Hey everyone!
I’m a 22 year old male who is just now finishing up the first year of my Masters of Science in Clinical Exercise Physiology. I was planning on applying this upcoming cycle, but as I’ve been looking for advice surrounding how to make my application better (creating good activity descriptions, personal statement, etc), I’ve been more discouraged about my chances of getting in and whether or not the Masters was a good idea. I graduated last year (2020) from my undergraduate university with a Bachelor of Arts in Exercise Science. I wasn’t totally sure whether or not I wanted to do medicine, and made the classic mistake of not trying as hard as I should have, resulting in me not doing extremely well my first 2-3 years. As I gained more clinical experience, I slowly began to realize that my grades needed to be mucH better, and it took me about another semester to learn how to study for science classes properly. I ended up with a cGPA of 3.28 and an sGPA of around 3 to 3.1 (I haven’t done the exact calculation to be honest, I just know it’s well below what it should be for a med school app). Additionally, my current MCAT score is a 509 (up from a 497 the first time I tested), and while that’s decent, I know that may not be nearly as competitive as it probably should be. As I finished up undergrad, I sought advice from a research mentor at a University in my hometown, who recommended I complete a Masters program at that university. I’ve been studying much harder and doing better in this Masters program (my GPA right now is a 3.9), but as I mentioned before, I’ve been reading that Masters GPAs are basically useless on med school apps and it has left me feeling sort of lost. I am fortunate to have a lot of hours working as an intern at a local cardiac rehab (700+ hours), research hours (200+), and leadership positions in clubs/organizations. However, I’m sort of at a loss as to whether or not my application is strong enough to apply this cycle, what I should do if I don’t apply in terms of doing more school to strengthen my application, and just generally what my steps should be going forward. Any advice is greatly appreciated and you are more than welcome to be blunt/blatantly honest with me. Thank you guys so much and sorry for the long post!