How quickly could someone finish a bachelor’s if they studied like a med student

[Piskaupf]

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A middle of the road one; not too difficult like electrical engineering.

Let’s say finance. Studying 8 hours a day, could someone hypothetically finish a bachelors in 1.5-2 years?

 

[Kracin]

Material and knowledge wise, yeah probably 1.5 years of preclinicals at many med schools is similar if not more to what other people learn in 4 years during undergrad

the bureaucracy behind scheduling the classes + the needless detail some undergrad courses go into is a big hindrance

 

[Dr G Oogle]

It’s the number of credit hours and more importantly degree requirements if you can fit it all in then yes you could finish quicker but I doubt in 1.5 years, earliest I heard was 3 years for a 4 year degree, could probably do it in 2.5 I imagine

 

[Schwifty]

I have an undergraduate business degree, if I studied like I do in med school (and assuming the curriculum was set up to finish it fast) it would have taken about 1.5 years maybe 2

 

[deleted480308]

If you’re asking in reference to speeding up the path to med school, don’t. You need to master the prereqs and get As in everything.

Speed is a good way to have a fast degree that you never get into med school with

 

[stickflip723]

The way I'm studying now and the pace things are moving, I could easily see the 1.5 years of preclinical being like 3 or 4 years of undergrad.

 

[ciestar]

It’s the pre-reqs in undergrad that kill you. You have to take this one class before this other class, oh, and that class is only offered in the fall.

 

[libertyyne]

A bachelors could be compressed to 1.5 years if it was the same pace as medical school. If you have a supportive school and a boatload of AP credits you could finish a bachelors in 2- 2.5 years. The problem is you need a school to support your efforts, and aid/scheduling will be a hinderance.
If you are too young medical schools will question your maturity, and this will hinder your ability to round out your application in terms of volunteering/research and leadership.

 

[Piskaupf]

Ok let’s say if the student
1. Wasn’t confined by administrative reqs and could take any class at any point and study whatever, whenever he wanted. His only objective is to learn the material.
2. There are no prereqs like english history chem.

Edit: however, you have to learn the content well enough such that you’d receive an A in all the classes-C’s don’t get degrees here

 

[Goro]

A middle of the road one; not too difficult like electrical engineering.

Let’s say finance. Studying 8 hours a day, could someone hypothetically finish a bachelors in 1.5-2 years?

Four years

 

[Allosteopath]

Wasn't there a 9 year old who was on track to finish their engineering degree at 9 years old, having started high school when they were 6? I think that leaves aboutleave 2-3 years to complete a Bachelor of engineering? I guess we're just all behind the curve. I don't imagine the poor kid had much of a childhood, but if he could do it pretty quick, so could you!

 

[mostwanted]

In TX, it is not uncommon for high school graduates to also have an associate degree (dual credit). I have a family member, who is finishing high school at 17 and can easily graduate in two years with bachelors (planning on starting med school at 19 or 20) With smart planning, bachelors can be done in 2 years. I respectfully disagree with anyone who suggests you need 4 years honing the prereqs to do well in medical school. Simply not true. 8 years it takes for MD, is excessive compared to most international standards.

 

[MusicDOc124]

In theory, 2 ish years, but in reality when you consider that many courses rely on a previously taken course (i.e. bio and chem for orgo, orgo for biochem). I imagine in most degrees there is a similar network of courses that are taken stepwise. Some courses are also only offered in fall or spring each year. There are sometimes limits to how many credits you can take. Even if there are none, there are additional fees for overloading to take enough credits to go beyond the typically 18-ish "cap" for full time. This would cost a lot extra, as if you went an extra year anyway.

 

[MusicDOc124]

In TX, it is not uncommon for high school graduates to also have an associate degree (dual credit). I have a family member, who is finishing high school at 17 and can easily graduate in two years with bachelors

Then by taking dual credits for 1-2 years worth of work, you're not actually doing a full bachelors in 2 years, FYI - it's the 2 years + 1/2 years worth of work. Otherwise this is a completely different discussion, and we'd need to go off the basis of starting from an associates across the board, which isn't the context here at all.

 

[dpmd]

there's several people in my med school who graduated in 2 or 2.5 years with their bachelors. Given they took classes at community colleges during high school

That means they took more than 2 or 2.5 yrs though.

 

[Gilakend]

1.5 years seems very doable imo from a pure content perspective. Maybe I was just a bum in undergrad and the difference is bigger bc I go to a school with a condensed pre-clinical, but the amount I study in a day now is comparative to how much I studied for an entire exam in UG.

