Pre-req's questions

[linglei]

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I am currently a pre-med student and I have already completed Org II and Physics I& II, my first choice is to get into the medical school in my state, so my advisor told me that I should take anatomy and physiology instead of gen bio because she thinks it will be more helpful to me toward preparing for the Mcat, and I did talk to the admission office from this school, the dean told me that he thinks this is a great idea, however I emailed admission office from another medical school which is in another state and they told me that I have to take gen Bio I&II and it cannot be substitute with anatomy and physiology, so what should I do? Thank you!

 

[unhappytnt]

You have to take Intro Bio with lab for two semesters. Why don't you take that first and then move onto anatomy and physiology? A&P is definitely helpful for the MCAT but a solid knowledge of general bio is essential.

 

[linglei]

You have to take Intro Bio with lab for two semesters. Why don't you take that first and then move onto anatomy and physiology? A&P is definitely helpful for the MCAT but a solid knowledge of general bio is essential.

Thank you for replying, I do not want to take extra courses since I am a non-trad, and my advisor thinks that gen bio is not helpful because they do talk about planets, and after I talked to the dean from the admission he seems really support my advisor's idea that is why I am so confused. I think I will have a good chance of getting into this school since I am currently working in the hospital part of the school and doing research at the academic part of the school. But when I apply for schools I wont just apply for one school that is why I am looking for the best plan which will be accepted by most schools. Thank you again!

 

[aSagacious]

Though I think P&A will be more helpful in preparing you for the MCAT, it is likely that a good number of schools will not accept the sequence as a substitute for intro bio. My inclination would be to take the safe route and go with intro bio.

 

[linglei]

Though I think P&A will be more helpful in preparing you for the MCAT, it is likely that a good number of schools will not accept the sequence as a substitute for intro bio. My inclination would be to take the safe route and go with intro bio.

Thank you, that is what i am thinking and I def will talk to my advisor about it,and gen bio is also much easier than A&P🙂

 

[jab8220]

my advisor thinks that gen bio is not helpful because they do talk about "planets"

?😕 What school is this?

 

[CodeBlu]

Do intro bio. Your advisor needs to learn not to tell students to shut doors.

You need intro bio at every school in the US. No doubt.

TAKE INTRO BIO. Then move up to A&P. Plain and simple.

 

[orthomyxo]

Is your adviser an idiot or something? Other than the fact that it's a requirement at every single US medical school, how in the world can you take the MCAT without even knowing basic biology?

 

[Truzzi]

All of them. Have you ever heard the phrase, "Don't put all your eggs in one basket"? Well, if not, it is very suiting for this occasion.

 

[linglei]

Do intro bio. Your advisor needs to learn not to tell students to shut doors.

You need intro bio at every school in the US. No doubt.

TAKE INTRO BIO. Then move up to A&P. Plain and simple.

Thank you, the "intro bio" is the gen bio right? and once I finish Gen bio and all the other pre-reqs, I can take Mcat and apply for medical schools right? and A&P is not a requirement to apply from what I understand right? Thank you!

 

[aSagacious]

Thank you, the "intro bio" is the gen bio right? and once I finish Gen bio and all the other pre-reqs, I can take Mcat and apply for medical schools right? and A&P is not a requirement to apply from what I understand right? Thank you!

Correct. On a side note, Swarthmore put together a list of schools with atypical upper-level science requirements: http://www.swarthmore.edu/Documents/slife/pre_med/Advanced_Science_Requirements.pdf

 

[linglei]

Correct. On a side note, Swarthmore put together a list of schools with atypical upper-level science requirements: http://www.swarthmore.edu/Documents/slife/pre_med/Advanced_Science_Requirements.pdf

Thank you for the info, also regarding English courses I saw that my school offer ENG 110 Freshman Composition and since I have to take one year ENG so I have to take the next one that offered in my unversity which is ENG 202 Intermediate Composition right?

