Changing my major my senior year and need advice?

[RedMoss]

Hello all! So I have recently discovered this forum and wanted to post a long standing question that I have been considering. I am currently a Finance major at the University of Houston going into my senior year this August. I have been considering changing my major for the good part of this academic year. I have experienced a small portion of the "corporate world" and have found very few things about it I like about it. The culture, the work, the lack of advancement within the workplace and have been going through the paces just to get through my undergrad.
These last few days I have really been considering switching my major (to Biology or Chemistry if need be) and attempting to earn my M.D. after completing my undergrad. At this point I am heavily considering this option above all. I am currently looking at my options as far as switching my major (my eligibility as a senior) and improving my volunteer work hours. So my questions are as follows,
1) what advice would you give someone in my position making this change? Should I change my degree to become a more competitive candidate?

2) what coursework would I have to take as far as completing my undergrad? (I will make an appointment with a counselor at my Uni but to date I have only taken General Biology and Microbiology?) I know the usual retirement is one year of organic chemistry, one year of physics, one year of biology (I assume my courses cover that?). I to date have taken College Algebra, Finite Math, Business Calculus, and Statistics for Business Applications, would I need to take Calculus I?

3) How have you found the coursework as far as school/life balance goes?

Thank you for taking the time to read my post and relying.

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[esob]

You need biochem for the MCAT and most med schools. The path to biochem is generally 2 semesters of gen chem followed by 2 semesters of Ochem as prereqs for biochem, thus, if you haven't even taken gen chem yet, you are looking at at least a couple of years of coursework. You'll also need to include several courses worth of advanced bio electives to get a degree in bio, including but not limited to genetics, cell bio and animal physiology.

 

[RedMoss]

You need biochem for the MCAT and most med schools. The path to biochem is generally 2 semesters of gen chem followed by 2 semesters of Ochem as prereqs for biochem, thus, if you haven't even taken gen chem yet, you are looking at at least a couple of years of coursework. You'll also need to include several courses worth of advanced bio electives to get a degree in bio, including but not limited to genetics, cell bio and animal physiology.

Could I apply to med school as a finance major as long as I complete my prerequisites?

 

[Ulgarmoose]

Could I apply to med school as a finance major as long as I complete my prerequisites?

Absolutely

I changed my major to biology senior year because I needed a lot of prereq courses and just figured it made sense that way.

 

[esob]

Could I apply to med school as a finance major as long as I complete my prerequisites?

You can apply with a major in basket weaving as long as you complete the prereqs; the question is how will you do on the MCAT without a strong science background. I was a religion major for 3 years before I switched to bio and while you learn other skills in non-science courses there is still a ton of science stuff on the MCAT. It won't stop you from doing well but it just means you will likely need to self-study more for the MCAT than your typical bio major would. At the end of the day if you can make your GPA and MCAT as high as a bio/chem major's then you will actually probably have an advantage b/c you will stand out from the crowd.

 

[RedMoss]

You can apply with a major in basket weaving as long as you complete the prereqs; the question is how will you do on the MCAT without a strong science background. I was a religion major for 3 years before I switched to bio and while you learn other skills in non-science courses there is still a ton of science stuff on the MCAT. It won't stop you from doing well but it just means you will likely need to self-study more for the MCAT than your typical bio major would. At the end of the day if you can make your GPA and MCAT as high as a bio/chem major's then you will actually probably have an advantage b/c you will stand out from the crowd.

How was the transition? Right now I'm sort of in a transitional phase in my life and am really curious as to how such a big change like this will play out. Whether changing my major or just doing the prerequisites, the former would obviously involve diving deep into biology and all the advanced required courses. How challenging were those courses? How much math was involved in them? And with what GPA did you graduate with? I apologize if this is a bit much, I just need to here this from someone who has been there and done that.

 

[timephone]

I think the challenge of pre-med science courses will vary with the individual. I did an undergrad and masters in the social sciences and I found those high level classes to be much more difficult than biology and chemistry. But many people will probably have the opposite experience.

Also make sure to ask your academic advisor about possible excess credit hour surcharges. In my state (Florida) if you go over I believe 136 total earned hours in your current degree program you are charged 2x the tuition per credit hour. This is to encourage people to graduate with the credits (and major) they have and not stick around taking classes that don't count towards your major.

 

[esob]

How was the transition? Right now I'm sort of in a transitional phase in my life and am really curious as to how such a big change like this will play out. Whether changing my major or just doing the prerequisites, the former would obviously involve diving deep into biology and all the advanced required courses. How challenging were those courses? How much math was involved in them? And with what GPA did you graduate with? I apologize if this is a bit much, I just need to here this from someone who has been there and done that.

I was a religion major at a top 100 private university with 87 hrs @ 3.93; currently a biology major at a state university with 48 hrs @ 4.0. The coursework is night and day really. Two polar opposite skill sets. The science work is almost completely objective, where the humanities work was almost entirely subjective. The humanities work allowed me to crush my practice section for CARS however (as I did on LR section of the LSAT) but the raw facts are significantly more relevant to the science sections from my perspective.

As far as courses, honestly the upper division bio courses are easier. I see people talk all the time about how they got C's in chemistry but they got an A in NeuroPsychoPhysioChemicalBiology and expect that shows a maturation: it doesn't. Everyone knows the upper division bio courses are easy. The sophomore level courses such as Ochem 1/2, Cell Bio, etc. are the hardest classes for most, for a variety of reasons. As far as math, you just need to be infinitely comfortable with algebra and you'll be fine. If you struggle with algebra then chem/physics will be challenging.

In the end, I thought about keeping a religion major and just doing the prereqs but the prereq list is so exhaustive and so closely connected with the requirements of a bio degree, that it amounted to taking fewer classes for me to simply switch to a bio major.