The Under M1 Club, Part II - COME ON IN!

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Hey all...

wow, there's a lot of responses (hehehe) 😛

Hmm, let's see here, where do I begin...

UCLAstudent - so you don't like English, eh? 😀 I don't think that doing what you're doing is neccessarily research, but you should maybe check with your pre-med advisor (assuming that you have a good one...most UCLA people I've talked to have said otherwise...)

jenni4476 - glad to hear from ya! I agree with the Tuesday thing though. I'd definitely be driven crazy if I had to take two labs in the same day, and Calculus on top of that 😱 So did you decide on "Short Course in Calculus" or "Analytical Geometry + Calculus?" I've got short course, but it's still Calculus, and the fact that my professor knows his stuff and looks like Vin Diesel (Triple X) doesn't help matters much :laugh: As for logic, I do hope that you don't get a boring professor. Logic is a boring subject, so having an excitable prof like mine would help a lot.

AspiringDoctor9 - Hi there. I would agree with Skaterbabe's advice...if you're okay with Osteopathic schools, I'd go and sign up for a few. Other than that, I would suggest taking the classes over again to get a better grade (if your school allows that) or taking more upper-division science courses to show medical schools that you can handle it. Welcome! 🙂

minx - those are all very good colleges that you've checked out. I'm not sure of any schools near the bay area because I live down south in the OC (I'm sure some of you out there have seen this TV show?) As for taking the MCAT, it is better to take it in the Spring, because taking it in August will put you behind in the applications process (unless you want to wait another year before you apply to medical school).

Miss155 - Hmm, I think that I may have a different definition of balanced from yours, but it looks like your Fridays will be packed. Other than that, it seems like you're taking quite a bit of classes on some days and only a few on others...if that seems balanced to you, then I'd say yes, it is balanced. If it was me, I'd try to spread out my classes a bit more, if that is possible. Welcome to the club! 🙂

Jasminegab - Welcome in! 🙂 Now, as for your situation, I think it was misleading when I explained taking the MCAT to hrusky, since there are plenty of people who take more than 4 years to finish school. It really should be "the year before you graduate" because I know that there are plenty of people who can be seniors and still have a lot of units to complete before they graduate. Don't worry about it. Just take advantage of signing up for classes (you're a junior now), and focus on studying. At my school, completing 60 units makes you a junior. I've finished 38 and after this semester it should go up to about 53...hope to hear from you again sometime.

Well, now that I've finished answering everyone (took me a whole half-hour!), I'll post up my situation today. I didn't get one of my books that is required for lab. Stupid bookstore doesn't have it. Anyway, it looks like I'll be in the library making photocopies of the blasted thing 😀 I do have an assignment from it due tomorrow, after all. Today is my light day. Only one class, Cell Bio Lecture, from 11:30 to 12:45, and I plan on going home soon afterward. Well, I think that I shall schedule an appointment with my pre-med advisor first (he must be very annoyed because I go to see him a lot). Let him know how I have been and what I have done (hospital volunteering, getting more GE's done, etc.) as well as what I plan on doing for the future.

If anything interesting happens, I'll let you all know!
 
Can you tell I'm bored today-I've been here twice already.....waiting for paint to dry in between coats. But we're almost finished with our remodeling stuff-this weekend should do it:clap:

Biodude-Actually, I'm only in Pre-Calc this semester. Whether I take the short calc course or the analytical geometry one in spring depends entirely on what time they're offered. My school doesn't publish the class schedules very far ahead of time, only a list of what courses will be offered and whether they'll be daytime or at night. It will also depend on how well I handle pre-calc. If it turns out that I'm struggling and the short course doesn't fit my schedule I may delay it till next year cuz I have to take Bio 1 during next summer and I sure don't want to combine that with calc.

Also, I would love a prof who looks like Vin Diesel and really knows his stuff😍 (I may be married but I can still fantasize, right?):laugh:

I feel your pain on the bookstore thing too--bureaucracy personified!

Skaterbabe-Hope your long day goes well! I'm going to be required to attend ACS meetings too, you've gotta let me know what it's like....

UCLAstudent-I'd echo everyone else and say talk to your premed advisor. Unfortunately, I don't know much about the way AMCAS classifies things yet so I'm sorry I can't be of any more help...And welcome-I missed you last time. It'll be great to have more people on here who've completed prereqs and can keep the rest of us motivated!

minx-check out Princeton Review for schools if you haven't already...they've got some pretty good info on there

Not much else happening except I'm being driven nuts by the constant roar of Harleys. The 100th anniversary celebration is being held in Milwaukee this weekend, and one of the major camping sites is just south of where I live-they're housing 100,000 people there! And our city's pop is only 40,000 to begin with so we're being completely overtaken and man is it noisy! I'm just planning to hole up in my house this weekend-there's no way I'm venturing out onto the streets unless I need to. OK, back to painting....
 
Long day today.....Today was the 3 hour lab in Bio.....Good news....I got an A for a class that I never went to.:clap: I don't know how this happened but they sent me my summer grades and there it was...a big fat A for the class I only went to for one day. It was at the school I transfered from. So now I have to make my way back to the school I transfered from to get a transcript before they realize the mistake...if there is one.🙄

In my new school, biology is taught much different than in my previous school. The focus is on applying what you learn rather than just reading a book and memorizing it. This is great. Most of my classes are like this. Just study the notes and use the book for anything you don't understand.

My biology class is taught in an auditorium (did I spell that right?) with like 100 students. Makes me feel like I'm in medical school already.

Studying....I have planned to study using my notes from classes at the computer study room. What I do is, whatever my teacher gave as notes, most of my teachers use powerpoint so we go online to the blackboard get the notes from there, I retype them, using the book as reference. This helps me do a little review. Each study session is 50min followed by 10min break. Some courses I have to give more time too. So I study for 50 min, break for 10, then study the same subject for another 50min. I'll see how this works for me.


Well....that's my day....talk with you all tommrow.

Jasminegab
 
Thanks for the welcome. 🙂 I'm actually not quite done with my pre-reqs. I still have one more physics class, one more biology class, and statistics.
 
