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Veterinary Science Graduate Programs from U. of I.
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Kara31191

Kara31191

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Hey all,

It's been a while. I've just been finishing up my first year of undergrad and I'm so excited for the summer ahead.

If any of you SDNers remember, I have been working with an avian/exotics/wildlife/sm animal vet (and a crazy one at that) for 3+ years... Over 5,000 hours of experience! I just quit that job 3 weeks ago, and I started at an emergency center- boy are they willing to teach!

It's the best place to work, and the flexibility of Weekend/late night shifts absolutely works with school. Unlike my previous boss, they are SO willing to schedule me around school, and they completely understand.

This summer, I will be volunteering a full day a week at Foster Parrots, an avian/exotics sanctuary in Rhode Island, and another full day a week shadowing a large animal vet. I'm super excited!

Anyways, to the questions:

Signing up for classes next year. I have taken Bio I and II, Pre calc, Calc, Chem I and II, English Comp (freshman english), and Spanish.

I was thinking of signing up for Anatomy and Physiology I, Physics I, Org. Chem I, and Biostats next semester. What do you think? Too much?

I'm planning on taking Biochemistry next summer, and so I really shouldn't have to finish up too many pre-reqs the following year. Advice?

Also- Organic Chemistry is pretty scary sounding. Any advice? Good websites for studying? If you know UNH, any resources here you found particularly helpful? Should I get a tutor right from the beginning?

Also- Vet school. What am I looking for in which ones I will apply to? Would I have a chance at UC Davis as an OOS student if my GPA is high? What should I do to prepare for the GRE? Any recommended online classes?

I can't financially take classes this summer, and I'm really sad about it. But I'm going to take the time and get the experiences in. Also- I got an apartment starting July 1st, and I can take my beloved Scarlet macaw! 😍 YAY! 🙂 Yes, I'm crazy about those birds!

Thanks everyone,
Kara
 
Kara31191 said:
Signing up for classes next year. I have taken Bio I and II, Pre calc, Calc, Chem I and II, English Comp (freshman english), and Spanish.

I was thinking of signing up for Anatomy and Physiology I, Physics I, Org. Chem I, and Biostats next semester. What do you think? Too much?

Also- Organic Chemistry is pretty scary sounding. Any advice? Good websites for studying? If you know UNH, any resources here you found particularly helpful? Should I get a tutor right from the beginning?
Click to expand...

I can tell you I took Orgo 1 and Physics 1 together and they whooped my butt. Now, I am TERRIBLE at math, so physics was my own personal hell, but taken with also biostats and A&P...yuk. Don't worry about finishing the pre-reqs before you apply. You can have some still to finish your senior year and thats fine, just dont have more than 1 to finish by spring semester your senior year.

Also, Orgo isn't necessary scary. I personally hated gen chem and loooved orgo. Just stay on top of it, do every homework and practice problem, get together a study group to make practice problems for each other and GET A TUTOR if you feel you are slipping. If you stay on top its really not that bad.
 
Hey Kara, welcome back!

Glad to hear that classes have been going well for you. That schedule sounds a little bit on the crazy side - I personally probably wouldn't want to take a schedule like that unless I absolutely had to for some reason. In my opinion, taking away one of those courses and substituting with a less time consuming gen-ed would still be a challenging science courseload of the sort that vet schools like.

On applications, one thing you might want to do since it's early is kind of plan out which of the prereqs you're taking work for which schools. For example I'm not entirely sure of UCDavis's policy on Anatomy & Physiology combined courses to fulfill the Physiology prerequisite. Other than that, the standard advice about applying to a "dream school" reach or two (Davis is pretty much always a reach out of state), your in-state, and schools that take a lot of OOS students pretty much applies here. It's of course possible to get in here out of state, but it seems like a high GPA on its own isn't what will do it. Rather, good depth of experiences and something that makes you unique will go the longest way for you.
 
