Summer School

[JBone87]

Hey everyone,

Do you know if med schools have a negative opinion of taking classes in the summer? Are they viewed as worse because they are a few weeks shorter than standard semester-long classes? Specifically, I want to get a couple of the prereqs out of the way this summer. Any insight is appreciated. Thanks a lot.

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[Tired Pigeon]

As long as they cover the same material, generally it's not a problem.

 

[Meatwad]

Maybe it depends on where you take them (CC vs. top research university). I attend the latter, and I think you'd have to be out of your gourd to think classes are easier in the summer! They certainly don't cover less material, or go easy on you with the tests or labs. I think it's MORE difficult to cram an entire semester of difficult material into 1 month.

 

[relentless11]

Maybe it depends on where you take them (CC vs. top research university). I attend the latter, and I think you'd have to be out of your gourd to think classes are easier in the summer! They certainly don't cover less material, or go easy on you with the tests or labs. I think it's MORE difficult to cram an entire semester of difficult material into 1 month.

Not neccessarily. Taking one class over the summer at a community college while doing well at a university during the academic year is fine. Seriously, if you got an A in the first semester of general chemistry during the spring, and then got an A for the second semester class during the summer at a CC, who cares. Combine that with doing well in OChem and your other classes at your university, then nobody would give a crap about it.

The only caveat would be the few schools (like 2 of them) in the nation that do not accept community college work. Many..many students do summer school to finish on time and thus save money. Many many others take summer session at a community college that is close to home so they don't have to pay rent at school and the high university summer tuition. If you do well in all your classes (university and CC) then you have nothing to fear.

I do however agree that summer classes may actuall be harder (CC AND University). I've done both. In fact, I do recall the CC classes being harder than the university classes....and I go to one of the top University of California schools, and have attended summer session at our sister schools including Cal, and UCLA. Speaking of the UC, University of California med schools as well as Stanford and USC do not frown upon taking summer session courses. Med schools understand that you want to finish undergrad as soon as possible so you can save money.

 

[Law2Doc]

Maybe it depends on where you take them (CC vs. top research university). I attend the latter, and I think you'd have to be out of your gourd to think classes are easier in the summer! They certainly don't cover less material, or go easy on you with the tests or labs. I think it's MORE difficult to cram an entire semester of difficult material into 1 month.

I personally would agree with this -- if you take the courses at a reputable place that adcoms tend to accept, then summer is not an issue. I also agree that you shouldn't expect the summer classes to be easier -- they tend to go at a much faster pace, and for some are much harder.

 

[JBone87]

Thanks for the info guys. I'm planning on taking the summer classes at my 4 year university, so no problem there. And I understand that the classes are shorter but the same amount of material is packed in. I just didn't know if med schools had a concern with the classes being so condensed and thinking students wouldn't learn as much (although if I do well on the MCAT, I assume thats not an issue. Thanks again.

 

[Meatwad]

I'd like to add that if I were on an adcom, depending on the candidate's record, I might find the fact that they took challenging pre-req courses in their summers a very positive thing. That shows you did not give yourself a break for even a couple of months. Instead of going to the beach and partying, you were doing a 5 hour organic chemistry lab three times a week for a month. Seems like you'd have to either be insane or very dedicated to get through that.

So in this sense, I could see it being helpful before I could see it being harmful.