Biomedical Engr Grad School Advice

[engr21q]

Hello all,

I am currently a Biosystems engineering senior at a Research 1 university and I am in the process of applying to graduate schools. I just wanted some advice on my chances of getting into a good Biomedical engineering program.

My current GPA is sitting around a 3.1, and it will be most likely around a 3.2 at my time of application. This is due to the fact that I was a pre-med student and I did not do so well in some of the medical school pre-req courses (o chem, etc.) With the exception of one failed engineering course that I am retaking, my low GPA is all due to the medical school pre-requisites I took. I have not taken the GRE yet (that is happening in mid-November) but I expect that I will get good scores. As far as research experience, I have worked in a research lab on campus for about a year, working with nanoparticles, lanthanide-based fluoroscopy techniques, and other biomedical imaging methods.

My main concern at the moment is that my low GPA may bar be from getting into a good program. Most programs state that the average applicant GPA is a 3.5, which is significantly higher than my application GPA will be. I expect good GRE scores, great recommendation letters, etc. but I wanted to know if anyone had any insight into my chances of getting into good BME programs.

Currently the list of schools I want to apply to are:

University of Virginia

University of Michigan

Boston University

UCSD

UCSF

Case Western

I am toying with the idea of applying to MIT, Johns Hopkins, and some other top programs but as I stated before, my GPA concerns are putting me off from applying there.

If anyone has any advice it would be extremely helpful! Thanks!