Taking Biochemistry Before Organic Chemistry? Possible or Suicide?

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.

jls483

New Member
5+ Year Member
Joined
Nov 19, 2016
Messages
1
Reaction score
0
Hi Everyone,

Non-traditional student here working on pre-reqs for veterinary school. I'm taking General Chem II and Orgo (online through an extension school - Chem II could be taken concurrently). I'm worried that I might not do well enough in Organic Chemistry that I might have to repeat it.

I've gotten conditional permission to enroll in a Biochemistry class at my school without Organic Chemistry. Is is possible to do well in Biochemistry without Orgo? Let's say for argument's sake, I don't do well and have to pretend like I'm entering Biochemistry without it. Is this complete suicide?

I'm not shy about getting tutors or going for extra help.

Members don't see this ad.
 
Hi Everyone,

Non-traditional student here working on pre-reqs for veterinary school. I'm taking General Chem II and Orgo (online through an extension school - Chem II could be taken concurrently). I'm worried that I might not do well enough in Organic Chemistry that I might have to repeat it.

I've gotten conditional permission to enroll in a Biochemistry class at my school without Organic Chemistry. Is is possible to do well in Biochemistry without Orgo? Let's say for argument's sake, I don't do well and have to pretend like I'm entering Biochemistry without it. Is this complete suicide?

I'm not shy about getting tutors or going for extra help.

My biochemistry class has quite a bit of organic 2 concepts in the material. I would do well in organic before attempting biochem, as it is a difficult class in itself.
 
Hi Everyone,

Non-traditional student here working on pre-reqs for veterinary school. I'm taking General Chem II and Orgo (online through an extension school - Chem II could be taken concurrently). I'm worried that I might not do well enough in Organic Chemistry that I might have to repeat it.

I've gotten conditional permission to enroll in a Biochemistry class at my school without Organic Chemistry. Is is possible to do well in Biochemistry without Orgo? Let's say for argument's sake, I don't do well and have to pretend like I'm entering Biochemistry without it. Is this complete suicide?

I'm not shy about getting tutors or going for extra help.

It is technically possible, but I wouldn't recommend it...mostly because if you are struggling with Organic why would you want to move on to a more difficult class? If I were you, I would figure out what I needed to be successful in Organic before moving on. Having a solid Organic foundation will only help you.

I took Ochem II and Biochem at the same time, but I would at least get through Ochem I before Biochem IMO.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 users
Members don't see this ad :)
Agree with the above, my biochem class had a fair bit of organic in it, and I can't imagine it would be a good idea to move on to that class if you're struggling so much with organic.
 
I'm also also a non traditional. I took biochem before any orgo and did fine with it. But then upon taking orgo I realized there were all these things I had had to rote memorize for biochem that would have been familiar and would have made a lot more sense if I had taken orgo first (as in, ohhhh I get it, it's a pre req for a reason). I did fine, but I'm good at memorizing, and I'm not sure how difficult my classes was - it was online through UNE.
 
Hi Everyone,

Non-traditional student here working on pre-reqs for veterinary school. I'm taking General Chem II and Orgo (online through an extension school - Chem II could be taken concurrently). I'm worried that I might not do well enough in Organic Chemistry that I might have to repeat it.

I've gotten conditional permission to enroll in a Biochemistry class at my school without Organic Chemistry. Is is possible to do well in Biochemistry without Orgo? Let's say for argument's sake, I don't do well and have to pretend like I'm entering Biochemistry without it. Is this complete suicide?

I'm not shy about getting tutors or going for extra help.
At my school, ochem is a prerequisite to biochem. Also, I don't know about the magnitude of it- I'm a biochem major, so I took 9 hours of biochem 1,2, and lab instead of the 3 hour survey course. I personally didn't think there was too much organic chemistry in biochem, but there's definitely some important aspects that carry over.

