LCSW considering medical school
Hello! I'm currently a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and work full-time at a private practice agency doing outpatient therapy. I have been heavily considering a career change and medicine has always been interesting to me. It was my first choice of career when I first started undergrad, but I did not have the focus at the time to do well enough in my science classes, volunteer/shadow, etc. I got a late ADHD diagnosis within the last couple of years that I believe significantly impacted me at that time. I didn't know how to manage it.
I graduated undergrad in 2017 with an overall GPA of 3.2 or 3.3. I can't remember exactly, but I know it was in that range. I'm getting my transcripts soon, so I'll know for sure. I think my science GPA would have been around a 2.75. I know that's not great at all. It was mostly C's and B's in my science courses.
I went on to get my Master's in Social work and graduated in 2021. Granted, I know the soft sciences are much easier, but I graduated with a 3.8 GPA. I was able to be a lot more disciplined and focused with my time and energy. I was more mature as well which I think helped me stay dedicated. At that point, I had wished I could go back to repeat undergrad and would have tried much harder than what I did. I do truly feel like I have the mental capability to do well in those science courses, but I just didn't have the maturity and executive functioning skills at that time to follow through.
I am now considering taking the next several years to try and make myself competitive for medical school. I started first thinking about retaking all my science courses to get better grades, which I wondered would be required anyways since it will be over 10 years since I took them by the time I apply to med school. I was hoping to apply May and summer of 2028.
I think that my background as a therapist will obviously be a strength on my application and in addition to the retakes, I am going to focus heavily on volunteering/shadowing as well. And obviously studying hard to get a great MCAT score.
My main two questions are:
I was thinking about retaking all the prereqs at community college. Is this looked down upon by admissions committees? I am able to take the classes at the same four year institute I graduated from, but I am trying to save a little money.
While I know a lot of this is heavily dependent upon my ability to really perform well in the retakes and get a good MCAT score, is this a total pipe dream given my undergraduate GPA?
I would really appreciate any insight and thoughts. Thank you for taking the time to read!