I think taking A&P along with orgo, physics AND biostats would be really tough, especially as a sophopmore but that's just my opionion. There is no way I would have been able to handle that courseload during my second year of college. I took organic and maybe pick one other tough class. You can take A&P anytime during your college career and at least at my school, it wasn't a pre-req for other upper level classes I wanted to take so I didn't take it til my senior year. But for me, Physiology is hard so taking it with lots of other hard classes was a no no (just my opinion). And biostats? YUCK! isn't there a regular stats class you can take? I took regular intorduction to stats and I used that to fufill my stats requirement. I did take biostats in grad school and boy did I regret it, toughest class I ever took, and I loved stats in college! According to AAVMC (http://www.aavmc.org/vmcas/college_requirement.htm) Davis, Colorado, NC State, Oregon, Purdue, Washington, Wisconsin, Western and Penn require statistics
 
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eringobraugh said:
And biostats? YUCK! isn't there a regular stats class you can take? I took regular intorduction to stats and I used that to fufill my stats requirement. I did take biostats in grad school and boy did I regret it, toughest class I ever took, and I loved stats in college!
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The difficulty of your biostats class may be due to the fact that you took it as a graduate student. I took biostats in undergrad and it was actually a watered-down version of the regular stats. Mine was super easy and I ended up with an A (I had like a 120 average). Make sure you talk to people at your school about the specific classes; they'll probably know which classes are more difficult/easier (depends on the syllabus, professor, etc.). Good luck!
 
NStarz said:
The difficulty of your biostats class may be due to the fact that you took it as a graduate student. I took biostats in undergrad and it was actually a watered-down version of the regular stats. Mine was super easy and I ended up with an A (I had like a 120 average). Make sure you talk to people at your school about the specific classes; they'll probably know which classes are more difficult/easier (depends on the syllabus, professor, etc.). Good luck!
Click to expand...

Thats probably true but If I recall there were a few undergrads in there as well, though I'm not sure if there was an actual "undergrad" class for biostats. My roommate was in med school at the time and she was taking biostats throught Health Sciences and said it was easy, so maybe I just suck at stats 🙁
 
If I were you, I would take Physics, Orgo, and MAYBE stats together - but definitely would not take A&P along with that load. Even if you done well in your classes over the last year, there is no rush to get A&P done since it's not a pre-req at many vet schools.

Reasoning:
Orgo - hard conceptually, involves a lot of time memorizing
Physics - often very homework intensive
Stats - often very homework intensive
A&P - INCREDIBLE amounts of memorization which takes lots of time

I always planned my semesters this way: (you might already know this)

Each science unit you take = 3 hours of studying outside of class
Each GenEd unit = 2 hours of studying outside of class

If you took all those classes you would be taking around 15 units of science, right?

That means 45 hours of studying a week, at least 6-7 hours of studying/day.

That's a lot - not impossible, but why chance your grades?(especially since all those classes are pre-reqs)
 
eringobraugh said:
Penn is the only school that specifically requires Biostats, so unless you have your heart set on Penn IMO, I would skip the biostats.
Click to expand...


hold on a second - What? really? How did I miss that? crap.



EDIT : *phew!* just looked at UPenn's website - it's Mathstats OR Biostats...sheesh. nearly blew an artery. 🙂
 
heylodeb said:
hold on a second - What? really? How did I miss that? crap.



EDIT : *phew!* just looked at UPenn's website - it's Mathstats OR Biostats...sheesh. nearly blew an artery. 🙂
Click to expand...

haha sorry, I'm dumb. 🙂
 
eringobraugh said:
Penn is the only school that specifically requires Biostats, so unless you have your heart set on Penn IMO, I would skip the biostats.
Click to expand...
My heart definitely just stopped for about 2 seconds there. *sigh of relief*
 
ok I'm editing sorry about the confusion guys...

OT, goldnretrivrgrl, my grandparents live in State College! 🙂
 
All I'll say is that I'd be careful with Biostats. I seem to remember some schools not wanting any stats classes except for traditional, plain statistics (no biostats, psych stats, etc.)
 
i took biostats. at my school it was exactly the same as regular stats but the teacher taught it in a fashion towards bio. so basically everyone who was a bio major took it instead of stat. For example, on test problems the paragraph questions would be about a chemist working on __ and __ for this time, blahblah. or A grad student is making a solution of __ and __... So that it was geared towards our way of thinking.