Hey all! 🙂

Got home a little while ago. Today was long, but fine. I was done with my organic lab about 45 minutes early so I was able to go grab the last free lunch they were doing this week. Burgers and falling off the bones bbq pork ribs...yum 😀 . Then I had organic and physics lectures. I love both of these lectures. Organic is all powerpoint and in a packet for us, so all we have to do is add a couple notes here and there. Otherwise it's just listening. Physics we really haven't done much worth taking notes on yet hehe, but the prof is fun 🙂. One of my friends didn't even take out paper and pen today in there lol. Both of my lab instructors are females. My orgo one is cool, my physics one is pretty laid back. I was out of physics lab by like 3:45 today so as I was walking over to the ACS meeting (which started at 4:30) I ran into one of Dr Schoffstall's more experienced team members, Mike. Since we had time he showed me what I was gonna be doing tomorrow. No biggie, just distilling some liquids to purify them a bit. Then we went to the meeting. Today was pretty much just a hi, how ya doing, this is who we are, what we've done in the past, what we know we'd like to do this year sort of thing so it was pretty boring lol. We have a couple brewery's nearby so we usually go visit one of them each year. We also hold a ping pong tournament to fund raise. We go to area high schools and do demos and promote uccs and chemistry, hold science fairs and judge them, stuff like that. We're going to try to start selling goggles under the bookstore price, and I think next semester we're going to sell old prof's tests in packets (right now profs just provide links to them on their course sites but so far all that have been asked are more than willing to let us sell them instead), and then we sell the study guides for the standardized exams from the ACS we all take. I think for the most part we just kind of hang out and have fun together lol.

I have a feeling every school is different in what they actually do for the club, but hopefully that'll give you some idea jenni.

Jasmine - Sounds like you've already got a good study plan in place! I love classes that use books more as supplements vs relying heavily on them hehe. And congrats on that surprise A! lol...that's awesome:laugh:

Tonite I have to read at some of the second chapter in Physics, but other than that I'm just gonna chill and hang out with my bf a bit. Tomorrow is an early day. Gotta work in the stockroom from like 8 or 8:30 til 1ish. Then I have physics lecture at 1:40, and after that I'm gonna go work in the lab for a couple hours. Mike will be around after 4:30 or so if I need any help with the distillation but I don't forsee any. It's all laid out in my lab book if I run into trouble lol.

Have a good one!
--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hello everyone,
This morning I have been Helping the kids of a friend to their HW so their ready for school.
Thanks for your advice biodude on college and MCAT
Jenni4476 I have already had a look there(I have my med-school list there) ,but for collge peterson education is even better.
 
Hi Guys,

Biodude and Skaterbabe - Thanks for the advice and encouragement - it's been a long road. Freshman and sophmore year really took its toll on me academically, which is when I took most of my core requirements. I guess it's harder because I'm a non-science major, so I don't have many upper division science courses to reinforce my core classes. Maybe it's time to take some, eh? I don't mind at all applying to some DO schools - I just want to become a physician, I frankly couldn't care less what letters I had after my name.

UCLA Student - I wish you would have told me you were at UCR for the summer, I'm here too! What did you think of having class here? Was your experience enjoyable?
 
AspiringDoctor9, I had a very good experience with my UCR class! It was kind of tedious because a lot of papers were assigned in such a short time, but, overall, I feel like I learned a lot. 🙂

Today will be another day at the hospital. The doctor I work with declared every Friday Hawaiian day so he can wear a Hawaiian shirt. So, I ditched my volunteer uniform and dressed up for the holiday. 😀
 
Hey all 🙂

Hope everyone had a good day!

I was done with the work I could do for the stockroom by like 9:30 (after getting there at 8:30) so I just worked on physics most of the morning😎 . That is the one advantage to the stockroom work hehe...study time! At one point Mike wanted me to come over and run thru a full distillation with me, but I was stuck in the stockroom til physics lecture so he never got to run one with me. We had a hail/heavy rain storm right before I had to leave for physics - boy am I glad it was chilly enough for a jacket today and I grabbed my hooded one lol. Physics was a blast like usual, and was an awesome break from the doldrum of the stockroom lol. Then I headed back and got started on a distillation. The equipment was already set up for me (which isn't usually the case, but someone had left it out yesterday), and one of my other team members helped me get it started. Ended up spraying him pretty well with water hehe. Ooops...but everyone has done that once or twice so no biggie. Had plenty of time to get thru a distillation run and clean up before catching my bus. Yeah it's boring stuff too since it's just typical experiement stuff, but at least it requires more attention and skills then cleaning glassware and setting out stuff for labs lol, and I wasn't in the lab by myself. Mike and Justin both commented that I was a good worker so hopefully I'll get upgraded relatively quickly to an actual project or experiment vs just distilling stuff that the others on the team use. I definitely have plenty of study time with both jobs so far tho lol. All and all today was definitely a good day 🙂.

Have a good weekend all!
--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hi Guys,

Finally! Summer school is over as of today - I'm glad that I finally get a 3 week break. I had my final exam today, and they posted grades already! I'm surprised they posted grades that quickly - I was worried earlier, but now I'm so happy! I got an A+ for the course, my 10th on my transcript! I went back and slept for the rest of the day, and I'm moving back home tomorrow until the school year starts. How is everyone else doing?
 
AspiringDoctor9, how/where do you check your grades?
 
Hi UCLAStudent,

Well, there's 2 ways to check your grades. If your professor uses the website "ilearn.ucr.edu" - they post your scores there. If you want to wait for the registrar to get around to it, you'll need to login to PAWS, which is the UCR student add/drop/grades page. I don't know if you can get into it since you're not a full-time student, but you might wanna ask anyways. Other than that, I'm not sure! Call the Summer Sessions office - they'll be able to tell you for sure.
 
Congrats AspiringDoctor:clap: Now you've just raised the bar for the rest of us😀

You must really start classes late-I thought I did and mine start Tuesday....

Skaterbabe-Glad to hear about your good day-it's always nice to get a compliment, isn't it? The one I got from my pointe teacher last night saying I had great control and beautiful extension cancelled out the painful toes after she made us do TONS of balance work (meaning staying up on one foot in passe or arabesque for as long as we humanly could-OUCH!) 😀

Overall, a good day except the textbook company shipped me the wrong medical terminology book. It's the last book I need and I had to order it online since it's a distance ed class. So I spent fifteen minutes on the phone trying to explain to them that ground shipping was not acceptable, I needed next day air since I have to have the book Tuesday. Eventually I succeeded in getting it and making them pay for it since it was their screwup in the first place. Oh well, small bumps along the road....

