Do I have any chance?

[silveradoprincess]

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Good afternoon,
I'm sure I'm similar to many many students, but I'm currently in need of some reassurance. I'm currently doing poorly in Organic chemistry (no, I don't know why). I'm a junior (the teacher was away during my senior year and the "teacher" was a fundamental chem. teacher so I opted out of taking it then). As far as study habits, I devote around 2-3 hours a night/during the day to organic chemistry alone and then about an hour or more for my other courses. I've never failed a class (until organic) and I will definitely be retaking it. However, I think unless I can find a way to take things differently, I may be a year behind. Does that put me out of the water for Veterinary school?

As for experience, I have around 1000-1200 mixed animal veterinary hours as of today, and I've been around animals working my whole life (rodeo through high school, family farm, FFA, etc.). I have recommendations from two instructors at my university as well as the State Veterinarian of my state (my current boss).

Any suggestions?

 

[mmmdreamerz]

Hi there! Welcome to SDN. There's a stickied "what are my chances? thread at the top. Post your stats there and you'll get the most feed back.

As for Ochem...lot's of people have trouble with that class, but it's another hoop you have to jump through. You said you don't know why your not doing well, but honestly to do well you're going to have to figure it out! You said that you devote 2-3 hours a night to Ochem but is it effective studying? Definitely review your tests and see what exactly you aren't getting. Go to office hours. Form a study group with your friends. Quite frankly, I memorized my way through Ochem I and II which probably isn't the best way to do it, but you do what you gotta do.

Retaking one class doesn't knock you out of the running for vet school, but obviously you have to get through Ochem. Work hard at figuring out what isn't working NOW so even if you do have to retake, you're all that more prepared to do well.

 

[silveradoprincess]

I fully intend on taking it until I pass with a higher score, definitely not giving up and throwing in the towel. I consider it effective studying, I'm redoing homework problems for the chapters he's assigns. I've been to study groups as well as met with the teacher, in his words "You're doing exactly what you should be, I'm not sure why you aren't scoring higher". (sigh). Thank you for replying!

 

[LyraGardenia]

Good afternoon,
I'm sure I'm similar to many many students, but I'm currently in need of some reassurance. I'm currently doing poorly in Organic chemistry (no, I don't know why). I'm a junior (the teacher was away during my senior year and the "teacher" was a fundamental chem. teacher so I opted out of taking it then). As far as study habits, I devote around 2-3 hours a night/during the day to organic chemistry alone and then about an hour or more for my other courses. I've never failed a class (until organic) and I will definitely be retaking it. However, I think unless I can find a way to take things differently, I may be a year behind. Does that put me out of the water for Veterinary school?

As for experience, I have around 1000-1200 mixed animal veterinary hours as of today, and I've been around animals working my whole life (rodeo through high school, family farm, FFA, etc.). I have recommendations from two instructors at my university as well as the State Veterinarian of my state (my current boss).

Any suggestions?

I REALLY struggled with organic chem, and had to take organic II five times. Yeah, not my best move. It definitely made applying to vet school more difficult (I had to apply three times), but I did eventually get accepted to Kansas State. So it's not a deal-breaker, especially if you get an A or B the second time around and all your other grades are good. As far as if it puts you behind for graduating, I finally made a B in it my second semester senior year, so I didn't have that issue. I was able to take summer classes in order to keep up on my number of credit hours needed for my scholarship. But lots of people take five years (or more) to finish undergrad, so don't worry about that as far as vet school admissions goes, although I understand it might be disheartening. You might try getting a tutor if going to your professor and forming study groups hasn't helped. There's also the option of dropping the class if it's not too late and you're sure you're going to fail; a W would look better on your transcript than an F.

 

[silveradoprincess]

That's the worst part, it's too late to drop. My friend found this way to take both courses online (University of New England) and it transfers to my university as full credit. It's self paced so I could do it anytime. Think I should try that or just retake it next year? I hate that F, but unless a magic act happens (and it may..) I'm out of luck. Tutors aren't offered here (I tried). Thank you so much for your response!

 

[LyraGardenia]

That's the worst part, it's too late to drop. My friend found this way to take both courses online (University of New England) and it transfers to my university as full credit. It's self paced so I could do it anytime. Think I should try that or just retake it next year? I hate that F, but unless a magic act happens (and it may..) I'm out of luck. Tutors aren't offered here (I tried). Thank you so much for your response!

Mizzou told me it looks best to retake and pass the same course, but I don't know if all schools feel the same way, so you might want to contact the schools you plan on applying to. But the New England course might be a good option, especially if organic I is only offered once a year at your school. Oh, and Khan Academy videos are also a great resource!

 

[deleted806434]

Just another piece of advice as far as organic chemistry goes... I found that it was very helpful to write reaction summary sheets with all of the different reactions I needed to know for each exam (with each type of reaction, mechanism, what functional groups are used, etc.). This was really helpful for long synthesis questions on exams because I knew exactly what I could do with certain functional groups. Recognizing patterns was also key for me. Maybe try doing additional questions in your book that are similar to homework questions--if you get those right, you should feel confident about answering similar exam questions because you are actually understanding and not just memorizing. Hope this helps a little. Good luck!

 

[Liquid_Phoenix]

That's the worst part, it's too late to drop. My friend found this way to take both courses online (University of New England) and it transfers to my university as full credit. It's self paced so I could do it anytime. Think I should try that or just retake it next year? I hate that F, but unless a magic act happens (and it may..) I'm out of luck. Tutors aren't offered here (I tried). Thank you so much for your response!

I definitely agree with using Khan Academy. Also check out Chad's videos. Just type that into your search engine and it will come up. Sign up with your email (it's free) and he breaks the steps down so easily in his videos. Not sure which book you are using but it follows mine step by step. He's awesome!!