So why should I be looked down upon because I took prereqs at a community college?

[TheWeeIceMan]

Why should they prefer that I take noob material like Bio I and II, Chem I and II, and Physics I and II at a cc instead of a 4 year uni? Scared my grade isn't legitimate? If that was the case, and my cc experience was just baking cupcakes and playing checkers in the class for a 4.0, why did I run through OChem, biochem, and Pchem like they were my wives at my uni?

If Physics wasn't legitimate, why did I use the heat transfer and power engineering at my uni tests as toilet paper when I made my A's?

Math not legitimate? Too bad I made an A in Diff EQ at a 4 year uni.

Bio wasn't legit either? Genetics and A&P shined my shoes.


So...what's the problem?

Calm down.

Again, adcoms don't have information about the difficulty of every CC in the country. They have to make generalizations, and one of them happens to be that classes taken at CCs aren't as rigorous as those at a 4 year university. Not every school thinks this way, but it is a sentiment that you may run into.

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[ccgrad]

This. They are a SMALL portion compared to most places. Besides, if you only apply to Top 20 schools, you can easily get rejected and be a sad panda

OP, who cares? You are obviously not only gonna apply to "Top 20 schools". If they reject you, move onto the other bundles of med schools that will take you. There are plenty of schools to choose from!

I'm just fervid that I would auto-lose and apparently my aspirations of attending certain schools are thrown in the dirt because someone that learned about what is a Eukaryote, what is F=ma, and what is Hund's rule at a bigger school automatically gets preference...

 

[rodmichael82]

Not if your MCAT score is higher and have better ECs.

I'm just fervid that I would auto-lose and apparently my aspirations of attending certain schools are thrown in the dirt because someone that learned about what is a Eukaryote, what is F=ma, and what is Hund's rule at a bigger school automatically gets preference...

 

[KnuxNole]

I'm just fervid that I would auto-lose and apparently my aspirations of attending certain schools are thrown in the dirt because someone that learned about what is a Eukaryote, what is F=ma, and what is Hund's rule at a bigger school automatically gets preference...

Take another helping of pumpkin pie, relax, and realize that you'll be in good shape. I dunno what specific school you want to go to, but if you have a good app, you never know. After all, with med schools, you aren't going to apply to a couple, or only focus on "rank". The goal is to get to A med school...since after all, more than half the people who apply fail to get in on the first try.

 

[ccgrad]

Calm down.

Again, adcoms don't have information about the difficulty of every CC in the country. They have to make generalizations, and one of them happens to be that classes taken at CCs aren't as rigorous as those at a 4 year university. Not every school thinks this way, but it is a sentiment that you may run into.

Okay, but even if hypothetically a CC was not as rigorous and the adcoms were 100% right about that, where's the doubt in my rigor and knowledge when I do well in classes at the uni that depend on prior knowledge of that material that I'm being questioned about with respect to rigor?

If I hypothetically destroy the MCAT, which covers material that I took at a CC like Gen Chem, Bio, and Physics, and do better than someone that took it at say UT Austin or Illinois Urbana Champaign, what difference does it make that they took it there? It obviously didn't help them do better than a cc student on a standardized admissions test for medical school.

 

[ccgrad]

Take another helping of pumpkin pie, relax, and realize that you'll be in good shape. I dunno what specific school you want to go to, but if you have a good app, you never know. After all, with med schools, you aren't going to apply to a couple, or only focus on "rank". The goal is to get to A med school...since after all, more than half the people who apply fail to get in on the first try.

Haha GLUT 4 is on overdrive right now, I can't get another pumpkin pie.

 

[KnuxNole]

Maybe they didn't do as well because they didn't prepare well? Didn't study as hard? Aren't as strong readers/critical thinkers?


And I know that feel. Had a huge dinner with relatives, now back home feeling pregnant and chilling :O

....but you can always make room for more pie!!!

 

[rodmichael82]

What about GLUT 1,2 and 3?

Haha GLUT 4 is on overdrive right now, I can't get another pumpkin pie.

 

[TheWeeIceMan]

Okay, but even if hypothetically a CC was not as rigorous and the adcoms were 100% right about that, where's the doubt in my rigor and knowledge when I do well in classes at the uni that depend on prior knowledge of that material that I'm being questioned about with respect to rigor?

If I hypothetically destroy the MCAT, which covers material that I took at a CC like Gen Chem, Bio, and Physics, and do better than someone that took it at say UT Austin or Illinois Urbana Champaign, what difference does it make that they took it there? It obviously didn't help them do better than a cc student on a standardized admissions test for medical school.