For those of you who have taken Anatomy, do you know of anyplace where I can find a list of mnemonics and other helpful things? I glanced through my book and atlas and unfortunately it's very technical and doesn't seem to offer any helpful tips like that. I suck at pure memorization and need some tricks....I know someone recommended a book before as a supplemental text that's really good with stuff like that but I can't afford to buy any more books right now. Believe me, I'd love nothing more but...
 
Hi!

Jenni - I'm sorry to hear about your textbook situation - it bites, seriously. My summer class - they only ordered 140 textbooks for 246 students, some of us had to go without for the first couple of weeks and play catchup later until they got more into the bookstore, so I know how that is. I really don't know much about the memorization techniques you're looking for - it's pretty sad since I haven't taken much science above and beyond the minimum requirements - I'm a humanities major, so not a lot of upper division bio classes for me. Have you thought about posting a separate post, just regarding this? You might get more responses that way. Does that help?

And yeah, we're on the quarter system so we always start late - the end of the first quarter (11 weeks) is Christmas. I really hate the quarter system - there's never any time to even breathe and you ALWAYS know what number week it is, but almost all of the University of California is on it, so I guess I'm stuck. =(
 
Hey guys!
I am on the board of the pre-med club at my university. I was wondering if you guys had any good suggestions about meeting topics that you think would have been beneficial to you thoughout the whole process. Also, suggestions about some fun activities for the club to do that would not cost much, (our leadership last year was terrible, and so we have practically no funds!!)
 
Thanks AspiringDoctor9. I just remembered that my TA said we could e-mail him about our grades if we have to, so I'm thinking that I will do that.

I'm so anxious to go back to school! Pretty crazy, I know. 😀
 
Morning all!

You're all up early this lovely Saturday lol. It's cool and overcast here today, makes it really feel like fall is here already 🙂. My favorite seasons are spring and fall cuz it's not too hot, not too cold, and everything is beautiful!

Congrats on your A+ AspiringDoctor!! :clap: I was excited when I found out that I had beat one of my lab co-workers in our comparative religions class hehe. I got the A. He got a B+. Don't worry I'm not going all gunnerish on y'all...just rarely actually beat other hardcore science people in classes lol. I actually feel bad for him, cuz I felt like I was turning in complete bs and crap on some of my questions and yet I still got an A, so I wonder how bad he wrote stuff in order to get the B+...

jenni - That sux that you got the wrong medical terminology text! But I'm glad you were able to make them see that they needed to overnite it to ya and not have to pay extra for it!

For mnemonics, try medicalmnemonics.com. It's set up more for med school, but there are anatomy and physiology links to various mnemonics. That should get you started. Also, when you can get your hands on a supplemental text look for it on either half.com or amazon...you should be able to get your hands on a good shape used version pretty cheaply. The one we suggested on the other thread was Human Anatomy and Physiology by Elaine Marieb, fifth edition (She's got a new 6th edition now too).

Welcome coll! My school's pre-health/pre-med club sux lol. I'm not even sure if we have one right now lol. Anyway, topics that I think would be beneficial to the whole process would be study techniques, essay techniques, group reviewing various schools in the area, stress relievers....stuff like that. As far as activites, how about a note taking/old exam service and sell the packets to anyone on campus for a couple dollars (can't cost that much to copy them), having a ping pong or pool tournament at your school's recreation center and getting local businesses to donate prizes (it's good business for them so many are more than willing to donate gift certificates, etc....our ACS club does that every year), once you get some funds together you could sell cards for various holidays (preferably homemade computer generated ones), roses around valentines day, and start thinking about bringing in students and admissions people from local med schools for talks. Once you have a bit in your account you could sponser parties and bbqs on campus as well, charge a couple bucks for drinks and food, and just have a blast....Good luck!

I have a ton of homework/reading this weekend. We have to read 2 chapters for Research Methods vs the typical one it will be the rest of the semester. Then I have to read a chapter for each of my other 3 classes, do 20 homework problems between physics and organic (orgo due thurs, physics due fri), start studying for a quiz in organic on thurs, and work on my writeups for orgo and physics labs (and the next prelabs hehe), but those aren't due until Thurs either. Thankfully I have a couple extra days this week to get thru the extra chapter in Research Methods. We don't have classes on Tues either for Labor Day (although I do have to work for sure in the stockroom, and maybe the lab too)😀 . Other than the extra chapter in Research Methods this will be my typical workload tho other than studying for exams/quizzes and doing homework assignments in Research Methods. I'm going to try and get all my reading done every weekend, and work on practicing extra problems and doing lab writeups during the week cuz I really don't want to carry more than one or two books with me every day lol.

Have a good one everybody!
--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hi all,


Well last week was the first week of school as some of you already know. My week at my new school was very interesting and exhausting.

I realized that I was taking an english class that I had already had and passed with a B+. I had to run to the Dean of english to straighten out why I had to take this class over again when I already had taken it at another college. It came down to me having to drop this english class because they made a mistake on my transfer evaluation.

Now that that's cleared up, I am down to just 4 classes this semester. It also makes more room for me to focus on my Pre-med studies before I graduate.

I'm still looking into International medical schools since I can never get into a US medical school. I have personal issues which prevent me from entering US medical schools.:scared: Please don't judge me and ask me what they are. I really do not want to go into them on this board. Let's just say that I made mistakes when I was younger that is causing all kinds of troubles now, that is for those who don't believe that people make mistakes and can correct their lives.

Anyway, I feel that since I'm starting a new school as a Junior, I get to start over. My history of dropping class after class is over and I'm making better grades now. My focus is more on my education now. I study better now as an adult then I did when I was younger.

So for all you younger generations out there stressing over grades and getting into a good medical school count your blessing. At least you have a shot of getting into some medical school (perhaps not your choice school-but it's a medical school and that all that really matter right?).

I have a long battle ahead me and failure is not an option for me. I have to prove myself beyond grades, MCAT scores, LOR's and where I did my volunteer work. However, I'm determined to make it. I don't know how, but I will not stop until I graduate with an MD behind my name and I'm helping the sick and hurting.

