Regarding college admissions, if you don’t meet the gpa requirements, does that permanently bar you from that college? As an example, if you take all the courses needed to get in to medical school, the MCAT, and have the minimum amount of credits, but not the gpa, does that mean it’s time to look for another major and give up on med school?
IIRC it’s not really a cut-and-dry, plug-in-the-numbers-and-everyone-above-this-number-gets-accepted kind of deal. GPA is only part of the decision process, particularly with things like medical or law school. Good essays and interviews can go a long way in neutralizing sub-par GPA.
It might be time to give up on going to a specific med school, just like if you had a childhood dream of attending Yale Law School, a 180 (perfect) LSAT, and a 2.0 GPA, you might be SOL.
But the thing to do for someone in this situation is talk to someone in the admissions department. Often, cutoffs aren’t really cutoffs.
In California, the state schools have to accept a certain number of students that do NOT meet the minimum gpa for the education program. That’s what helped me out because my attitude for my BA was that I don’t care if I have a 1.0 gpa as long as I get that sheepskin. After all, I’m never going to grad school. 
It depends on where you apply, and what your other outstanding points are.
GPA’s are merely one criteria in measuring your success in school. MCATs, letters of rec, leadership roles, volunteering hours, work experience are all other ways that you are judged just as much if not more at medical schools. But it varies from location to location.
Though then again, something like a 2.0 is going to be barring you from a lot of places, and same with a 3.0. You don’t have to be the best, you just have to be better or equal to your peers, and if you’re in about the same range as them, you should be competitive.
Talking to your school guidance counselor/premed advisor will usually give you a decent assessment on your chances in applying to medical school, but don’t let that discourage you if you don’t like the answer. Be realistic, but don’t assume they’re perfect.
I don’t know about medical school, however with Pharmacy school, which is almost as hard to get into, the limits given are more of a guideline then a cut off. Schools normally have a level of academic achievement that they like, which is normally averaged between the GPA and the test of choice (For medical schools, the MCAT, for pharmacy schools, the PCAT). They will look at the people applying for that school, and will take the top how many from that average they decided, and ignore the rest. From those top, they will then look at the other parts of their academic career, like leadership in clubs, volunteer jobs, essays, etc… Then they will select the top how many of those to interview. The interviewees will then be put into three groups, accept, defer (wait list), and reject.
Your particular chance to get into any particular school depends on both your academic performance, and also the group of people applying in a particular year. If you are at the border (like I was), you could be denied straight off one year, while the second year you might get an interview.
So, basically, if you have a GPA of 2.0, but score a perfect on the test (a 100% for the PCAT), you might get an interview… while if you have a GPA of 4.0 but score low on the test (30% on the PCAT), you might still get an interview… It all depends on the school itself, and the group of people that are also applying that year… And once you get the interview, the most important thing is how you did on that interview, and not your grades.
thank you for your advice. That helps a lot. sorry about misleading the people on this thread
Medicine was probably not the best example to use. For me, i’m trying to get into the college of business in Hawaii, yet looking over the requirements for admissions, I won’t get in as is. There’s no interviews, essays, etc.I worry since I can’t keep taking classes forever and the university will restrict my standing if I’m not making timely progress on some degree.
It’s because of those reasons that I wonder whether it’s better to give up and work towards something else.
What do you mean by “the college of business”? Is this an undergraduate program or a graduate one? What university is this a part of? What do you mean that the university will restrict your standing if you’re not making progress on a degree? Are you already a student at the university? Are you saying that the university admits students and then expects them to be admitted to a particular degree program in which they will get their degree? You really should be clearer about this. Programs differ wildly at different universities and your situation sounds like one that’s not typical of many universities. We’re not mind-readers, and unless you explain things more carefully it’s impossible to understand what you’re talking about.
My law school divides applicants into three categories:
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If your LSAT score and GPA are both above a certain level, you are automatically in.
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If your LSAT score and GPA are both below a certain level, you have no chance of being selected.
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If your LSAT score and GPA falls in the area between (1) and (2) then they look at all your other achievements – with special emphasis on diversity and life experience.
A law professor explained this to me as he was explaining a Supreme Court case on affirmative action in school admissions. He wouldn’t tell me the cut off scores for the first two categories.
I see. sorry about that. This is the Schidler college of business under the University of Hawaii at Manoa.I’m trying to enter the undergraduate program. I don’t know about other colleges, but basically you have to have a major declared by the end of your sophmore year otherwise they won’t allow you to register for classes in the next semester.
Even when you declare a major, you have to send in a proposal of classes you’re going to take to fulfill the major’s requirement. Any deviation from that proposal can block you from graduating.
with regards to the time factor, If you have about 136 credits with no sign of graduating in the next semester, your registration is for classes is restricted. A factor that hinders me in this case is that I want to become a certified public accountant. The problem that relates to the time policy is that I have to take about 150 credits at an accredited college to fulfill one requirement of the CPA exam in Hawaii. I’ll admit it’s not the only way to fulfill that since I could either get a Masters degree in Accounting or work two and a half years in an accounting firm. However, I don’t like either options since one requires me to go through more education and there’s no guarantee I’ll get in the master program. I’m not too thrilled with the other option of working under an accounting firm for a total of five years.
so I’m pretty much at a crossroad where I have to make a pretty critical choice soon.
Do you have an academic advisor at your university who can tell you what courses you can and can’t take? Does the business college have admissions advisors who can tell you what the specific admissions requirements are? Go ask them if there is any flexibility in the G.P.A. requirement. They will know more about this than we do.
If you’re required to take 150 hours to be able to sit for the CPA exam (a national requirement, not just a Hawaii requirement), you might as well get your Masters of Accountancy. Since the AICPA changed its requirements years ago, most university’s don’t even offer a BBA in Accounting as a stand alone program anymore. You graduate with a BBA and Masters of accountancy at the same time.
Have you talked to a counselor at UH to make sure you understand the requirements
correctly?
The State of Hawaii’s requirements to sit to take the CPA exam is only 120 college credit hours. But to obtain a license to practice as a CPA, you are required to have passed the exam and have 150 college credit hours, and have two years of experience working under the supervision of another licensed CPA.
The 5 year experience requirement you mentioned is for people that passed the exam prior to 2000, when they changed the law upping the educational requirement to 150 hours.