It was actually a higher level than just stat101. i just looked it up...it was called biometrics301 "[FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1][FONT=arial,helvetica][SIZE=-1]Descriptive statistics, introduction to probability, sampling, confidence interval estimation, hypothesis testing, simple regression and correlation. Emphasis on simple applications of statistical techniques and interpretation of statistical results."

I guess each school is different tho? I applied to these schools and had no problem: IL, VA, PA, WI, MO, MN, CO
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Wooohoo UNH!!

Ochem was tough, but definetly doable if you put the work in. Those classes are pretty much what I took sophmore year.
If you can get berndston for anat, he's great, I loved him!

And laue was awesome for biochem!

If you have specific unh questions or about opportunities in the area send me a message. I've been here 5 years now 🙂
 
moosenanny said:
All I'll say is that I'd be careful with Biostats. I seem to remember some schools not wanting any stats classes except for traditional, plain statistics (no biostats, psych stats, etc.)
Click to expand...




I applied to a ton of schools and never had a problem with biostat
(by the way, be prepared to nap in that class!)
 
Kara31191 said:
Also- Organic Chemistry is pretty scary sounding. Any advice? Good websites for studying? If you know UNH, any resources here you found particularly helpful? Should I get a tutor right from the beginning?

Also- Vet school. What am I looking for in which ones I will apply to? Would I have a chance at UC Davis as an OOS student if my GPA is high? What should I do to prepare for the GRE? Any recommended online classes?
Click to expand...


I hate Organic! It was the hardest class I had to take, and physics was difficult for me too, because I am not engineering minded and just don't get it. So, I definitely would pick one or the other to take in the semester... not both. Mainly just because Organic is SO challenging and the only way to really pass and/or make a good grade is to just work the problems over and over and over again.

Secondly, about the vet school, I don't know much about UC Davis but I did want to say that I have a poultry science minor (I was a double major for 3 years) and the avian experience seems to be a very good addition to a vet school app. Its sort of rare for students to have an interest in birds (of all kinds) and I definitely think that was what helped distinguish me from other applicants.
 
I liked gen chem and absolutely hated organic. I took Organic and Physics together for both semesters. I'm not sure how difficult physics classes are at your school, but here at UTK they weren't too tough--just a lot of homework. I would definitely not trying to take A&P at the same time. It's a 5 hour class here, which I think would just be too much when combined with organic. I'm not sure what the difference is between biostats and regular stats, but my statistics class was a joke. I worked the newspaper crossword in every lecture and got an A.

As far as tips for organic, like everyone else has said, stay on top of the material! Everything builds upon each other, so if you start to get behind, you'll be WAY behind before you know it. You'll be working problems many times, and be sure to get help if you have even the slightest feeling you'll need it. I gave my roommate these tips this semester and she did better than I did. 😛
 
Also, just wondering, why are you wanting to take Biostats if you've already taken Calculus? Is it a specific requirement for somewhere? I know that usually places will take either Calc or Stats... so you only need to take one usually? Unless its a specific pre-req somewhere...
 
libster06 said:
Also, just wondering, why are you wanting to take Biostats if you've already taken Calculus? Is it a specific requirement for somewhere? I know that usually places will take either Calc or Stats... so you only need to take one usually? Unless its a specific pre-req somewhere...
Click to expand...


I think Penn specifically requires calc and stats, though I can't remember of any other schools wanting it.
 
libster06 said:
Also, just wondering, why are you wanting to take Biostats if you've already taken Calculus? Is it a specific requirement for somewhere? I know that usually places will take either Calc or Stats... so you only need to take one usually? Unless its a specific pre-req somewhere...
Click to expand...


I think Calc/Biostats are requirements for her major. Every prevet at UNH has to take both. It's "calculus for life sciences," as if that makes it any better!


Also, another suggesstion: I found a lot of schools required a public speaking class, and UNH doesn't require that, so try to squeeze it in somewhere if you want to apply to more schools.