Well, it been a long somewhat depressing day for me as you can see in this post. Please don't feel sorry for me...nor am I looking for any sympathy. Just keep in mind what you have. Too many people don't know what they have until it's gone. Getting it back is HELL. Now....I'm going to bed...I need rest. Talk with you all later.

JasmineGab
 
:clap: Congrats for your A+ aspirindoc
skatebabe on your B+:clap:
Jenni- i hope you get the right book of medical terminolgy for a anatomy te xt book I used tortora/ Grabowski Principle of Anatomy & Physiology 10th edition its really really good make it is easy to study from plus it has a cd-room as a study guide with lots of nice features.
 
Hey all 🙂

lol Minx - I got the A, Justin (my coworker) got the B+. But thanks, after hearing about his grade my A was that much sweeter cuz it meant that he was actually grading them vs just giving everyone who put in a lil effort an A.

Jasmine - Congrats on finding out about the credit for english in time to drop it! I ended up retaking gen psych and us his I before I realized I already had them hehe. oops...oh well. Is it a possibility for you to go to an Internat'l school that conducts clinicals here? For example St Christopher's in Lufton, England does their first 2 years there (with anatomy in London), then you come back to the states for the last 2 years and residency...That way you can start practicing here as soon as you get your degree and licensing vs having to take all of the extra tests most internat'l students have to in order to practice here.

While I don't have the same personal issues that you do with getting into a US med school I have a similar academic history. I'd sign up for classes and just quit going to them. Some I withdrew from, others I didn't. So while I came into my current school as an almost senior creditwise I didn't have enough credits in anything to be anywhere near a degree, so I'm basically a sophomore now (after my first full year). I'm doing much better now, although math is still giving me fits and bringing down my gpa, and i had a slight relapse over the summer to old habits that I'll have to make up next summer.

I agree that some of the "youngsters" on this site could use a good reminder of just how lucky they are, but luckily the ones in this thread are all pretty humble 🙂.

Hang in there Jasmine! If you ever want to talk feel free to IM me ([email protected] on AIM)...

As for me, I finished my Research Methods reading for the week yesterday. The book for that is hilarious. It was actually written for grad students in exercise science programs and is for the first research class they typically take. Therefore, it's mostly a how-to guide to writing theses and publication papers. There's tons of examples of bad writing, and often the authors are showing how dry and long writers make their papers hehe. I also finished most of my cell bio for the week. I'll finish that today and work on organic 🙂.

Hope everyone has a good day!
--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hi guys!

Jasmine - totally hang in there! I think that something you really had to work for feels much better in the end than something that was really easy to achieve - it makes you feel like you really accomplished something important. I'm sure medicine is the same way - if you really wanna get there, keep going! You'll make it!

Skaterbabe - Ouch, physics and organic chem? I remember when I took them both at once, and I didn't like it very much. Granted it's supposed to be "normal" - but I think it was more than I wanted to deal with at once back then. At my campus, organic chem lab was practically another class in terms of how much time it took (but not extra units were given, it was lumped in with lecture)- postlabs took 2 hours to write, prelabs about 3 hours to write, then 4 hours per week in lab. Is it the same way for you?
 
I hate it when the threads are not working right...now I've got a dozen posts that I have to sort through thanks to the (non) automatic e-mail updates on this thread.

Just got back from the hospital today. It was somewhat better than the last two shifts that I had done, because I got to do a bit more, plus I began to anticipate what the PCA's needed me to do. Hopefully, this will continue to the point where they won't even need to ask me what to do...

Let's see here...today, I had to go around checking up on certain patients, and I helped with getting food to others. Then there was the matter of this one particular patient who kept on trying to take off his breathing mask. I had to sit and watch him to make sure that he didn't. That was the last thing I had to do before I finished up my shift, and also the most boring, since I sat around and the patient was quite persistent. It ended when the nurse came in and put a N.G. (naso-gastric) tube in him. Poor guy...it was somewhat disturbing to me when I realized that the tube went down the guy's throat through the nostril...

Actually, come to think of it, I didn't get to do much of the "hands-on" stuff like cleaning up after bowel movements, but what I did do was well-appreciated by the patients.

Sorry for not responding to anybody's posts, but I am still sorting them out at the moment. Although, I do have some advice for people through the whole process of being a pre-med...it takes a lot of persistence, so you'd have to prepare yourself for the long haul. I mean, it's only been a year since I started college, but it's felt like forever; keeping yourself motivated is key 😀 Let's see...what else...oh yeah, and it's a good idea to spread out classes, or else you may burn-out like me. I'm still trying to recover from that.

I've noticed that a lot of pre-meds around here (especially on the pre-allopathic board) are very uptight. A good idea would be to not be so uptight 🙄 Have some fun once in a while. Being a physician is serious stuff, but it's not like you can't have some fun while studying to become one...
 
Hey all!

Done with cell bio for the week 🙂. Now I just have orgo and physics lol. I realized that I only have one write-up this week tho since we don't have to do one for our first exercise in orgo. Yay!

AspiringDoctor - At our school orgo lab is a separate 2 credit class. We have two tracks tho - one for majors, one for nonmajors. The one for majors has two full 2.5 hr labs per week (so 2 experiments per week), the non majors only have 1 full lab, and then a 50 minute lecture over whatever experiment we're doing that week (which is a complete waste of time cuz they put all the powerpoint slides from it up on the website). I'm in the one for non majors so it isn't soo bad. I haven't written my first prelab yet, but I don't forsee it taking quite that long. We have to write everything up in "prep" for the lab, but don't have to write the entire procedure...we just reference that and then include any changes that are being made. Then we have to take a 10 pt mc prelab "quiz" online each week. Afterwards we have to write it all up which I'm sure will take much longer than the prelab phase lol. There's also questions to answer out of our lab text that we don't have to turn in but will cover material that will be on our two exams. Physics lab is only one a week for 1 hr and 45 min. We have short prelabs for that one...at most 5 questions (although a few of them will definitely take some time to figure out). There's usually room for our data,etc in the lab book so we don't have to keep a totally seperate lab notebook for this. Then we just have to write it all up each week.

