Student from Canada with a 3.3 GPA

on June 3, 2019

Student from Canada with a 3.3 GPA

This particular student reached out to me via GMAIL concerned about transferring to the US for Dental School. Here is our conversation.

Email Subject: Dental School Application

Hey Dentalforyou,

My name is █████ and I am currently an undergraduate student in Canada studying science, in my first year. My first year GPA has not been the greatest, I am scoring a 3.3 out of a 4.0 and hope to improve, are there any tips which you would recommend to strong arm my application, such as placements. Additionally, when would the best time to write the DAT be. Or any schools which you would recommend looking into, I am currently interested in NYU but acknowledge that I have a long journey to go.

Thank you for your time

Hello █████,

Apologies for the late reply! I usually try to get back to pre-dental students within a week but classes just got out of hand! I promise to be better with your emails in the future.

It’s interesting that you emailed me at the time that you did because I’ve been working with a pre-dental student from Canada! Through working with him, I found out a couple of things about applying to US schools as a Canadian citizen. You’re perfectly eligible to apply to dental schools in the US and the requirements wont be as stringent as Canadian schools either! A 3.3 out of a 4.0 GPA still puts you as a semi-competitive applicant for US schools but you will also have to get a great DAT score. You should aim to take your DAT sometime in your junior year of dental school before June. This way, you will take the exam, apply, and interview while you’re in your senior year, finish college, and start immediately after graduating. Otherwise, you may take a GAP year if you wait to take the DAT after graduating.

Some great schools to look into are the private schools here in the USA. They’re generally more open about accepting non-american students. This is only because publicly funded schools are required by the government to accept a good number of US citizens. I believe all schools in California are Private schools with the exception of UCLA.

Lastly, I also consulted with a fourth year dental student here at my school that grew up Vancouver, B.C.. He mentioned that some Canadian dental schools drop your “worst year of credits” and calculate your GPA based on three years. Be sure to keep your options open and calculate if you qualify for Canadian schools as well! The tuition in Canada is amazing and something you do not want to overlook.

Thank you for your email and please let me know if I could answer any more!

Sincerely,
Michael Yoo

*[Use At Your Own Risk Disclaimer] Please note that although I am a WesternU Dental Student, in no way am I affiliated with WesternU interviews and admissions. The provided information are personal anecdotes intended to aide pre-dental students. Any action you take upon the information is strictly at your own risk and no one affiliated with this website, WesternU, and myself can be responsible for your use of the information contained herein.

Thank you so much, regarding extra curricular activities and involvment what would look good on my application. I was thinking of applying to NYU or schools more along the border as they accept alot of canadian students but I would be closer to home possible. Additionally, lets say if I attend dental school in the states what would the process look like to transfer to canada to practice, would it be possible?

Thank you for your time,

█████ ███████

No problem at all!

A lot of applicants have dental assisting and shadowing as extracurricular activities listed in their application. I think both are very important for you application but if you want to stand out, I highly suggest working at a nearby dental school in any way. Even in an administrative position. This will show you how a school is run and also give you an appreciation for all the things that dental professionals go through. I believe schools loved that I worked as a dental assistant at the UW School of Dentistry because I told them that I appreciated faculty members so much as I’ve seen first hand how much they need to go through in order to teach future generations of dentists.

Being close to home is a great idea also. You will want that support while going through any program. As far as transferring back to Canada, I will have to ask one of my colleagues that is graduating soon! He’s from Vancouver B.C. and is looking at going back soon. It may take a while since it is spring break but I’ll be sure to report back and tell you what I find out.

Sincerely,

Michael Yoo

Hello █████!

I hope all has been well!

I reached out to our Canadian dental student to get his input on what he’s going to do in order to transfer back to Canada. Unfortunately, it took a while to get a hold of him since he was taking his WREB exams. I copied and pasted our conversation below because I thought it was pretty straight forward. Hope this helps!

Dental Student: Hey Michael! Almost forgot about our convo for a sec. So if you wanna practice in Canada and you graduated from the US then all you need to do is take the NDEB. That’s the dental board exam in Canada that certifies you in every province. It consists of a written portion which is 300 questions and a 1-day OSCE portion which is a set of station exams where you go to every station in a sim clinic and answer questions about scenarios based on charts, radiographs, dental hx, etc. Way easier than wreb imo lol.

Michael: Hello! Thank you for getting back to me! Thats pretty simple! Is there a wait period after you take the NDEB? Also, it sounds like you don’t really have to study for it if you take it immediately after the WREB. Is that right?

Dental Student: Yah seems like ndeb is easier than what we have to go thru here. I don’t think there is a wait period. I know there are application deadlines and once u register to take it they provide you dates and locations to take it. Not sure if there are US dental schools that offer ndeb but there may be. Otherwise you’d need to go to Canada to take it. But the written and osce is all done in 2 weeks. So you sit the written exam once weekend and then you take the osce the next weekend.

Sincerely,

Michael Yoo

Hey Micheal,

Thank you so much for this information, it is highly appreciated.

One more question, regarding the DAT examinations, would the Canadian DAT be transferable to the USA or is it recommended writing the USA DAT? As I was viewing the different situations, many USA schools do accept the Canadian but which would be encouraged.

No problem at all!

I know some schools take the Canadian DAT but I would double check with every single school you apply to. Both are essentially the same test with the exception of the soap carving in the Canadian DAT.

Sincerely,

Michael Yoo

This conversation was posted with the permission of all correspondents.

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