Language Major/Pre-Med

[LAMS14]

Hello SDN community!

I was accepted into my UC as an undeclared major, but I have come to the conclusion that I want to major in a Foreign Language as well as stay on the pre-health track.

But the two are not directly related and picking classes already stresses me out loads (even before college has started, haha).

Has anyone does this before? And/or could possibly recommend a good timeline for freshman year?

I've done hours of reading on this forum, and research on other sites, but I haven't found enough information relating to my situation and I'm still at a loss as to where to start...

Any and all help is greatly appreciated, thanks!

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[kevster2001]

You should talk to a pre-health/pre-medical advisor at your specific school.

 

[theWUbear]

First thing people should tell you is to major in what you're interested in. I will add this: learn new languages while you still can! I'm sure there have been many many people who have majored in a language, still taken the premed courses, taken the MCAT, and gone to medical school. As for a good timeline, just take gen chem/gen bio/physics whenever it fits well into your schedule, start your language classes, and get those graduation requirements out of the way early. No sweat

 

[gravitywave]

You should talk to a pre-health/pre-medical advisor at your specific school.

...who will probably tell OP that s/he is crazy, and needs to major in biology, but to also make sure to take chem up through thermo, and calc up through tensors.

OP, you'll be fine. undergrad is four long long years long. in my class we have language, literature and music majors. i believe that coming from a humanities background is often an edge in admissions, and there's a school of us on here that believe the best way into med school is via a non-science major followed by a high-quality post-bac.

my advice is to spread things out and have a good mix of material every semester. a good start this fall might be to take the pre-med bio I; calc if you havent had it, otherwise chem I; your language; and a graduation requirement elective. throw in PE if your school requires it, and you have 14-15 credits.

don't take 18 credits your first semester because you think you need to to get it all done. dont forget to have a life either. there's plenty of work to do once you get to med school

 

[CurrySpice]

You can certainly do it! It's nice to have a set number of classes that you need to take outside of the sciences for balance. Plus, at my school you could fulfill a large number of GE requirements within the language.

First semester:
Intro Chem
Calc I
Foreign language
Freshman writing
PE class

Second Semester:
Intro Chem II
Intro Bio I (if offered... otherwise any science, math or statistics class)
Foreign language
Freshman religion
Fun class!

etc. etc.

I would recommend only taking 4 classes your first semester, plus a fun PE class if you will need it (great to get those out of the way before your science labs all start to conflict). You want to have the free time to be able to try out as many clubs as possible in order to find your niche. You will have time to figure out how to succeed in college, while figuring out what type of ECs you love.

I took chem and bio together freshman year, and loved it. But I had taken AP Chem (and not gotten credit for the exam) so Gen Chem I was basically review for me.

Edit: I would write out a 4-year plan once you get access to the course database (so you can figure out what classes are offered when). This way you can make sure that you have a good balance across all of your semesters AND that you fulfill GE requirements, pre-med classes, as well as your major classes. The time you invest doing that now will pay off when you have a senior year that is NOT loaded with crazy-hard classes!

 

[hiyaman]

If your at a UC, it might be hard to take upper division bio classes * if you wanted to * without a major in biology. Although I don't know if all UC's have same major restrictions.

I know UCI is a pain to get into upper div bio lectures without a major in biology, but you could probably work around this.

 

[bookfreak89]

Hello SDN community!

I was accepted into my UC as an undeclared major, but I have come to the conclusion that I want to major in a Foreign Language as well as stay on the pre-health track.

But the two are not directly related and picking classes already stresses me out loads (even before college has started, haha).

Has anyone does this before? And/or could possibly recommend a good timeline for freshman year?

I've done hours of reading on this forum, and research on other sites, but I haven't found enough information relating to my situation and I'm still at a loss as to where to start...

Any and all help is greatly appreciated, thanks!

There are some people at my school that majored in Spanish/French-Italian/Classics and are premed; however, it was not that easy.

...who will probably tell OP that s/he is crazy, and needs to major in biology, but to also make sure to take chem up through thermo, and calc up through tensors.

OP, you'll be fine. undergrad is four long long years long. in my class we have language, literature and music majors. i believe that coming from a humanities background is often an edge in admissions, and there's a school of us on here that believe the best way into med school is via a non-science major followed by a high-quality post-bac.

my advice is to spread things out and have a good mix of material every semester. a good start this fall might be to take the pre-med bio I; calc if you havent had it, otherwise chem I; your language; and a graduation requirement elective. throw in PE if your school requires it, and you have 14-15 credits.

don't take 18 credits your first semester because you think you need to to get it all done. dont forget to have a life either. there's plenty of work to do once you get to med school

I think it depends on the school/premed advisor. As long as the OP has some guidance and can plan to take all the necessary prereqs on time, they should have no problem with fitting in the classes (unless it conflicts arise, which they usually do, so that may require some schedule maneuvering).