Summer/Winter Class

[blazinfury]

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I am in need of some advice. I am currently taking a pretty difficult courseload and doing research on the side. I have AP credit for calc and took 1 semester of calc in my undergrad. Now I am taking stats, but I think that I may need to drop it b/c my professor is horrible and I do not have much time to devote to it. I know that a lot is expected of me as an MSTP and taking a big courseload is one of them, but I am doing research now and a few other ECs and so I need to find time to devote to all of them. I do intend to take stats next year again and hope that the prof is better and I should have more time with orgo being done.

I was wondering if it would be really bad for me to take organic chem lab this winter or summer session, while I do some research on the side? Will med schools look down on me? Or should I take stats during the summer instead?

Any advice is appreciated. Thanks so much.

 

[bd4727]

I am in need of some advice. I am currently taking a pretty difficult courseload and doing research on the side. I have AP credit for calc and took 1 semester of calc in my undergrad. Now I am taking stats, but I think that I may need to drop it b/c my professor is horrible and I do not have much time to devote to it. I know that a lot is expected of me as an MSTP and taking a big courseload is one of them, but I am doing research now and a few other ECs and so I need to find time to devote to all of them. I do intend to take stats next year again and hope that the prof is better and I should have more time with orgo being done.

I was wondering if it would be really bad for me to take organic chem lab this winter or summer session, while I do some research on the side? Will med schools look down on me? Or should I take stats during the summer instead?

Any advice is appreciated. Thanks so much.

Um, my advice would be to relax first off. People will just look at your GPA and MCAT and glance/not even look at your transcripts. Do whatever you have to do to get as good a GPA as possible and prepare yourself well for the MCAT.

 

[blazinfury]

So what is your take on taking difficult pre-med classes, like say Biochem, which have the potential to be GPA killers. Save them for senior yr and take medium difficulty courses throughout? I ask b/c the difficult courses, such as Biochem, Human Physiology, Genetics, are typically the ones that help w/ MCATs, from what I hear.

 

[bd4727]

So what is your take on taking difficult pre-med classes, like say Biochem, which have the potential to be GPA killers. Save them for senior yr and take medium difficulty courses throughout? I ask b/c the difficult courses, such as Biochem, Human Physiology, Genetics, are typically the ones that help w/ MCATs, from what I hear.

Without question you should take those before the MCAT. People in MSTP programs, in general, have no trouble with undergraduate biochem and genetics.

 

[blazinfury]

Is there any order in which you would recommend taking those classes? For next fall, would recommend that I take biochem or physiology?

 

[GWD]

I found Biochem and Genetics to be easy and enjoyable A's.

I found physiology to probably be the most fascinating, but somewhat more difficult because of the volume of material it was necessary to learn (but this will be something you'll need to get good at for med school anyway).

By far, I found the 2nd semester of O-chem to be the most difficult, annoying, and useless (1st semester was kinda fun, easy, and quasi-useful). Trying to memorize and make sense of all those mechanisms and esoteric Diehl's-Alder bull**** is for the birds!