If you kill the MCAT and have good grades at both your CC and university then you'll be just fine.

 

[ccgrad]

What about GLUT 1,2 and 3?

Already working on overdrive, need GLUT 4's late response to get this excess and store it, or it's about to come out when I go #1 if SGLT1 doesn't get it's act together or if I go over 180mg/ml.

 

[ccgrad]

Maybe they didn't do as well because they didn't prepare well? Didn't study as hard? Aren't as strong readers/critical thinkers?


And I know that feel. Had a huge dinner with relatives, now back home feeling pregnant and chilling :O

....but you can always make room for more pie!!!

If they had the nice opportunity of going to a uni and flourishing in their freshman level science, but if they didn't invest the time to prepare well and didn't study over the MCAT, which is so important, then as an adcom I don't want them preparing or studying on how to operate on people, I'm not going to give them a thumbs up for taking freshman level science at a uni.

Also fine, I'll eat a SMALL piece of pie...haha

Rebound effect coming soon and I'm going to get hungry in a few hours...haha

 

[Lucca]

The MCAT is the great equalizer. It functions EXACTLY how the SAT/ACT did in high school: a parametrically standardized, gameable test that lets adcoms know what the applicant's gpa means in context. Universities have so much grade inflation right now (this problem is only increasing) that a student from, say, MIT, Caltech, or Uchicago would boned if it weren't for the MCAT.

 

[WestCoastNative]

How's Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, when it comes to community college? I looked on their website and they haven't touched the issue. Is anyone aware if they make a big deal of it?

 

[rodmichael82]

Already working on overdrive, need GLUT 4's late response to get this excess and store it, or it's about to come out when I go #1 if SGLT1 doesn't get it's act together or if I go over 180mg/ml.

You kind of lost me on the 180 mg/ml, I think that you might have meant mg/dl. GLUT 1 and 2 play a role in the blood brain barrier and neurons with a more significant clinical role in hypoglycemia.

 

[KnuxNole]

Take another helping of pumpkin pie,

seeee, even spambots like pumpkin pie!

 

[JohnnyMath]

seeee, even spambots like pumpkin pie!

As someone who has taken a CS class and is interested in the material, I've always wondered if Spambots knew how to solve CAPTCHAS on their own, and if so, how do they do it...?

 

[DokterMom]

Why should they prefer that I take noob material like Bio I and II, Chem I and II, and Physics I and II at a cc instead of a 4 year uni? Scared my grade isn't legitimate? If that was the case, and my cc experience was just baking cupcakes and playing checkers in the class for a 4.0, why did I run through OChem, biochem, and Pchem like they were my wives at my uni?

If Physics wasn't legitimate, why did I use the heat transfer and power engineering at my uni tests as toilet paper when I made my A's?

Math not legitimate? Too bad I made an A in Diff EQ at a 4 year uni.

Bio wasn't legit either? Genetics and A&P shined my shoes.

So...what's the problem?

The problem is your attitude OP. Aggressive. Defensive. Chip on your shoulder.

why did I run through OChem, biochem, and Pchem like they were my wives at my uni?

Hateful. Misogynistic. Judgmental. Blaming. Mentioning the WASPiness of your non-flawless friends -- unnecessary.

It seems your CC prepared you very well academically. That's great for you. And your academic performance at your 4-year uni will substantiate your academic qualifications. Your academic credentials are unlikely to keep you out of a good medical school.

Now fix the non-academic parts. Lose the nasty attitude and the 'poor me' chip. Go help some people who are less fortunate than you -- there are bound to be a few. Show some altruism and human kindness because those are important in a doctor and are things medical schools look for.

 

[LizzyM]

I've not seen animosity toward students who attended CC and then transferred to a good uni. I've also seen applicants get interviews after taking post-bac classes at a cc while working after college.

What is considered undesirable is taking a class at a cc while enrolled in a uni. Some students do this in the summer to fit in something before a semester abroad but others do it to avoid a weed-out course at their home instituiton.

 

[brianbellau]

Interested in what CC you went to OP? Was it taught to UC Berkeley standards or something? I haven't heard of any schools going that in depth in mitosis in a Gen Bio 1 course.

Also CC courses can be harder from what I've heard. There is no curve, so if 0 students out of a class of 40 get an A, then the professor will not give a single A. the professor will not curve to give say 10% of the class A's, the grade they get is unmodified.