 

[deleted947265]

Realistically? Somewhere in the ball park of 1.5 to 2.5 years but it really depends on the major/program/university. The issue is that universities won't let you take advanced courses without the prerequisites and only offer certain prerequisites at certain times.

You will also hate your life. You wanna know how I know? I just checked and I was 6 credits short of earning a complete Bachelor's degree from my university. I took 91 credit of coursework to complete my CS degree in a little less than 2 years and most of my prereqs. I thought it would take more credits than that but I guess not.

I didn't do well for someone who wants to apply to medical school (3.5). If you want to apply to medical school and set yourself up for success: don't rush things. You won't impress adcoms, you will get worse grades, and it will suck. Don't overload yourself, spread out your coursework, don't take 5 upper levels in one semester, and do not under any circumstances take summer courses.

It sounds like there might be some hypothetical edge case where doing that might be a good idea but yeah don't do that. Learn from my mistakes, kids.

 

[IlDestriero]

If you came in with several accepted AP credits, took summer school, and loaded up on classes each semester, you could theoretically finish in 2.5 years. However the reality is that some classes cant be taken concurrently, some will not be offered when you’d need them, etc. However you could finish in 3. My wife did this. But it was because she was bright and enjoyed school. Most people don’t take summer school courses, especially premeds who want to do research gigs at the NIH, etc.
My nephew is also a Mensa kind of guy who was taking college courses starting freshman year of high school as part of some gifted program. He took the full 4 years to graduate. He took more classes than he needed, did a double major, semester abroad, travel programs, etc. He did that because college is the time to explore your options, spread your wings, live a little. There’s no reason to blast through locked in your dorm room.
Life is an adventure.

 

[deleted915325]

Am I the only one who feels med school preclinical is just a tiny bit easier than undergrad?

 

[Sleepingdoc]

We had biochem, genetics, cell bio, micro all done in 1 month... so 1.5 years seems reasonable but it seems like it can be done quicker.

 

[libertyyne]

Am I the only one who feels med school preclinical is just a tiny bit easier than undergrad?

I literally never studied in Undergrad besides going to class and the night before. In medical school I almost study everyday.

 

[ooh a bean]

I think 1-2 years would be reasonable, especially if you don't have to do extracurriculars like the ones people normally do in college that take up a ton of time (Greek life, sports, etc.)

 

[efle]

Am I the only one who feels med school preclinical is just a tiny bit easier than undergrad?

I literally never studied in Undergrad besides going to class and the night before. In medical school I almost study everyday.

In a pass/fail setting and compared to my notoriously weedout college, yeah it was cake.

But if I studied like it was step 1 dedicated nonstop? Could've done everything I covered in college in less than a year.

 

[raiderette]

So if you could take all the classes that you need whenever you choose, 2 years sounds reasonable. However, if you are planning to then go to medical school, you would needs 1-2 years to get the research, extra curricular, leadership, work experience and testing required to be competitive.

 

[hallowmann]

There are accelerated BSN degrees that are 1-1.5 yrs. For some, the only "pre-reqs" are a previous degree (any previous degree) with general education requirements. I think you can easily compress a bachelor's into 2 yrs. They do it all the time in BS/MD and BS/DO programs.

 

[ciestar]

Am I the only one who feels med school preclinical is just a tiny bit easier than undergrad?

It was awful for me. I didn’t struggle at all in undergrad with the exception of ochem

 

[thatchemguy]

I wish I went to one of those weedout colleges lol. My undergrad (super tiny no name school) was super easy, and I didn't get to build the strong discipline/study habits that my med school classmates from big name schools did.

 

[deleted915325]

Yeah ochem did suck for sure. I went to a weed out college. I guess there were just classes in college that I couldn’t get an A in no matter how hard I tried but in med school I can get the A if I just put the work in. Calc 1 and 2 killed me in undergrad.. thought I was going to drop out cuz of those

 

[alprazoslam]

Prob varies widely by degree. crap majors I’d say could be done in a year.
Harder engineering 2-3 maybe prob closer to three

99% of college majors are BS so on average 1-2 years ez pez

 

[RangerBob]

1.5 years? Where did you all go to school? There’s no way I could’ve finished that quickly if I worked as hard in undergrad as I did in medical school.