Thankfully this isn't my first semester of keeping a lab notebook for chemistry tho. For the majority of my classmates it is. About 20 of us did an honors Gen Chem II last spring where our lab was basically an organic lab (recrystallizations, synthesis, IR spects, NMR spects, etc) where while we didn't have to turn in any weekly write ups we had to keep a full notebook because we had to write up a research paper over the entire semester at the end of the class. Everyone else was filling out pre-written experiment sheets for their Gen Chem II.

The lecture sections for physics and orgo aren't too bad either. The orgo prof put all his notes into a packet for us so we just have to fill in examples here and there during class, and the physics prof is just fun hehe. I'm taking alg based instead of calc based which helps a lot tho. For orgo we have a 10 pt mc homework for each chapter and for physics we have 10 problems a week to work (which works out to 10/chapter). I'm of course doing all the questions in the books too, but it's not like they are being graded hehe. Physics is 4 exams, Orgo is 4 exams, 4 quizzes, and 2 or 3 "concept quizzes" per day. The concept quizzes are mc questions that we get 3 points for if we get it right, 1 pt for if we get it wrong, and 0 pts if we don't answer. (In the end those will get averaged out to a 100 pts total possible).

Then I have cell bio and Research Methods as well. Cell Bio is simply 3 exams and 1 quiz (don't know what kind of format yet tho) based entirely off lectures. For research methods, the prof puts up an outline of the lecture notes that we just print out and fill in details on. Then we have 3 exams, 7 assignments, and 55 pts for class participation. Most of the assignments are Excel based so they shouldn't be too awful. Most of my profs have built review days into the schedules before exams too which is cool 🙂.

Biodude - Sounds like you had a better, more meaningful time at the hospital today! How's the studying going?

Ok on to orgo studying 🙂.
--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hey, Skaterbabe74, I am not making much progress. I finished about 3/4 of my math homework and will be starting on my Logic homework once the Calculus stuff is finished. After that, I'll have a look into my Cell Bio texts and my enormous 4 Chapter assignment from Greek Philosophy. There are also some notes that I need to finish up for my Lab just so that it would seem clearer to the TA...so you can very well tell that I've got a lot of work ahead of me.

On the plus side, I'll only have Cell Bio and Calculus on Tuesday, so it's not like I have to have EVERYTHING done by then. Just the Cell Bio reading assignment (first quiz coming up!) and my Calculus homework (due every Monday, but this Monday is Labor Day = no classes, so it'll be on Tuesday instead).

I still need to make sure to get most of the Greek Philosophy reading done by then. Greek Philosophy sure is a lot of reading.
 
Yeah I'm definitely loving having two extra days to get stuff done (We're off both Mon and Tues here) lol. Course I didn't do as much during the week knowing that I had the extra two days to do stuff, and I didn't get my physics book til Wed lol. I finished the problems for chap 1 in orgo and did my homework for that which is due Wed. I won't be submitting it til probably Wed tho cuz there's a couple I want double checked before submitting it. (We turn those in online). Cool thing is that our lowest two grades on homework will be dropped but I'd rather my first one not be one of them lol. I want to spend tomorrow doing my write up for physics lab, and my prelabs for physics and orgo labs so I'm gonna try to read the 2nd chapter for both physics and orgo tonite. Other than the reading for orgo I have everything that I need done for Wed finished at least. Lab stuff is due Thurs, and then my physics homework over Chapter 2 is due Friday. I also have my first orgo quiz on Thurs, but it shouldn't be too awful. All we've done so far is really review stuff from gen chem lol.

Break time is over so back to orgo 😛

--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hey Guys, I've been reading this thread for a while and I'd thought that I'd join. I have to say it's nice to know I'm not the only cat kickin around these boards that has a less than steller past academic history. I have to say Jasmine, I'm with you, if it takes me 10 years just to get into medical school, than so be it!!! I've resolved that medicine is what I'm meant to do, and I'll stop at nothing until I get there. I guess it would have been nice if I had truely realized this when I was a freshmen, but since I didn't Im here, starting my second degree, determined to get my average up, and so far Im on track!!! Go Me!! Good Luck to you all, Im sure we'll all get where we want to go 🙂
 
Welcome to the club, climberchick!
 
Since my schedule is rough, and I can't make a decision, I thought I'd throw my problem out here.
I need to drop Physics or Sociology. Disregard any notions about pre-reqs, because they are not in my decision making process. They are at the same time, but Physics is M/W nights and Soci is Thursday nights. I hate Physics. I just may hate Sociology more. One of them needs to go, and I don't know which I should jettison.

Tomorrow I'll be reading some Analytical stuff, and I'll bring my Orgo and Physics stuff to work Tuesday and do them then.
 
Hi Coz,

Regarding your decision, if you're not worried about physics being a pre-req, then I would probably give you the following advice. Since you're posting here, you are probably a pre-med? All of us have to watch our GPAs to get into medical school, and quite frankly, I'm a sociology major and I find it MUCH easier to obtain As in sociology than physics. If you like one course much more than the other, then pick it. But if you're taking a course just to fill a slot, don't like either one, and don't care about pre-reqs... if you're gonna put in the time, at least pick the class where you'll have an easier time getting an A. Does that help any?
 
welcome climberchick
 
Hey Cozmosis, I think it all depends on you. Which one do you really hate more? Just drop that one. On the other hand, taking Organic with Physics forces you to study a lot too, right? So, here are your choices: drop Sociology and spend a lot of study in Physics and Organic or drop Physics and spend your time studying Sociology...but you said that you may hate Sociology more, so there's the problem in dropping Physics. This is also disregarding pre-reqs, like you said. So really, it is up to you. If I were you, I'd drop Physics...I assume that there doesn't need to be much studying required from Sociology (compared to Physics)?
 
I am excited about a research position that I may get in the fall. It's with my psychobiology teacher from last quarter. He will also be my psychology teacher in the fall. I'm not sure what the research entails, but I think it will involve animals/behavior.

I'm getting my wisdom teeth out tomorrow, so I may not be around for a couple of days. 😱 I'm a tad nervous.
 
Okay, so I'm in the middle of trying to finish this wopper pharm assignment and I get so much done and then I have an urge to check this forum out again. I don't know if finding SDN was a blessing or a curse, you guys are all so inspiring, but your also a big distraction. 😛 I'm leaning more towards a blessing, I just have to get my act together. Okay, off I go to disconnect my internet.... there's more than one way to skin a cat!!!😀
 
Hey all!