Also, at my school ochem is one of the hardest courses offered and the test average is like a 55% and you're still expected to pass. Huge weed out course. So having ochem first imo, makes you better for biochem because you already have those really good study patterns!
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 users
Yeah, organic I was definitely a pre-req to biochem at my undergrad when I took it. Organic II was not required beforehand at the time but it is now from what I understand from current students because the professors found that those who had already gone through the entire organic series did better in biochem overall. I took biochem after having already had both organic I and II and it actually helped me out quite a lot---I couldn't imagine having not had that background before tackling it, though I know some people have. So I guess I'm in the "It's technically possible, but it could potentially be more difficult without the baseline level of organic chem knowledge and familiarity and you may not do as well as a result" camp.
 
If you can find a syllabus, i think that would be of great use to you. Biochem at my school (one semester series, not two unless you were a chem or biochem major) didn't have much orgo. I mean there was a lot of DRAWING of organic compounds in pathways we had to memorize but no reaction mechanisms or anything of that sort. My biochem seemed more bio than chem, but every professor teaches to their own liking so I'd say find out before making the jump.
 
If you can find a syllabus, i think that would be of great use to you. Biochem at my school (one semester series, not two unless you were a chem or biochem major) didn't have much orgo. I mean there was a lot of DRAWING of organic compounds in pathways we had to memorize but no reaction mechanisms or anything of that sort. My biochem seemed more bio than chem, but every professor teaches to their own liking so I'd say find out before making the jump.
My biochem prof this semester doesn't have us draw anything this semester. She's a really good teacher. She's like "this is what you know, I'm not gonna test you on your ability to blunt memorize information, that doesn't help much. I'm gonna test you over your ability to turn what you memorized into useful information".

Probably my favorite teacher of undergrad honestly.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
In my biochem course we had to know the electron-pushing mechanisms for lysozymes and serine proteases, which is organic chem-heavy. But there was also a lot of inorganic involved as well. O-chem and Gen-chem were prerequisites and I would recommend taking them first.
 
I'm also also a non traditional. I took biochem before any orgo and did fine with it. But then upon taking orgo I realized there were all these things I had had to rote memorize for biochem that would have been familiar and would have made a lot more sense if I had taken orgo first (as in, ohhhh I get it, it's a pre req for a reason). I did fine, but I'm good at memorizing, and I'm not sure how difficult my classes was - it was online through UNE.

This may have changed since TorbieTroll took it, but UNE requires one semester of organic chem before taking Biochem.

I'm currently taking UNE's Biochem online. I think I could pass the class without having taken organic before, but it sure does make it easier having had Org II through them (which was essentially intro to biochem anyways).

Suicide? No. Best way to get a good grade? Probably not.
 
Hi Everyone,

Non-traditional student here working on pre-reqs for veterinary school. I'm taking General Chem II and Orgo (online through an extension school - Chem II could be taken concurrently). I'm worried that I might not do well enough in Organic Chemistry that I might have to repeat it.

I've gotten conditional permission to enroll in a Biochemistry class at my school without Organic Chemistry. Is is possible to do well in Biochemistry without Orgo? Let's say for argument's sake, I don't do well and have to pretend like I'm entering Biochemistry without it. Is this complete suicide?

I'm not shy about getting tutors or going for extra help.

I am also a non-trad and I agree with everyone who has responded. I'm currently taking Ochem 2 and biochem at the same time and so far it's been really good, but I can't imagine if I had taken it without a solid foundation of Ochem and gen chem prior to taking it. Ochem was a pre-req for my biochem course. We are currently drawing all of the structures for the glycolysis cycle in biochem and then we will move on to the Krebs cycle.

It's always a personal preference on what you can handle. I've crammed in ALOT of science courses into every semester the last 2 years, I just tried to make sure my foundation for the information I was headed into next was strong.

Good luck to you :)
 
This may have changed since TorbieTroll took it, but UNE requires one semester of organic chem before taking Biochem.

I'm currently taking UNE's Biochem online. I think I could pass the class without having taken organic before, but it sure does make it easier having had Org II through them (which was essentially intro to biochem anyways).

Suicide? No. Best way to get a good grade? Probably not.

Not being one to want to implicate myself in anything, let's just say that *if* it had been a prerequisite I *might* have said to myself 'whatever, that's really just a suggestion since they don't check... I can probably do it and it fits best in my application schedule at this particular time'. And it worked out just fine, but I can't say I'd recommend that path (either path... the choose-your-own-prereqs or the take-classes-that-will-affect-your-application-when-underprepared one).
 
