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Does anyone know how tech's undergrad program is? specifically as a Biology major or other "Pre-Med" degrees? 😕
Texas Tech University-Biology/Pre-Med
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How "good" is this school as a biology major-pre med.
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Good enough. 🙂
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I did my undergrad (Pre-med Microbiology major) and graduate degree (M.S. Microbiology) at Texas Tech. I did however graduate from grad school in 2007, so some of my info may have changed slightly...but here goes.
From an undergrad perspective, the Biosciences are decent here. You will start out with Dr. Dini teaching Bio 1 & 2. Dr. Dini is an Excellent professor, but also a bit of an ass. Cant personally blame him - his Bio 1 & 2 classes are the main weed-out classes you have to go through. He often starts out with > 250 students per class, x 2 classes - meaning he has upward to 600 pre-med/Vet/Pharm..naggy..students that bitch about every grade they receive. By the end of the semester, I think he said there will only be around 60% of the class remaining, and if my memory serves me correctly, that seemed about right with the number of empty seats at the end of the semester. If you are extremely self motivated and study hard for his class, you will be fine. He apparently is a writer for test questions on the MCAT for the biology section, or atleast that is what I have heard him claim in the past..but from my experience with the MCATs, his questions are nothing like what you see on the exam. His exams do however, teach you how to think and put things together and I would say it is pretty good prep for the MCAT bio.
The other upperclasman-core bio sciences, such as: Cell Biology, Genetics, Microbiology, Cell & Molecular biology are hit or miss and the quality of the course is fairly dependant on the professors - some of this I only know from what I have been told...I did not have to take Cell Biology and Cell & Molecular as a Microbiology major. I can tell you that, atleast during my time at the school, and I do have a biased opinion on this, the Microbiology program, while small, had some extremely good instructors...If you get the chance, I would definately take any course instructed by Dr. Michael San Francisco (Bacterial Phys. & Pathogenic Micro), and classes by Dr. Randall Jeter (Bacterial Genetics). Their courses are difficult, and probably not GPA boosters by any account, but definately will teach you some good microbiology.
If your interested in research, there were a lot of research oppertunities available. After going around to a couple of labs, I was able to find several graduate students that were intested in taking me on as an undergrad researcher. Did some time washing dishes and then graduated up to doing various molecular techniques and then to taking on two of my own projects. I had several friends that were able to do the same.
The administration staff for the biology dept. was extremely friendly and helpful throughout my undergrad and graduate years. During my years, Dr. John Zak was the Chair of the dept. and if it wasnt for him sitting down with me and helping me figure out some study techniques that would work, I wouldnt have made it. I recently heard that Dr. Densmore is now the Dept. chair, and I knew him fairly well - I am sure he will be just as helpful to any student in need.
The biology dept. does utilize graduate TAs to teach laboratory courses and some graduate students are allowed to teach under the guidance of their PI. If you have a hard time with laboratory courses, this could be a good thing or a bad thing for you. Graduate Students, and I speak from experience on this, can be extremely good teachers if they are teaching courses that are directly in their field of study...or they can be pretty sh*tty teachers as they have no real training in how to teach...were kinda just dropped into the classroom and told to teach it. Some times, the TAs get put into teaching assignments that are not in their preference or even in their main field of study, and this can hurt their desire to teach really limit how well they can teach. Honestly, I think TAs make awesome teachers for laboratory and even lecture based courses...once again however I am biased on this opinion. The TAs that I had, and when I was a TA, spent a lot of time helping students not only with our laboratory course, but also with their lecture course material which ran parallel to the lab. TAs are a lot easier to find around the biology building than some professors and they arnt as intimidating either.
The other core science courses you have to take, such as Chemistry, O-chem, Bio-chem and Physics were fairly decent. They too use a TA teaching system for laboratory courses and the TAs were always available to help me out when I needed it. The O-Chem instructors were extremely good when I took the course, but I had a hard time with the instructors of the Bio-Chem courses...
I thought the core Physics courses at Tech were horrible. If they havent replaced the 900 year-old professor who was teaching it back in 2003-4, I would suggest taking it a CC if possible...
Also, the Pre-Professional Health Dept. which is supposed to help pre-med students get all their stuff together and stay on track to apply to medical school...well they are more-or-less a joke. I dealt with this bunch of jokers a couple times during my freshman year as an undergrad - they were pretty clueless about admissions into medical school (didnt even know what a DO school with TCOM only like 6 hours away)...hopefully this has changed since my freshman year. But, from what I hear, most school's have a clueless bunch that they title as Pre-med advisors...so no biggie.
Ultimately, I would say I got a pretty good education at Texas Tech. I cant really say it is better than any where else as I didnt attend undergrad or grad school any other place...But, I do know from conferences and what not, where I met a lot of undergrads and graduate researchers from universities around the world, that the education at TTU is atleast on par with the majority of other schools. In the end, you get out of it what you put into it.
If you have any questions about TTU..please ask.
