HS Junior worried about how I'll do in college with the pre-med track.....discouraged.....

[Highschooldoctorplz]

So for starters, telling anyone other than my parents that I want to become a doctor someday is laughable, truly a joke considering the high school I go to, every other student has a nice 3.8 - 4.0 gpa with a plethora of them getting accepted into top undergrad schools. I definitely slacked in my early years of high school, I'm starting to get in the groove for studying (better late than never) all because reality is starting to bite me in the back with my current status. I'm realizing that if I keep up the current pace I won't become a doctor let alone anything in life with my "winging it" mentality.

Now that I've established some backstory on my current status, what is seriously bothering me is how I will stand in college. I plan on taking Calc AB + Ap chem next year to get a feel for the types of courses that I will be having to take in college if I do take the pre-med track. EVERYONE says its hard, and it must be, but I don't know how a person who is finally learning how to actually study in junior year could take the infamous pre-med track many students drop out of in college. Are the dropouts just not dedicated? Or studying far less than the ones that are making it to med school? I mean a 3.5 weighted gpa in high school, so far is not good, and I don't know what extent of studying could get me prepared for college where I should have at least a 3.7 -3.8 gpa if I even want to consider becoming a docotor.

This might be all over the place, I'm just scared and excited at the same time and truly don't want to fail my first semester of college. My first semester avg was a 84 weighted with all honors classes (extremely bad) and I can't imagine having to repeat the same mistakes in an even more difficult and possibly a irreversible (meaning if I mess up its over) situation. High school can easily be bs'd till the end whereas college will require knowledge of the information throughout especially till the MCAT happens....

Just any advice would be beneficial to me. ex. what any pre-meds think the difficulty would be like for me or advice on how can just prevent this. (What also sparked this post was me blindly listening to friends at school or teachers even claiming that "you need to be an exceptional science + math student (in high school) to succeed at completing the pre-med track, and that I'll most likely end up as one of the many that drop out of taking the rigorous track"



A tl;dr for those who don't want to read is, is pre-med doable for someone with poor high school performance like mine, and how can I prepare for freshman year of college with the pre-med track in my schedule.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[longhaul3]

You already gave yourself the best advice you need...don't listen to people who don't know what they're talking about. What do your friends at school (or most teachers, for that matter) know about getting into medical school?

That said, it will be difficult, but it's difficult for almost everybody. In fact, that's why they make you do it...you have to jump through a bunch of hoops and show some determination. Any college you go to will offer academic help with the classes you find difficult, and you should use it if you need it; your tuition dollars help pay their salaries.

Try not to feel intimidated. And honestly, as immature and narcissistic as many of the pre-med college students are on this site, I do also think you should read up, check in periodically, and listen to some of the more experienced posters as you go along. I had never heard about this site until I was in medical school, and I wish I had before that.

Lastly: there are tens of thousands of people who go to medical school every year. While most people who apply don't end up getting in, there's no reason you can't be one who does when you have 5-6 years ahead of you to work on it.

 

[liquidstatic]

You're worrying too much! College is a totally different beast than HS and students that excel in college didn't always excel in HS. I did ok in HS but my grades weren't outstanding (similar to you). I've been accepted to 2 med schools, am on 2 waitlists, and am waiting to hear back from 1 more!

My best advice to you is to start out strong when you start college. It's a lot easier to keep a high GPA than to build up to one. When your friends are off partying every night first semester, stay back a few nights a week and hit the books. That being said still have fun! College goes by a lot more quickly than you think.

 

[WholeLottaGame7]

So for starters, telling anyone other than my parents that I want to become a doctor someday is laughable, truly a joke considering the high school I go to, every other student has a nice 3.8 - 4.0 gpa with a plethora of them getting accepted into top undergrad schools. I definitely slacked in my early years of high school, I'm starting to get in the groove for studying (better late than never) all because reality is starting to bite me in the back with my current status. I'm realizing that if I keep up the current pace I won't become a doctor let alone anything in life with my "winging it" mentality.

Now that I've established some backstory on my current status, what is seriously bothering me is how I will stand in college. I plan on taking Calc AB + Ap chem next year to get a feel for the types of courses that I will be having to take in college if I do take the pre-med track. EVERYONE says its hard, and it must be, but I don't know how a person who is finally learning how to actually study in junior year could take the infamous pre-med track many students drop out of in college. Are the dropouts just not dedicated? Or studying far less than the ones that are making it to med school? I mean a 3.5 weighted gpa in high school, so far is not good, and I don't know what extent of studying could get me prepared for college where I should have at least a 3.7 -3.8 gpa if I even want to consider becoming a docotor.

This might be all over the place, I'm just scared and excited at the same time and truly don't want to fail my first semester of college. My first semester avg was a 84 weighted with all honors classes (extremely bad) and I can't imagine having to repeat the same mistakes in an even more difficult and possibly a irreversible (meaning if I mess up its over) situation. High school can easily be bs'd till the end whereas college will require knowledge of the information throughout especially till the MCAT happens....

Just any advice would be beneficial to me. ex. what any pre-meds think the difficulty would be like for me or advice on how can just prevent this. (What also sparked this post was me blindly listening to friends at school or teachers even claiming that "you need to be an exceptional science + math student (in high school) to succeed at completing the pre-med track, and that I'll most likely end up as one of the many that drop out of taking the rigorous track"



A tl;dr for those who don't want to read is, is pre-med doable for someone with poor high school performance like mine, and how can I prepare for freshman year of college with the pre-med track in my schedule.

A couple things:
1) I was surprised by who out of my high school ended up going to medical school. A couple people I could see, but also a couple I never would have predicted in a thousand years, either for lack of interest or lack of motivation. You can turn it on in college and still succeed. The caveat being, if you wait too long into college, it gets progressively harder.
B) There's no pre-med "track." There are a few standard courses that medical schools require, but otherwise college is what you make it. The majority of your courses can be philosophy, economics, or political science, for all people care. Most people do end up in science majors just because they find that easier/more interesting by default.
#) Make sure to have a balanced college life. A lot of people's natural inclination is to stress, which leads to putting more pressure on themselves, more social isolation, which increases stress even further. It's a vicious cycle. Make sure you study hard and put in consistent academic effort, but also make sure to socialize, make friends, get involved in extracurricular activities (that you enjoy), and take care of yourself.
4) As others have noted, most of your friends and teachers don't know anything about what it takes to get into/succeed in medical school. An anonymous internet forum isn't an amazing source, either, but in general this place is a lot more helpful than most of the resources available to you. Wisdom of the masses and what-not.

 

[Turkishking]

The individuals that end up failing off of the pre-med track end up undermining the rigor of the courses, or aren't dedicated. All you need for success is a strong work-ethic, and good time management.

 

[BeddingfieldMD]

Just try to get into a good college. If you do well there, particularly in the required science courses, then you'll still be on track. Your high school grades won't matter.


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

 

[Bancrofti]

I graduated high school with a 3.0 GPA. I was an athlete and getting A's wasn't really a priority for me. College was tough as I hadn't really developed great study skills beforehand. I managed to squeak into med school and I told myself from day 1 that I wanted to be one of the best. I'm a 4th year student now about to graduate, and I'll be finishing AOA, meaning I'm somewhere around the top 10-15% of my med school class, which is filled with what I consider to pretty smart people.

I still suffer from imposter syndrome at times, but by and large, I've come to realize that your ability to succeed in medicine is directly correlated to how hard you want to work, not some innate level of brilliance. You'll be fine as long as you continue on an upward trend.