Today is writing day for me lol. I need to write up last week's lab from physics and do my prelabs for physics and orgo today. Both aren't due until Thurs but since I have no idea how long either will take figured I'd do them today instead of during the "school week".

Welcome Climberchick! No, you're definitely not the only one with a less than stellar early college career lol. Out of curiousity, what was your first degree in, and what are you working on now? As far as the curse or blessing thing, I totally know whatcha mean hehe. We're definitely all addicted lol. I'm getting good at using SDN only for breaks from studying tho lol. Good luck on your pharm assignment!

Cozmosis - That's a hard one for sure. Ok, disregarding prereqs...I guess the question is which do you really hate more and by how much? Sure soc should probably be an easy A, but I know if I'm taking something that I absolutely despise, and am bored to death in I have a tendency to not get the easy A cuz I end up blowing off stuff for it. So it would take vigilence on your part to make sure you did whatever stuff you have to for it. Also, if I despise something, especially if it's a nite class, it feels like I'm there a heck of a lot longer then just the 3 hrs of class (or however long it is). Given that I'd probably choose physics cuz I dislike it less, and would have a better chance of doing everything I need to for it. On the other hand, you already have two major lab classes in analytical and orgo so you'll have to decide if you really have the time to commit to doing the problems and write ups for another lab class on top of those. If you do stay with physics, if you don't stick with soc. I probably didn't help you decide, but I guess if it was me I'd stick with physics given the above arguments....but I also like physics a lot more than soc not just a lil bit lol.

UCLAstudent - That sounds like a great opportunity for you! I hope it works out! As far as the wisdom teeth, it won't be too bad. I had all 4 plus my 4 incisors and one tooth straightened at once when I was getting my braces lol. No it wasn't a blast or anything, but I got a lot of yummy milkshakes out of the deal
😀 . Just take whatever pain med they suggest religiously and you'll be fine lol.


Ok, I'm off to finish reading my orgo chapter (need that for Wed), and write my labs up! Happy Labor Day!!
:clap:

--Jessica, UCCS
 
Thanks, Skaterbabe74. 😀 Good luck with your labs. Lab reports were the worst part about chem. lab, in my opinion. They took forever! What a fun way to spend Labor Day. 😉
 
To answer your questions skaterbabe, my first degree was in human biology. Of course I fumbeled it up, my GPA for my last year is really good, but it doesn't make up for my early years. Im taking pharm and OCHEM this semester to try and increase my science GPA, I'm also working full time. I don't actually start full time on my second degree until next year. I have to make some money first, but I'm planning on taking history with a few science electives. (I'm working as an RBA so at least my job is getting me some clinical experience!! It's fun too)
 
LOL UCLAstudent. I'm not actually doing a chem write up this week. I just have to do the prelab for that. I'm about 2/3 of the way done with my physics write up, but yeah inputting equations into a word doc. totally sux. Only have my conclusion left thank goodness lol. Even if I didn't have these to do today tho I wouldn't have done much even tho it's a holiday. Our bus service doesn't run on holidays and my bf was working during the day lol.

Climberchick - Ah ok...what are you going to get your second degree in? Do you know yet? And what's an RBA? I totally understand the needing to make money thing lol. Keep up the good work!

--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hey Everybody!! (seriously, i don't know how some of you can go down each new post and answer it specifically, i don't have enough patience for that 😛 I'll just reply to the ones that stick out in my mind)

Welcome climberchick!

Well, it looks like we're all doing well.

Jasmine: Well, whatever happened in the past, it seems like you're a very different person now. And i feel like you will get to where you want. It's nice to be reminded of what we have, so thanks for the 2 mins of reflection i had when i read your post 😉

Biodude: Philosophy IS so much reading. I tok intro philo and the guy would assign like a 100 pgs a week. I was like WTF? Phil was never on the top of my list... but the class was so easy. I finally caught on around final that had i ONLY attended the discussion b4 each exam, i would have done just as well. The TA basically went over the answers we would need on the exam. Oh Well..

SkaterBabe: I think you seem to have a pretty good work ethic...or at least plan well i nadvance for your assignments. I tend to plan ahead for studying for exams, but labs are usually done last minute...but one of my goals this semester is to change that. It's so stressful and i end up wasting so much time owrrying as opposed to finishing my work.

UCLAStudent: Congrats on your research position. I too am starting work in a new lab this semester. I hope it becomes a fruitful year for all of us!

Coz: If it were me, i'd go with the soch. I really enjoyed that class so much. And the stuff you learn sticks with you...like you'll remember it when your 40...physics...well...i hope i can remember it a week after i take the mcat 😉

Well, it looks like i just about answered everyone...lol.

As for me, school starts tomarrow. I have just about everything ready. i ordered most of my texts online...and am starting to worry about how long it'll take to arrive. I can't afford to get behind this semester. Especially september, i have a million things going on this month.

By the way, i'm as typical a pre-med as can be. I'm starting my 3rd yr, pursuing my first degree in biology. I'm turning 19 on sept 16th (yay!!) And i try to keep my head above the water, when semester starts going full blast. So no interesting past experiences.

I'll be letting you all know what my final course list and my feelings about each class are later. Maybe wednesday when i will have gone to all my classes. Tomarrow i just have french and socializing...lol. Gotta meet up with all the peeps and see how everyone's doing.

Now i gotta decide what i'm gonna wear tomarrow. Do any of you stress about what to wear? I do sometimes...but other times i just about roll off the bed and head to class...like when i'm going thru long bouts of studying..

Alright, take care, lots of luv to you all!!!!!!
 
Good luck with school tomorrow, DrSal! 😀
 
Skaterbabe: I'm planning on taking a BA in History. I kinda feel like I should learn about the world, instead of just living in "my own little world" you know what I mean? A RBA is a room based attendant on an OR. YOu just go around getting everything ready before surgery and stuff. It's fun to be around all the excitement, but I'm envious of all the med students that come around... I wich I was there already that's all 🙂
 
Hi Guys,

I have a dilemma, so I thought I'd throw it out here. I'm looking at my classes for the Fall term, and am trying to figure out what I'm going to take. I need to take 2 sociology classes for my major... and then the rest is up in the air. Should I take an honors class in contemporary issues in modern biology (small class of about 20... letter of recommendation chance perhaps?), or retake organic chemistry I (which I got a C+ in last time). I haven't taken organic chem in so long, I can't even remember what a ketone is. Any ideas everyone? And should I add a 4th class? There's nothing that needs to be taken - should I take something else for the heck of it?
 