From an undergrad perspective, the Biosciences are decent here. You will start out with Dr. Dini teaching Bio 1 & 2. Dr. Dini is an Excellent professor, but also a bit of an ass. Cant personally blame him - his Bio 1 & 2 classes are the main weed-out classes you have to go through. He often starts out with > 250 students per class, x 2 classes - meaning he has upward to 600 pre-med/Vet/Pharm..naggy..students that bitch about every grade they receive. By the end of the semester, I think he said there will only be around 60% of the class remaining, and if my memory serves me correctly, that seemed about right with the number of empty seats at the end of the semester. If you are extremely self motivated and study hard for his class, you will be fine. He apparently is a writer for test questions on the MCAT for the biology section, or atleast that is what I have heard him claim in the past..but from my experience with the MCATs, his questions are nothing like what you see on the exam. His exams do however, teach you how to think and put things together and I would say it is pretty good prep for the MCAT bio.
The other upperclasman-core bio sciences, such as: Cell Biology, Genetics, Microbiology, Cell & Molecular biology are hit or miss and the quality of the course is fairly dependant on the professors - some of this I only know from what I have been told...I did not have to take Cell Biology and Cell & Molecular as a Microbiology major. I can tell you that, atleast during my time at the school, and I do have a biased opinion on this, the Microbiology program, while small, had some extremely good instructors...If you get the chance, I would definately take any course instructed by Dr. Michael San Francisco (Bacterial Phys. & Pathogenic Micro), and classes by Dr. Randall Jeter (Bacterial Genetics). Their courses are difficult, and probably not GPA boosters by any account, but definately will teach you some good microbiology.
If your interested in research, there were a lot of research oppertunities available. After going around to a couple of labs, I was able to find several graduate students that were intested in taking me on as an undergrad researcher. Did some time washing dishes and then graduated up to doing various molecular techniques and then to taking on two of my own projects. I had several friends that were able to do the same.
The administration staff for the biology dept. was extremely friendly and helpful throughout my undergrad and graduate years. During my years, Dr. John Zak was the Chair of the dept. and if it wasnt for him sitting down with me and helping me figure out some study techniques that would work, I wouldnt have made it. I recently heard that Dr. Densmore is now the Dept. chair, and I knew him fairly well - I am sure he will be just as helpful to any student in need.
The biology dept. does utilize graduate TAs to teach laboratory courses and some graduate students are allowed to teach under the guidance of their PI. If you have a hard time with laboratory courses, this could be a good thing or a bad thing for you. Graduate Students, and I speak from experience on this, can be extremely good teachers if they are teaching courses that are directly in their field of study...or they can be pretty sh*tty teachers as they have no real training in how to teach...were kinda just dropped into the classroom and told to teach it. Some times, the TAs get put into teaching assignments that are not in their preference or even in their main field of study, and this can hurt their desire to teach really limit how well they can teach. Honestly, I think TAs make awesome teachers for laboratory and even lecture based courses...once again however I am biased on this opinion. The TAs that I had, and when I was a TA, spent a lot of time helping students not only with our laboratory course, but also with their lecture course material which ran parallel to the lab. TAs are a lot easier to find around the biology building than some professors and they arnt as intimidating either.
The other core science courses you have to take, such as Chemistry, O-chem, Bio-chem and Physics were fairly decent. They too use a TA teaching system for laboratory courses and the TAs were always available to help me out when I needed it. The O-Chem instructors were extremely good when I took the course, but I had a hard time with the instructors of the Bio-Chem courses...
I thought the core Physics courses at Tech were horrible. If they havent replaced the 900 year-old professor who was teaching it back in 2003-4, I would suggest taking it a CC if possible...
Also, the Pre-Professional Health Dept. which is supposed to help pre-med students get all their stuff together and stay on track to apply to medical school...well they are more-or-less a joke. I dealt with this bunch of jokers a couple times during my freshman year as an undergrad - they were pretty clueless about admissions into medical school (didnt even know what a DO school with TCOM only like 6 hours away)...hopefully this has changed since my freshman year. But, from what I hear, most school's have a clueless bunch that they title as Pre-med advisors...so no biggie.
Ultimately, I would say I got a pretty good education at Texas Tech. I cant really say it is better than any where else as I didnt attend undergrad or grad school any other place...But, I do know from conferences and what not, where I met a lot of undergrads and graduate researchers from universities around the world, that the education at TTU is atleast on par with the majority of other schools. In the end, you get out of it what you put into it.
If you have any questions about TTU..please ask.
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I also go to TTU for undergrad, and am in my last semester. I am a biochem major, but took quite a bit of bio (was my minor) and have several friends who are bio majors. i could answer questions as well.
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Texas Tech is good enough, like Milkman said, but you might want to look into Texas A&M. I saw in your earlier posts that you were looking for a school with the most financial aid available, and they have a program that exempts you from tuition if your parent's income is below 60,000.
By the way, does the LHS in your name stand for Lewisville?
By the way, does the LHS in your name stand for Lewisville?
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Thanks! I will look into Texas A&M. Tonight I went to a "Red Raider Night" for Texas Tech and was rather impressed with their spiel. I have a couple months until i have to start applying, so I still have time to "look around". Yes is is Lewisville, I go to Lewisville high school..did you go their? 😎
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I still go to Lewisville, unfortunately, but I'm a senior.
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unfortunately for me two, Im graduating on a 3 year plan just so I can get out of their(combined w/ other reasons)...Oh whats your name, I might know you. you can PM me if you don't want to say it on here.
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Damn aggies...
I wrote a lengthy review of Texas Tech's Pre-Med Biology on your post in the Pre-Allopathic forum. If you have any questions about the school, feel free to PM me or post in the Pre-Allo forum and Ill find it.
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Merged the PA thread to this one. Please avoid posting the same topic in multiple forums.