 

[linglei]

Correct. On a side note, Swarthmore put together a list of schools with atypical upper-level science requirements: http://www.swarthmore.edu/Documents/slife/pre_med/Advanced_Science_Requirements.pdf

Also I forgot to explain my situation in a better detail, I was graduate from another country with a undergraduate degree in Chemistry and also finished a master degree in Bimolecular science from an American University which is also the school that I am doing the pre-med at, so I think the reason that my advisor suggested me to take A&P instead of undergraduate gen bio is because that I already completed some graduate level biology courses such as adv biochem, adv genetics and molecular cell bio, however a lot of medical school here require that you obtain your science pre-reqs credits from an American or Canadian school which is one of the reason why I am re-taking all the pre-reqs,even though I want to get into a medical school as soon as possible but I do want to be fully prepared and giving them less chance to reject me, thank you everyone for helping me and giving out good advises again!

 

[aSagacious]

Thank you for the info, also regarding English courses I saw that my school offer ENG 110 Freshman Composition and since I have to take one year ENG so I have to take the next one that offered in my unversity which is ENG 202 Intermediate Composition right?

Not necessarily. Some schools let you substitute a 'writing intensive science course' for your second English class. For example, in one of my upper level biology classes all we did was read journal articles and write reviews, so I used this as my substitute (and none of the schools complained).

I was graduate from another country with a undergraduate degree in Chemistry and also finished a master degree in Bimolecular science from an American University which is also the school that I am doing the pre-med at...however a lot of medical school here require that you obtain your science pre-reqs credits from an American or Canadian school which is one of the reason why I am re-taking all the pre-reqs...but I do want to be fully prepared and giving them less chance to reject me, thank you everyone for helping me and giving out good advises again!

Unfortunately, despite your completion of these courses abroad, you might still have to repeat them at an American or Canadian university. While there might some schools that accept international applicants with no US pre-req coursework (though I doubt it), it would be imprudent to limit yourself to a smaller number of schools for such a trivial reason. In all honesty, taking the intro bio sequence will cost you a few hundred dollars and a couple semesters (if you already know the material very well you could just squeeze them in to an already-filled semester and gain a few free 4.0's).

If you want to roll the dice, you could try calling a couple of schools that claim to require Bio I/II and ask if A&P is a satisfactory substitute. If 3 or 4 schools in a row say yes then I think most schools will say the same.

 

[Nlongbottom]

just major in biology

 

[aSagacious]

just major in biology

Thank you for this valuable contribution to the thread, your input is appreciated 🙄.

 

[linglei]

Not necessarily. Some schools let you substitute a 'writing intensive science course' for your second English class. For example, in one of my upper level biology classes all we did was read journal articles and write reviews, so I used this as my substitute (and none of the schools complained).



Unfortunately, despite your completion of these courses abroad, you might still have to repeat them at an American or Canadian university. While there might some schools that accept international applicants with no US pre-req coursework (though I doubt it), it would be imprudent to limit yourself to a smaller number of schools for such a trivial reason. In all honesty, taking the intro bio sequence will cost you a few hundred dollars and a couple semesters (if you already know the material very well you could just squeeze them in to an already-filled semester and gain a few free 4.0's).

If you want to roll the dice, you could try calling a couple of schools that claim to require Bio I/II and ask if A&P is a satisfactory substitute. If 3 or 4 schools in a row say yes then I think most schools will say the same.

Thank you so much for all the good suggestion, and I decided to re-take all the pre-reqs to try to get 4.0's in this case I will have more options! Thanks again!

 

[afreaknamedpete]

I'm not sure if your institution has anatomy and physiology as one course or as a separate course, but there's really very little pure anatomy on the MCAT. If they are separate courses, Physiology is probably all you need for the MCAT. Of course, some schools do like to see exposure to both.

 

[1TB4RKSB4CK]

Get Gen bio out of the way first.