Yay! My physics lab write up is done! Woohoo!:clap: That was the most annoying thing I've done yet lol. I got it all written, saved it, printed it to read for errors, and went to resave it again and the stupid program crashed! Then it wouldn't reopen! 😡 So I restarted my puter, and got my document open, but only half of it was there! So I changed the stuff I wanted to in the early part of the paper and started typing the missing stuff in again, and I got GP faults over and over and over again!!+pissed+ I had to start saving the stupid thing every sentence just to get thru it. And it still kept crashing. I finally got it done tho. And now word seems fine. Go figure lol.

DrSal - I've learned the hard way about study habits. I plan well, but I don't always follow thru lol. For example, last spring for honors Gen Chem II we had to write a research paper for our lab at the end of class. We had a week to get it done. I wrote it like the last 2 days hehe. Over the summer I had a term paper for Comparative religions and ended up turning it in 2 hrs late cuz I wrote most of it in the 3 days prior to it being due. I'm trying to not let myself to that again. And without knowing how long these writeups were going to take I decided to do it today cuz I know how tired I am during the week once I get home after getting up at 5 or 6 lol. And yes I stress sometimes about what to wear. Mostly I just have to remember to wear closed toe shoes most days lol. It also depends how late I was up the nite before. If I was up late I'll typically just grab jeans, sweatshirt, and ball cap hehe.

Climberchick - That sounds like a great plan. I'm hoping to fit in a minor in history myself but I don't know if it'll work out. Depends when classes are offered since I pretty much only have summers available for non-sci classes lol. Being an RBA sounds like a blast (although I'm sure it's boring sometimes lol), and yeah I'm feeling the "I want to be doing that too thing" lol.

AspiringDoctor - What you take I guess depends on how many credits are considered "normal" at your school. For us it's typically 15-16 credits (18 max, 12 min) which equates to about 4 classes per semester. That honors class sounds fun tho and a great opportunity for an LOR! I'd hold off on orgo tho...plenty of people get C+ in orgo and get into med school. I'd probably take a history/lit/or film class as my 4th just cuz those are things that interest me...but you can definitely never have enough humanities credits in my opinion 🙂.

I'm taking tonite off from studying and hanging out with my bf for awhile. I need the break after the debacle with word lol. Besides I still have tomorrow to get stuff done since we somehow ended up with 2 days off for labor day hehe. Have a good one!
--Jessica, UCCS
 
Hi guys,

Skaterbabe - thanks for the advice. I think I will try that honors biology class, and maybe japanese if I feel like it. I've wanted to learn that language since I was like, 12. Also, full time at my university is 12-18 units (you need special permission to be outside that range). It's funny that you say that you can never have too many humanities units - I'm a humanities major. Does that help any? =)
 
Hey everyone, I thought I would jump in again...

Skaterbabe74 - congrats on getting that write-up done! Hope that you have fun with your boyfriend. And two days for Labor Day? Hmm, I could use that, but at least my classes tomorrow aren't going to be very much.

DrSal - Awww, 3rd year already? And it seems that you are younger than me (by a few months). I turned 19 on the day Tom Cruise turned 41. Anyway, on what to wear, I am probably the last person to ask. I just throw on whatever makes me feel comfortable. I don't wear any brand-name stuff, so that's one of the reasons why I can afford to live on $1800 a month in California with my mom and brother. And I think you should too 😛 Thanks for the sympathies on Philosophy. I still haven't done the reading yet. Have fun tomorrow. The first day of school is always very easy and laid-back.

Oh, yeah, and I'm a fast-reader (was a real book-worm as a kid). So it's not a problem responding to several posts at once. It just takes forever to type out what I want to say. My posts are incredibly long, aren't they?

AspiringDoctor9 - Afraid I can't help ya there...hopefully Skaterbabe74 has offered you sound advice. And if not, there are plenty of other people who should be showing up to help you out.

climberchick - I think that we can sympathize on the med student thing 😀 I know that whenever I go to a teaching hospital, I always feel like I wish I was there among those med students already. This sure is a long road that we're in for, but hopefully we'll be up to it.

UCLAstudent - I've had my wisdom teeth pulled out already. It's not so bad during the tooth pulling, I think. But then, I was knocked out by anesthesia before the surgery. Didn't feel like more than 5 seconds, and suddenly my eyes opened up again and I felt gauze in my mouth. Very painless and it felt fast (though it must have taken the oral surgeon 3 hours). By the way, I do hope that you get that research position, and trust me, there's no pain during the surgery, if you have competent enough anesthesia people there.
 
Well, I just got home about two hours ago from the surgery. I feel surprisingly well. I was asleep during the whole procedure. I'm still quite numb, so I'm not in any pain yet. I'm just icing my jaw and using gauze to stop the bleeding. I was planning on sleeping/resting the whole day, but I feel well enough to surf SDN. 😀
 
Hi guys!

UCLA Student - Did you have any luck finding your grades? I hope you did well!

And as for me, I'm just being lazy right now. I'm trying to decide classes for the rest of the year - one of the things I hate about a quarter system school is most classes are only offered once a year out of 3 quarters, twice if you're lucky. I'm wondering if I should take Japanese or not - does anyone know if this is a hard language to learn? And how is everyone else doing?
 
Hi all!

I'm still here or rather I'm back!! 🙂

I graduated with my BA in psychology with honors - Magna Cum Laude :clap: WOW (wasn't expecting to do that well!!!) on August 1!!!! :clap: Since then, I've been enjoying my VACATION from school. ( I remember what a social life is like now)

But, tonight it's back to school to start studying the sciences (no more psych papers!!!). I start tonight with honors calculus which is on Tuesday and Thursday 7-10pm and then am taking General Chemistry every Saturday from 10am-5:30pm. A total of 10 units. I'm still working full-time so I expect this semester to be a little bit of a struggle (plus have a new boyfriend to manage :laugh: 😱 )

I was rejected for the post bac program at SFSU so I'm feeling litle sad (due to state budget cuts they aren't accepting ANYONE that already has a bachelor's degree), however, I plan to start at San Jose State in the Spring full-time (bye bye job!) Only 4 more months to go!

