Science ???

[investing101]

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I am starting third year of undergraduate school and have yet to start the 8 semesters required at most MD schools. I am thinking of taking biology, inorganic chemistry and physics in one semester. Is this doable?

 

[235788]

yes.

If you're pressed for time. Take those 3, then organic in the summer. All doable.

 

[1TB4RKSB4CK]

Take it slow at first. Try Bio and Chem for a semester. If you get a good semester GPA, feel free to do Bio 2, Chem 2, and Physics 1.
Labs are the worst part of taking a 3 pre-req semester.

 

[plumhill]

It is but you'll hate yourself for it, and unless you have a strong science background from HS, then it'll be tremendously difficult to get the grades you want. My recommendation is to spread them out over two years, take the MCAT after you graduate, and then do an SMP (for upper-level science classes) or something else during a gap year.

 

[Nymphicus]

Remember that if you try and cram it all in and then don't do so well (which is honestly the most likely possibility), it will only hurt you in the long run.

 

[JRWPREMED]

I'm by no means qualified to give you advice regarding pre-med studies, I'm just offering my $.02.

That being said, I don't know if it would be the best idea to cram all of those courses into a year. I'm sure it is doable and you could probably get an A in the courses, but I'm looking at MCAT prep. If you take those 6 courses in a years time, are you going to be focused on mastering the material or just memorizing it for the time being and getting an A? If it is more towards the latter, you should postpone one of the course series.

Here is my rationale:

If you take all of these courses and don't master the material, MCAT prep is going to be a *****. You will spend a crazy amount of time on content review. I don't think anyone particularly likes MCAT prep, so the less you have to do the better.

On another note, don't forget that all of these courses have labs. I hated just doing Biology and Chemistry labs together. I would have hated my life if I had had to do Physics on top of it.... especially over a years time.

I agree with one of the posters above who said to take Bio I and Chem I together and see how it goes. If you handle it well, add PHYS I to Spring along with Bio and Chem II.

Good Luck!

 

[TheMightySmiter]

I took those three together during my post-bacc. I had no other classes and to be honest I was bored. In fact I added a humanities class to my schedule the next semester to give me more to do.

 

[ur2l8]

Doable but labs will SUCK. Just my opinion!!



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[theseeker4]

It is but you'll hate yourself for it, and unless you have a strong science background from HS, then it'll be tremendously difficult to get the grades you want. My recommendation is to spread them out over two years, take the MCAT after you graduate, and then do an SMP (for upper-level science classes) or something else during a gap year.

I think you mean a post-bac, not SMP, above. A SMP is a Special Masters Program, it is not upper-level undergraduate coursework but actual medical school classes you take to prove your ability to excel in medical school despite a poor undergraduate GPA. Unless the OP's grades are poor, there is no reason to even consider a SMP.

There is also little use in taking upper-level courses post-bac unless the OP has a marginal GPA. Having a good overall GPA and good grades in the pre-reqs is sufficient to gain acceptance (provided other stats and EC's are up to par) without upper-level course work.

OP, I agree with the others who advise you to start slow and then increase your course load when you know you can do well. You don't want to tank your GPA by loading too many hard sciences on at once. Remember that the labs are a time sink much greater than the typical 1 credit hour they are worth would suggest.

 

[investing101]

Whats so bad about lab? Is it hard or does it take too much time off the day ?

 

[theseeker4]

Whats so bad about lab? Is it hard or does it take too much time off the day ?

Labs are pretty easy. They take a lot of time, however, and when you have 3 of them a week, each 2-4+ hours long and requiring lab reports and other work to be done outside of class, you can see how much of time is eaten up by the labs that you could spend studying for your lecture courses.

 

[Rocher]

If you aren't working, this will be totally doable. If you are, I would hold off on one of them.

 

[jf1987]

You can do it. Those courses aren't too tough since they are intro. First year physics is easy and fun!

 

[rexxx]

i'm currently taking biology 2, physics 2, and organic chemistry 2 all in the same semester, and i took the first course of each of these simultaneously last semester. this semester i also have a physiology class.

its very time demanding, but definitely doable.

don't fall behind on any of it or you'll be in trouble, but you can do it.

 

[BA11]

Whats so bad about lab? Is it hard or does it take too much time off the day ?

It isnt that they are hard, in fact most basic undergrad labs are easy A's if you do all the work. The issue is they take a big chunk out of your day and require a lot of time-consuming effort for just a one-hour class or a small percentage of your overall course grade. It's hard to motivate yourself to do all the tedious lab reports and writing assignments and study for practicals for such a small part of your grade, even moreso because you'll very rarely feel like you're getting much out of it. Physics labs were the worst IMO, just hours of stupid common sense "experiments" that taught you nothing you didnt already know from the coursework.

 

[JRWPREMED]

Whats so bad about lab? Is it hard or does it take too much time off the day ?

Labs aren't hard, just time consuming. I actually enjoyed them for the most part. The thing that sucked was having the pre-lab assignments and a 5 page lab report each week per class; however I think this was due to me being an engineering major and having nearly 20 credits my first semester in college.

As a revision to my previous post though, I think you could probably handle it if you only took those three courses. Another science or math course and you might crumble under the amount of work. You could prob. add a Gen. Ed./Core course to balance out your schedule at around 15 - 18cr.

 

[asecondtolife]

I did that with two psychology upper divs for a total of 5 classes and it was my best GPA to date...hahah. I did feel like I was drowning from beginning to end though, since I also worked 8-10 hours a week it's definitely doable but I wouldn't do what I did again! Don't work and take too many classes at the same time!

 

[kaysquared]

I'm currently taking Bio II, Chem II, and Physics II and working 30-ish hours a week. Scary busy! Scary scary!

 

[Morsetlis]

You'll be well-prepared for med school if you can cram all of that into an A, that's for sure.

If you can't, well lolol?