Also "nutritional biochemistry" will not satisfy most basic nutrition requirements, like I thought it would. Most schools still wanted a basic animal nutrition class. I think UNH offers one if you can squeeze that in, if not, it is offered online.
 
And for my major, we have to take regular stat and biometrics to graduate, so it could be a non-prereq related class. As all consuming as preparing for vet school and applications is, not every class is taken because of it.

ETA: Cowgirla beat me to it

As a side note, stats was way harder for me than the biometrics course, but that could be attendance related
 
You are all awesome advice givers!

Yeah, I guess it's too much. I appreciate the O-chem book recommendation. I'm SURE I'll be buying it! I'll take all the help I can get.

To be honest, I would love to finish my pre-reqs in the next two years... UNH has so many AWESOME electives to offer! I just can't wait! =]

Hmm... I'm hoping that my interest in exotic and avian medicine will help me! And I'm working on building a wicked good list of experience. That will take time of course.

Ohhh... Another Question! Research. Who do I go to for research experience? A few veterinarians said they got involved with a grad student at UNH to help out and get some interesting research experience in. How do I go about doing that?

Thanks all!
 
For research experience, the best thing you can do is figure out what professors are doing research in an area that interests you and then go see if they need volunteers to help in their lab. You might start out cleaning glassware and stuff but if you show real interest and a desire to learn you'll be able to slowly pick up and learn lab techniques and at least get a view of how scientific research works.

As far as contacting professors goes, you can email them but honestly I've had the best success with actually going in to talk to them during their office hours if they're teaching courses, or other times if they tend to have their doors open. An email is totally easy to ignore, and shows kinda minimal effort. Personal introductions are much more effective.
 
😕Are all the professors doing some sort of research? Or...? How do I know? None of them really say anything.

A vet I work with said she worked with a grad student during undergrad. Would the school be able to help with that?
 
Kara31191 said:
To be honest, I would love to finish my pre-reqs in the next two years... UNH has so many AWESOME electives to offer! I just can't wait! =]
Click to expand...

That sounds wonderful, but don't forget that stuffing all the prereqs together can lead to GPA damage in your most important segment - your sGPA. You might want to spread out the harder ones just a little bit, maybe by pushing physics and/or A&P back. You'll still have a lot of open space for electives that way, but you'll have more breathing room.

As for the GRE, it's probably still a little early to worry about that, but this thread and the ones linked in it have good resources. If you have an iPhone/iPod touch, I really think the GRE Connect software is a great deal.
 
Thank you!

Dr. Boulton is actually my advisor! She's wicked nice. I know nothing about horses/large animals, so I'm shadowing this summer. It will be nice to learn some things about them though!

Thanks for all the info- including the GRE. I might start on those vocab lists though! Haha!
 
Kara31191 said:
😕Are all the professors doing some sort of research? Or...? How do I know? None of them really say anything.

A vet I work with said she worked with a grad student during undergrad. Would the school be able to help with that?
Click to expand...

Yes, we (MS & Ph.D. students) belong to labs (the lab of our "major professor"). It's likely that if you end up getting involved in research as an undergrad, you'll be under the direct supervision of graduate students (helping with their thesis/dissertation projects) but ultimately you are working for the faculty member. Which is good because that's who you want your letter of recommendation from, not some measly grad student. 😉
 
If you go to your school's web site they should have a section for each department that has bios of the professors and information about the types of research they are involved in.

You asked about the GRE; I know they are changing it soon but I used Barron's GRE and loved it. I mostly used it for the math; didn't study as much for the verbal because I didn't think I could memorize enough words for it to be effective. For the verbal, I would recommend just reading in general - books, journals, etc. You have a while until you take it so just expand that vocabulary. For the math, definitely get a book like Barron's because a lot of it is test taking strategy and understanding how the test is written. I raised my score like 300 points (based on my initial diagnostic and the real thing) by studying, and it wasn't actually much math that I learned, just how to take this particular test.

I'm gonna disagree with the Stats hate and say that I loved Stats, and it will really help you when you get to research and reading research papers.
 
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