I don’t feel med school was that much harder than undergrad. Maybe I could’ve graduated as much as a year early, but to graduate in 2 I’d probably be in class 8hrs/day plus studying another 6-8 or so. I’d never have a weekend off or vacation. But I had plenty of those in med school.

Medical school is nowhere near that bad.

I would never recommend anyone graduate early. Take your time. Med schools don’t care if you took a really heavy course-load or graduated early.

 

[Emmet2301]

This really depends. In college the material wasn't terribly difficult, but the exams were (at least at my school). And a lot of the bio/chem courses were weed out courses.

 

[alprazoslam]

1.5 years? Where did you all go to school? There’s no way I could’ve finished that quickly if I worked as hard in undergrad as I did in medical school.

I don’t feel med school was that much harder than undergrad. Maybe I could’ve graduated as much as a year early, but to graduate in 2 I’d probably be in class 8hrs/day plus studying another 6-8 or so. I’d never have a weekend off or vacation. But I had plenty of those in med school.

Medical school is nowhere near that bad.

I would never recommend anyone graduate early. Take your time. Med schools don’t care if you took a really heavy course-load or graduated early.

U may have had a harder major. I don’t think science could be finished super early. Just saying the run of the mill ez pez degree

 

[Gilakend]

U may have had a harder major. I don’t think science could be finished super early. Just saying the run of the mill ez pez degree

I was a science major and think anyone at my med school could have done it in 1.5 years the way most people study now. If it was like business admin or communications than even shorter.

I also go to a school where the preclincal is only 1 year and my UG was a good ole fashioned state school so maybe my view is skewed.

 

[RangerBob]

U may have had a harder major. I don’t think science could be finished super early. Just saying the run of the mill ez pez degree

I was art and design. No way I could have finished in less than two years.

Med school didn’t require studying in every spare moment. I felt taking three science pre-recs in post-bac kept me busier than the majority of med school.

I can understand people having different experiences. But compressing a 4-year degree into 1.5 years? We’re talking about taking 8 courses at a time.

 

[anbuitachi]

Depends on major.

The hardest part to condense for science majors (if the requirements are kept exactly the same) are the lab courses... you can only grow cultures and do experiments so quickly! 1.5 years sound very reasonable to me (was a biology major). Definitely take longer if premed major was more challenging like math/some engineering fields

 

[imcryinglol]

A friend from undergrad completed a double major in neuroscience and psychology, while being pre-med, while doing 10-20 hours of research a week. She finished in 2.5 years and is now an M1 at at a top 10 med school. She is what I would call, gifted.

 

[mvenus929]

If you came in with several accepted AP credits, took summer school, and loaded up on classes each semester, you could theoretically finish in 2.5 years. However the reality is that some classes cant be taken concurrently, some will not be offered when you’d need them, etc. However you could finish in 3. My wife did this. But it was because she was bright and enjoyed school. Most people don’t take summer school courses, especially premeds who want to do research gigs at the NIH, etc.
My nephew is also a Mensa kind of guy who was taking college courses starting freshman year of high school as part of some gifted program. He took the full 4 years to graduate. He took more classes than he needed, did a double major, semester abroad, travel programs, etc. He did that because college is the time to explore your options, spread your wings, live a little. There’s no reason to blast through locked in your dorm room.
Life is an adventure.

FWIW, I came into college as a second semester sophomore... if I had done more than 12-15 credits per semester, I could have easily finished in 2 years. But, you know, I wanted to enjoy the experience somewhat, so I took 3 years.

 

[medschoolmentors]

I did a "pre-med" major in 2.5 years and used my last half-year to study abroad. I did 12-15 credits per semester, no summer classes. Granted, I went in with AP credit that allowed me to skip math, English comp, and most of the foreign language requirements. And I planned my entire schedule from day 1, so there were no surprises and I wouldn't have to deal with courses not being offered a certain semester.

And yeah, I studied hard (sometimes haha) but I still had fun! It was a great decision for me and saved me money, but everyone's different.

 

[Michael3423]

Do medical schools see finishing your bachelor's degree faster as just racing through the system?

If not, is there any way I, a current microbiology major, could finish my bachelor's degree faster? I do not want to race through the system, but after focusing on biology for the past two years of college so much by taking at least 3 science classes per semester, I noticed how much the content overlaps. The reasoning behind this is to drill certain foundational concepts into your long-term memory, however, I am ready to move on. The only thing holding me back are the requirement for humanities courses. The only obvious option I see is to just load up on courses to finish my bachelor's degree faster.