I'm a non-trad student and had the option of taking biochem before Ochem but opted not to. I agree that Ochem will make Biochem easier. I also wanted to add on that having Ochem also made Biochem more interesting. I think, had I taken Biochem before OChem, I would have been relying on rote memorization and that would have made the class miserable.

I remember, with OChem under my belt, I was able to better understand how the class really filled in the gaps between what we cover in biology and chemistry. It made what could have been a difficultly dull class both intriguing and interesting. Which, the more a class can capture your interest, the better you're going to do. At least for me that's the case!
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 users
Also a non-trad, and I disagree with a lot of people here, actually. I agree that taking orgo before biochem makes biochem easier, but I'm taking biochem online through Harvard Extension right now and there is no arrow pushing at all. Nada. Nor do they focus on memorizing pathways.

There *is* a fair bit of acid/base chemistry and some things that would be useful to know from organic LABS (for example, we've discussed ways to separate proteins, and having some background in purifying compounds in my orgo labs has been helpful context here), but I would say those are all pluses, not necessary. (And I agree with what @Tulojow said about making it more interesting).

Orgo I is useful to have down pat, though, simply for understanding structural diagrams, chirality, etc. But orgo II? I think really depends on the class.

Side note: if you're struggling with organic, the books called "Organic Chemistry as a Second Language" are GREAT. Having those books made organic chem really enjoyable for me (disclaimer: I am one of those weirdos who loved organic chem).
 
I agree that it would be better to get through Orgo before Biochem, <especially> since you said you're struggling in Orgo....

If you're struggling in Orgo, do you really want to take another high-level class that you're marginally/poorly prepared for and risk doing poorly? Then you'd just take hits to your academic standing. If Orgo is proving difficult, you should figure out why and master that before moving ahead into Biochem.

It is not "impossible" to do well in Biochem without (or having done poorly in) Orgo. But the risk doesn't seem worth it to me.

It would be nice to do really well in Biochem. Our biochem class in vet school covered all of undergrad biochem in about 2 weeks - the first of 4-5 vet school biochem exams was basically "all of undergrad biochem". Having been able to do well in undergrad biochem made it a titch easier getting going in vet school.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 3 users
It would be nice to do really well in Biochem. Our biochem class in vet school covered all of undergrad biochem in about 2 weeks - the first of 4-5 vet school biochem exams was basically "all of undergrad biochem". Having been able to do well in undergrad biochem made it a titch easier getting going in vet school.
I'm glad to hear that biochem actually does have relevance then! I've professors tell me I was wasting my time studying biochemistry "when I only wanted to be a vet". (But that starts another rant about the med vs research vs vet med stigma that's in my department).
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
So y'all have done an excellent job covering this topic from all possible points, but I had just one more thing to add - at least one of the schools I applied to this cycle (University of Illinois maybe?) required that the biochem class must have Organic chemistry as a pre-req, so keep that in mind for picking which class to take!
 
I found basic ochem concepts important for biochem, but they are not going to ask you reaction questions like you are thinking. I say it is definitely doable.
 
So y'all have done an excellent job covering this topic from all possible points, but I had just one more thing to add - at least one of the schools I applied to this cycle (University of Illinois maybe?) required that the biochem class must have Organic chemistry as a pre-req, so keep that in mind for picking which class to take!

Just chiming in to add upon what palahala mentioned. There are several schools that REQUIRE organic to be a prereq to the biochem course you take. Illinois, Wisconsin, Colorado, Louisiana, and Missouri are the ones that come to mind but it would be best to reach out to the schools you are hoping to apply to before enrolling just to make sure.
 
I'm glad to hear that biochem actually does have relevance then! I've professors tell me I was wasting my time studying biochemistry "when I only wanted to be a vet". (But that starts another rant about the med vs research vs vet med stigma that's in my department).

Very much so! Our cell bio class first semester had a significant biochem component, and some other classes have some biochem concepts tied in as well.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
Top