Samuel Merritt ABSN Fall 2019

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Hi everyone! Just wanted to get the conversation started for those who applied for the ABSN Fall 2019 cohort. I applied for the Sacramento location but would love to connect with all who applied in general! Good luck everyone!

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Specializes in Community Health & School RN.

Hi Cheyenne, I have also applied to the Sacramento ABSN for Fall 2019. It’s going to be a long couple months waiting to hear back. ? Thank you for starting the thread!

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I also applied to Sac for Fall 2019 and after being waitlisted three times, I'm of course anxious to hear back ? LOL! At least I can still laugh at myself! Best of luck to everyone...including me!

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Specializes in Community Health & School RN.
On 4/2/2019 at 6:36 AM, elliebear said:

I also applied to Sac for Fall 2019 and after being waitlisted three times, I'm of course anxious to hear back ? LOL! At least I can still laugh at myself! Best of luck to everyone...including me!

Elliebear, do you mind if I ask what your stats are for the cohorts that waitlisted you? Do you have healthcare experience? Did they tell you to improve anything with each application cycle? I was waitlisted last cohort and I did get some pointers from the admissions counselor to help improve my app this time around. I’ll keep my fingers crossed for both of us!

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Hi @MamaKat916 ! Okay, when I applied previous times I had:

3.0 GPA Sciences

3.5 GPA Last 60 (less than 2.7 in my undergrad from over 15 years ago - oops!)

Decent LOR (first time two bosses, second and third times two profs plus a volunteer manager)

90% HESI with 80% in A&P

Tons of hospital volunteer experience. The second/third time I applied, I added about two months of work as an aide in an inpatient setting at a major hospital in the Bay Area. I've taught yoga for three years, am active in my community, etc.

Each time, whether it was Sac or Oakland, I was told that I couldn't do anything to strengthen my app. After the second/third waitlist, I'm like - gotta do SOMETHING! I retook A&P (I now have an A in part one and on track for an A in part two), and the HESI (got a 95% with a 100% in A&P).

Now going in with 3.2 GPA Sciences / a little higher last 60 GPA / way better A&P HESI score.

What about you? What did they say to improve? Literally best of luck to everyone. Consider me crossing my fingers, toes, and being in a permanent eagle pose until we find out LOL!

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Thanks for sharing! This is my first time applying, met with the admissions counselor as well - she said I was competitive but I don’t want to be naive!

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Specializes in Community Health & School RN.
17 hours ago, elliebear said:

Hi @MamaKat916 ! Okay, when I applied previous times I had:

3.0 GPA Sciences

3.5 GPA Last 60 (less than 2.7 in my undergrad from over 15 years ago - oops!)

Decent LOR (first time two bosses, second and third times two profs plus a volunteer manager)

90% HESI with 80% in A&P

Tons of hospital volunteer experience. The second/third time I applied, I added about two months of work as an aide in an inpatient setting at a major hospital in the Bay Area. I've taught yoga for three years, am active in my community, etc.

Each time, whether it was Sac or Oakland, I was told that I couldn't do anything to strengthen my app. After the second/third waitlist, I'm like - gotta do SOMETHING! I retook A&P (I now have an A in part one and on track for an A in part two), and the HESI (got a 95% with a 100% in A&P).

Now going in with 3.2 GPA Sciences / a little higher last 60 GPA / way better A&P HESI score.

What about you? What did they say to improve? Literally best of luck to everyone. Consider me crossing my fingers, toes, and being in a permanent eagle pose until we find out LOL!

I went in last time with a 3.25 in science GPA and somewhere around a 3.3 or 3.4 for my last 60 units. I think we must have been on the same life path for our first degrees, because my overall GPA before working on pre-req’s was in the 2.7 range also! So I brought up my overall GPA to help.

I have a 96% on the HESI and the A&P parts were 98% and 100% for math. My reading comprehension brought me down a bit.

I had three LOR’s, one from a professor, one from a registered nurse who is in a community service group with me and another one from a registered nurse who is a friend and was a colleague in our previous careers (she’s a SMU ABSN grad herself).

I didn’t have any volunteering experience in the medical field that was recent. I had shadowed nurses at a fertility clinic about 7 years ago. But I had loads of local community volunteer experience.

