Here Atty is trying to clarify OMD's mistatement. What mistatement?? OMD was describing HIS experience and in the very next line, as I quoted above, states that he had heard of some instances of this. OMD also asked for others to come back and post their own experiences. Atty DID do that but with a few 'add-ons' that I felt were unproductive to the forum. That's MY opinion.
Oh, and another thing.. I DO take this process VERY seriously. If I scare away the childish BS that you see on 'other' forums, fine. If the posting here is slower because of that, fine. OPM has quality information because of it.
"Nobody said ANYTHING about not stating an opinion! "
Did my post say anything about anyone SAYING that we cannot state our opininion? NO. I was just making a statement that was MY opinion. Sheesh people…
| QUOTE (efex101 @ May 14 2003, 12:34 PM) |
| "Nobody said ANYTHING about not stating an opinion! " Did my post say anything about anyone SAYING that we cannot state our opininion? NO. I was just making a statement that was MY opinion. Sheesh people.... |
Well then what was the point of this:
| QUOTE |
| ...If we cannot state our opinions even though some times they may not be PC what is the point of this forum?... |
Doesn't this infer that you felt someone wasn't able to state an opinion???
Okay. Here’s what my husband and I both see from this whole sordid affair.
We agree that atty has certainly accomplished what he wanted. . . . to cause fracas and dissention among the ranks.
So. My advice is that we simply conclude this discussion and carry on with the forums in the manner which they are intended. That is for people to ask questions, give advice, share experiences, and just about anything else, except always do so with the other members feelings in mind.
In other words, like my mom always told me, “If you can’t say something nice, keep your mouth (or in this case your keyboard) shut!”
| QUOTE (Linda Wilson @ May 14 2003, 05:28 PM) |
| My advice is that we simply conclude this discussion and carry on with the forums in the manner which they are intended. That is for people to ask questions, give advice, share experiences, and just about anything else, except always do so with the other members feelings in mind. |
Sounds good to me. Reading these posts makes me feel like I am over at SDN. Fortunately, this seems to be a relatively isolated occurence (sp?) on OPM.
Well, personally, and at the risk of being banned, I think that the worst thing written during the entire debate was this:
| QUOTE (Linda Wilson @ May 13 2003, 06:10 PM) |
| or are you still struggling to gain acceptance? |
That describes me, and probably several others here, to a tee.
Atty’s information was actually useful to me, as I’ll be applying to DO schools next year. Was Atty really banned?
| QUOTE (opmsthbhho @ May 15 2003, 06:14 PM) | ||
Well, personally, and at the risk of being banned, I think that the worst thing written during the entire debate was this:
That describes me, and probably several others here, to a tee. Atty's information was actually useful to me, as I'll be applying to DO schools next year. Was Atty really banned? |
No reason for you to feel at risk of being banned. You have to do quite a bit to get that title. He's the first out of 2000+ members. I'd say your chances are VERY low.
Since I agree with Linda and Dmaes that we should conclude this conversation and move on, that's what I'm going to do. I hope others will do the same.