- Joined
- Feb 27, 2012
- Messages
- 4
- Reaction score
- 1
Just wanted to stop in and say hello to everyone, I began browsing this site a few years ago. Probably 2012, or so. After years of struggling to figure out what I want to do, my family and I have decided that I should pursue medicine like I've wanted.
I suppose my story isn't that different from other non-traditionals, with the exception of maybe a few hiccups I've had along the way. I've been interested in medicine since my high school years, but never got around to pursuing it. I dropped out of high school my sophomore year due to... well, doesn't matter really. There's no good reason for doing that, ha. Went to community college after getting my GED in 2008, attended for a semester and decided I wasn't ready to go back to school yet.
Joined the Air Force a couple weeks after I turned 21, and spent just shy of 4 years in. I was able to exit voluntarily when they decided to downsize last year, because I wanted to go back to school. That was May 2014, then I got cold feet and didn't go to school, bounced around from dead end job to dead end job. Re-applied to the local university in January and was accepted to start this summer term.
I'll be attending a technical/engineering school, so my options for majors are kind of limited... the only other schools in town are National American University and a vocational school, so not too great of options. There's another state university about 60 miles away, but I'm not too keen on making that drive 4 days a week. Unfortunately, since my university does not have a single major outside of engineering or science, and they pride themselves on being difficult, most of the credits I have already don't transfer and I'll be starting from scratch. I have ~65 credits right now and so far they've accepted 4 classes and filled out the 12 elective credits for the degree, petitioning for a couple other classes but not holding my breath.
I've chosen to major in Applied Biological Sciences as I have no interest in engineering and don't want to take the classes involved in those majors. My choices were Chemistry, Applied Biological Sciences, or Interdisciplinary Sciences (which is 24 GenEd, 24 Humanities, 12 Useless and 60 Math/Science credits). The Chemistry program is a ACS-certified program and as such there's a lot of classes I don't need/want, so the weird biology major it is, I guess.
I'm still tinkering with the idea of just doing my core classes with them and then transferring somewhere else, but I don't know where I would transfer to since there's not many options here. I hate taking online classes, so a soft major from a university somewhere else won't be an option.. I'm just stuck! Lol.
Currently, I'm deciding how fast I want to push through my classes and graduate. I've got a few plans/timelines figured out, just depends on how much suck I want each semester. Almost every class I have to take is a lab course, with the exception of the 5 GenEd's and Calculus I still need. But those will be done this summer & fall. After that it's pure lab Bio, Chem and Phys courses. All my "filler" credits are used up.
If I stack 3 lab courses a semester + 1-2 other classes and utilize my summers well I could potentially graduate May 2017. That would be ideal. Or, I'll graduate May 2018 by stretching out the classes. Usually a year isn't that big of a deal, but my wife is still in the military and she's due for orders to a new duty station in the next year which could infinitely complicate things.
So if you've read all this now you know my story. I guess my only question for SDN right now is, would you stack Gen Bio/Gen Chem/Intro Phys/Calc for your "Freshman" year? And if so, what would you do to prepare for that? I haven't taken a science class since 2006, but I'm academically blessed and a very quick study. I have until early August to decide, but I'll probably be registering in May and if I get too worried I'd drop Intro Phys before August.
I suppose my story isn't that different from other non-traditionals, with the exception of maybe a few hiccups I've had along the way. I've been interested in medicine since my high school years, but never got around to pursuing it. I dropped out of high school my sophomore year due to... well, doesn't matter really. There's no good reason for doing that, ha. Went to community college after getting my GED in 2008, attended for a semester and decided I wasn't ready to go back to school yet.
Joined the Air Force a couple weeks after I turned 21, and spent just shy of 4 years in. I was able to exit voluntarily when they decided to downsize last year, because I wanted to go back to school. That was May 2014, then I got cold feet and didn't go to school, bounced around from dead end job to dead end job. Re-applied to the local university in January and was accepted to start this summer term.
I'll be attending a technical/engineering school, so my options for majors are kind of limited... the only other schools in town are National American University and a vocational school, so not too great of options. There's another state university about 60 miles away, but I'm not too keen on making that drive 4 days a week. Unfortunately, since my university does not have a single major outside of engineering or science, and they pride themselves on being difficult, most of the credits I have already don't transfer and I'll be starting from scratch. I have ~65 credits right now and so far they've accepted 4 classes and filled out the 12 elective credits for the degree, petitioning for a couple other classes but not holding my breath.
I've chosen to major in Applied Biological Sciences as I have no interest in engineering and don't want to take the classes involved in those majors. My choices were Chemistry, Applied Biological Sciences, or Interdisciplinary Sciences (which is 24 GenEd, 24 Humanities, 12 Useless and 60 Math/Science credits). The Chemistry program is a ACS-certified program and as such there's a lot of classes I don't need/want, so the weird biology major it is, I guess.
I'm still tinkering with the idea of just doing my core classes with them and then transferring somewhere else, but I don't know where I would transfer to since there's not many options here. I hate taking online classes, so a soft major from a university somewhere else won't be an option.. I'm just stuck! Lol.
Currently, I'm deciding how fast I want to push through my classes and graduate. I've got a few plans/timelines figured out, just depends on how much suck I want each semester. Almost every class I have to take is a lab course, with the exception of the 5 GenEd's and Calculus I still need. But those will be done this summer & fall. After that it's pure lab Bio, Chem and Phys courses. All my "filler" credits are used up.
If I stack 3 lab courses a semester + 1-2 other classes and utilize my summers well I could potentially graduate May 2017. That would be ideal. Or, I'll graduate May 2018 by stretching out the classes. Usually a year isn't that big of a deal, but my wife is still in the military and she's due for orders to a new duty station in the next year which could infinitely complicate things.
So if you've read all this now you know my story. I guess my only question for SDN right now is, would you stack Gen Bio/Gen Chem/Intro Phys/Calc for your "Freshman" year? And if so, what would you do to prepare for that? I haven't taken a science class since 2006, but I'm academically blessed and a very quick study. I have until early August to decide, but I'll probably be registering in May and if I get too worried I'd drop Intro Phys before August.
