Decided I want to do dentistry halfway through junior year. Need advice
I want to start by saying I’ve made this decision late but I’m confident it’s what I want to do. I love the profession and it combines everything I want in a career and a little bit of shadowing let me know I’m confident about the practice.
Current Stats:
3.3 GPA but I confidently believe I can get this to a 3.5 as I need to retake Orgo 2
No DAT yet
President and Vice President of my fraternity
President of my schools chapter of National Alzheimer’s buddies
Event Coordinator for BBB bio honors society
4 years Alternate captain for men’s volleyball club
~30 hours of shadowing
Haven’t counted volunteer work hours but have organized and been part of some meaningful volunteer work
My big concerns come from some pretty bad grades in my first few years. I’ve always done fine in my courses that aren’t science but my science GPA is definitely lacking. I failed orgo 2 and need to retake it. I had to retake archaeology of all classes. And I’ve got some low Cs in classes like physics and gen chem. I’ve also dropped a lot of classes as I thought I wanted to get a minor in Spanish and dropped the classes and the minor mid semester. My extra curriculars are my strong point but I have no research, low shadowing, and low amount of volunteering by sheer number of hours even if I have had some meaningful experiences.
I’m making this post because I’m looking for advice on where I’m lacking and how to boost my application but also to ask if I’m genuinely competitive enough or not. This may be hard to gauge without a DAT score and some time left but I keep seeing all these people with better stats and experiences than mine get in. Am I competitive and how can I become more competitive?