When I went to see Kathryn in Sac, she told me to get volunteer experience (I have since started volunteering at Shriner’s Hospital), she told me to remove any references that talk about friendship and replace them with ones that discuss academic or professional attributes. She told me to make my essay answers slightly less emotional and more evidence based, and last she gave me tips on my resume. I went ahead and re-enrolled in A&P I and I’ll take A&P II this summer (unless I get in!), and figured I could bump my sciences into the 3.75 range with A’s in those classes rather than B’s.

But honestly, it’s hard to know exactly what they value. If you look back at our Spring 2019 ABSN thread, you’ll see a range of GPA’s and experience levels and some people I thought would get in didn’t and vice versa!

So I think anyone who has GPA’s over 3.0-3.25 and HESI scores that are over 90% have a great chance of getting in if their essay answers and resume/work experience shines. I know they must see all the work you’ve put in and hopefully this time will do the trick!

i was waitlisted 48 out of 50, so bottom of the barrel!! I know Kathryn said they really love to see repeat applicants who make even baby steps to improve their application each time. I have high hopes for you Elliebear!!

Did you guys apply to the Sac campus this time? Fingers crossed!! I’m glad that the Fall application wait is closer to 2 months for answers rather than the 3-4 months they put the Spring applicants through!! Hang in there!! It’s your time, I know it!

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Specializes in Community Health & School RN.
16 hours ago, cheyenne.fisher said:

Thanks for sharing! This is my first time applying, met with the admissions counselor as well - she said I was competitive but I don’t want to be naive!

Cheyenne, do you mind if we ask what your stats are? I think it’s super helpful for us (and lurkers!) to know what is considered competitive. I constantly worry that my best will never be good enough, but I’m going to keep on trying and applying until I’m either competetive enough or they throw up their hands and yell “please! Let this poor girl in already! She’s applied 87 times now!!” ??

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12 minutes ago, MamaKat916 said:

Cheyenne, do you mind if we ask what your stats are? I think it’s super helpful for us (and lurkers!) to know what is considered competitive. I constantly worry that my best will never be good enough, but I’m going to keep on trying and applying until I’m either competetive enough or they throw up their hands and yell “please! Let this poor girl in already! She’s applied 87 times now!!” ??

Of course!! Haha

science GPA is 4.0

last 60 GPA is 3.7

hesi was a 94%, lowest was vocab at 87, a&p and math I only missed one each

LORs are from 2 professors, one oversaw my internship one was my micro and physiology professor who is also a MD

I volunteer at Sutter Sacramento, did a medial internship in Haiti & also did malnutrition research there too.

She said they weigh like 50/50 on experience & reasons you want to be a nurse and acedemics.

I love your persistance, you deserve to get in! I think the only thing that would hold me back is that I’m not done with my prerequisites, I’ll be taking patho and pharm this summer!

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16 hours ago, MamaKat916 said:

i was waitlisted 48 out of 50, so bottom of the barrel!! I know Kathryn said they really love to see repeat applicants who make even baby steps to improve their application each time.

I was in the 40s for the waitlist too! Then 14...then 15... hahaha! Our time will come!!!

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Hi everyone. Nice to see some familiar names here. Good luck to everyone reapplying!!

I was waitlisted for the cohort starting in Sac in January as well. Didn’t apply for the summer start because I wasn’t too keen on going to San Mateo.

But here we are again! Back at it.

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Hey everybody!

This is my first time applying for the ABSN program. I've applied to only the Sacramento location, so fingers crossed. My application package:

94.8% HESi, but I know they look at individual scores more than the overall.

100% A&P / Grammar 94% / Vocab 96% / Math 96% / Reading Comprehension 88% (ugh!)

Science GPA 4.0

Last 60 units 3.73

4 letters, 2 academic (Micro and Anatomy), 1 from a non-profit supervisor, 1 from a client whose elderly father I'm a caretaker for

Major shift in career after many years in IT, but one company was all clinical messaging software.

Lots of community volunteer experience including working with inner city youth.

Caretaker for one client and my elderly mother for the past several years.

Strong CV and essays.

I was told by the counselor that I'm competitive, but until I'm accepted, that means nothing! ;-)

Best of luck to everyone in this nerve-wracking journey.

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