Course Selection

[svb]

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When scheduling classes will it look better for medical school if I take honors courses. I go to Ohio State and they have honors classes. (i.e. will they look upon an A in Bio 101 lower than a B in HBio 101)

 

[Jason110]

When scheduling classes will it look better for medical school if I take honors courses. I go to Ohio State and they have honors classes. (i.e. will they look upon an A in Bio 101 lower than a B in HBio 101)

My advice: Medschools don't know the difference between what courses are harder than other courses. If you can take the HBio and get an 'A', by all means... do it ... besides, you'll learn more for the MCAT. However I still think an 'A' in a traditional class is better than a 'B' in an honors section. My two cents.

With that said, however. They will recognize you if you graduated with honors (or on the honors track). It looks good because it shows that you work harder. That's why engineers sometimes get the benefit of a doubt even with a slightly lower GPA.

Right now, however. You should be focused on your classes and enjoying them. Work hard! Very hard! but also remember that college is time you can't relive once you graduate.

Jason

 

[Iffy premed]

it is always good to take honor classes, but not on the expense of getting a lower grade, b/c then it just shows that you are over-ambitious, and didn't study enough. getting B in honor is not better than A in regular class.

But if you do well in honor courses, I do believe the AMCAS weighs honor courses more in calculating your AMCAS gpa

It was nice for me to see I had a 3.9 gpa according to AMCAS

 

[TexPre-Med]

I am going to have to disagree with the above post. That H doesn't do bull****. If you graduate with honors, then you have something else for your resume. This is why I dropped out. My school requires a bunch of honors literature crap that I swear is made to kill your g.p.a. I did take honors Bio however (made an A) and I think it helped for MCAT with the added info. If you know it, do. If you might get a B, I would strongly consider pulling an A elsewhere. g.p.a. is worth too much to screw up. (in my humble opinion.)

 

[dayz]

If you have a strong GPA then take the Honors if you want, if not go for the non Honors. Don't med schools tend to look at GPA as a way to reduce the number of applications? Also, would taking an Honors class take time away from your other classes? Some things to consider.

gluck

 

[mr. sparkle]

i agree with the previous posters.

a B in honors chem or something is definitely worth less than an A in regular chem. remember that some schools screen based on gpa, and won't really be able to factor in your honors classes into the gpa. (the distinction for a course to be "honors" is pretty arbitrary and dependent on the school).

i remember i took honors chem then switched to general chem after i did pretty crappy after the first exam. wound up with an A in gen chem (would've had a B- or C+ in honors chem).

if you think you can do well in the honors class, go for it. it may help on the mcat, but i don't think by much...

good luck.