Does how many science courses you take matter?

[Falconclaw]

Hey, so "Does Your Major Matter" has already been seemingly addressed, with the consensus being a firm "no." However, if you ONLY take the science classes that are required for medical school, would that really look good on an application? Or is it just not something they really care about?

I'm wondering because if it really doesn't matter, I'd rather major in something like history or political science, which both come more easily to me, and are just easier majors than something like Biology or Chemistry.

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[sinombre]

Hey, so "Does Your Major Matter" has already been seemingly addressed, with the consensus being a firm "no." However, if you ONLY take the science classes that are required for medical school, would that really look good on an application? Or is it just not something they really care about?

I'm wondering because if it really doesn't matter, I'd rather major in something like history or political science, which both come more easily to me, and are just easier majors than something like Biology or Chemistry.

It doesn't matter.

A potential downside is that your pre-reqs carry a lot more weight, so if you don't do well in a single class, it could bring down your sGPA a lot more than it would if you had more science classes to balance it out.

If you do well in everything, it won't matter what your major is or how many science classes you take.

 

[Falconclaw]

It doesn't matter.

A potential downside is that your pre-reqs carry a lot more weight, so if you don't do well in a single class, it could bring down your sGPA a lot more than it would if you had more science classes to balance it out.

If you do well in everything, it won't matter what your major is or how many science classes you take.

Yeah, I thought about that. At my school, intro bio classes are actually a lot harder than the upper level ones, so I was thinking of taking more science classes to get a higher sGPA.

 

[Falconclaw]

I guess to ask another question I've been wondering about, how important is the sGPA, relative to the cGPA?

 

[sinombre]

Yeah, I thought about that. At my school, intro bio classes are actually a lot harder than the upper level ones, so I was thinking of taking more science classes to get a higher sGPA.

Yep, a lot of people do this. I added a science minor to my non-science major to boost my sGPA, and it worked well.

I guess to ask another question I've been wondering about, how important is the sGPA, relative to the cGPA?

They're both important. If either is low it will hurt you.

 

[Aerus]

Hey, so "Does Your Major Matter" has already been seemingly addressed, with the consensus being a firm "no." However, if you ONLY take the science classes that are required for medical school, would that really look good on an application? Or is it just not something they really care about?

I'm wondering because if it really doesn't matter, I'd rather major in something like history or political science, which both come more easily to me, and are just easier majors than something like Biology or Chemistry.

Major in what you want. The prereqs will be sufficient, given that you do well in them.

The reason why there isn't a huge emphasis on taking more science classes beyond the prereqs (if you did well on your prereqs and have a decent MCAT score) is because no amount of upper division science classes could reasonably prepare you for medical school since the level of depth and amount of information between undergrad and medical school is far too different.

A senior friend of mine sat in on a couple med school lectures before. According to him, the whole upper division biochem sequence was covered in only a couple of days!

You'll be fine majoring in whatever you want.