Glad to see everyone is doing well and that we are all still hanging in there and supporting each other.

Roselee

Med School bound 2006!
 
Roselee - Yeah, the budget deficit totally sucks. I think like 940 students from my school were kicked out due to the increasing tuition. No thanks to the people who control the state Senate (some of which I unwittingly voted for - but I certainly didn't vote for Gray Davis) 😳

Congrats on the BA and Magna Cum Laude is really really nice! Hopefully, the med schools will see that 😀 It's been good hearing from ya after so long!

AspiringDoctor9 - I dunno about Japanese, but a Japanese major at my school told me that it's pretty easy to figure it out once you've gotten the basics down (but I bet that applies to a lot of things - sorry for the cop out). As for how I am doing, check out below.

UCLAstudent - Well, looks like you got the same tooth-pulling as I did. My brother's wisdom teeth removal was a bit different - the oral surgeon removed each tooth one at a time, each for a different surgery, so it took a while. I still prefer the method I went through - fast, convienient, and well, I think that's it. My mom thinks that the method for my brother is safer (less blood loss I suppose). If I were you, I would expect to start feeling pain later on today or sometime tomorrow. The frequency of it wasn't as bad as the acuity was for me.


Well, today was somewhat slow. It took forever for my Calculus prof to get the lecture going, and once he did, he didn't have enough time to explain the section we were on (limits) in-depth, so he decided to put off assigning homework for it until tomorrow. According to people who have taken this class before, this professor is behind schedule compared to the one they had before.

I did a quick read through for Cell Bio (didn't have the time yesterday) and went into class. Today's lecture started with a quiz, of which I got nothing right 😛 But that's okay, because the prof drops the lowest 3 quizzes, so I'll just have to make sure that it doesn't happen again. I really should get my act together now. The lecture itself was pretty basic (for someone who's had General Chemistry last semester). It covered atoms and molecules and bonds. Chemistry stuff, so darn basic that even a high school student should be able to figure it out. Next lecture we'll be covering the cytoplasm.

Tomorrow, lab is not scheduled to run, which frees up 3 extra hours, one of which will be spent going to the first Philosophy Club meeting of the semester. I think that this time around, I will continue membership in the SHPA (Student Health Professions Association), and then join the Philosophy and Biology Clubs, in addition to Circle K (community service club/association).

If anyone wants to know what I'm doing now (besides checking SDN and web surfing), I am currently delving into the second Chapter of my Greek Philosophy reading assignment (Chapter 3 in the textbook). I also have a Logic exercise and an additional Logic reading from the textbook to do. Logic is so boring now, and I don't know why...maybe I'll just have to wait until later on in the semester for it to get interesting. On the other hand, Greek Philosophy is cool. I think that maybe I should have started college with a Philosophy major instead of a Biology one, but I'm too much of a science freak so...I guess I'll just settle with a minor (double major would be too much work).
 
Hey all,

UCLAstudent: Take a few days to rest up after that surgery. When I had my wisdom teeth out it went pretty smoothly, almost no pain at all, but I here it can go both ways, or either lucky, like me, or your really unlucky and end up with a really bid ooowwweey for a couple of days. I hope your lucky! Just suck on a lots of popsicles! yum yum

Biodude: Philosophy sounds like a really interestinf subject. I didn't get much chance to take alot of non science electives my first time around, but it's definitely a course I'd like to look into taking next year. Calculus however I have had a lot of experience with. Personaly I found that it was much easier to learn calc from my textbook, the only thing i really got from my prof was his little hints about what may show up on the exam. Im not advising that you don't go to class :laugh: but definitely try focusing some of your study efforts on the test to see if that works for you !

aspiringdoctor:go for the japanese... If you've wanted to learn it for a long time then it is probably something you will really enjoy and do well in. Good Luck!

Skaterbabe: Way to go on taking the night off. You seem like you've been working really hard and we all deserve breaks. I'd like to spend some time with my BF right now, to bad he's in another state 🙁

As for me, Im off to my night class! It was a hard day a work to day. There was an emergency surgery, and the guy didn't make it. Just to much internal bleeding. The docs really feel it when they open someone up and realize that there is just nothing they can do... their not use to feeling helpless.
 
Hey all!

My bf and I had a nice time last nite. Had a couple Mike's Hard Lemonades and just hung out. 🙂 I can totally feel for ya Climberchick. I'll be going thru that when I go away for med school lol. At least we'll be able to keep in touch thru IMs tho...

Unfortunately once my bf left my night went downhill. My downstairs and to the right neighbors were blasting their hip hop and being extremely loud and boisterous most of the nite. About 2:30 I called the cops on them. (I've tried just asking way too many times before). They turned the music down for about an hour and then started blasting it again. Then they started having conversations at the top of their voices (as always happens when people drink) right under my living room window or out in the middle of the street. I called the cops again about 4:20, but they finally turned the music down enough at 4:30 so I canceled the call. Next thing I know two of them are having a huge screaming argument out in the street! It was finally quiet enough for sleep at 6am this morning!!! Thank goodness I didn't have classes today - that's when I would have been getting up lol. I just don't get how with 10 apts in this bldg I seem to be the only one willing to complain about it. The end apts may not have heard all of it but they definitely would have heard the argument. I am sooo unbelievably fed up with these people!😡 I ended up sleeping until about noon so getting up tomorrow is so not going to be fun lol.

So far today I've finished my orgo prelab for Thurs. That wasn't bad at all. The kind of nice thing about the write-ups for orgo is that it'll basically just be copying whatever is our notebook into a word doc lol. Next up is my physics prelab and then reading my physics chapter so I can work on the homework due Fri tomorrow and Thurs.

UCLAstudent - Glad to hear the surgery went well. Hopefully you won't have too much pain once the numbing wears off lol.

Roselee - Welcome back 🙂 Congrats on graduating magna cum laude!!:clap: That's awesome! Good luck with doing honors calc and gen chem while working full time! You'll definitely be busy this semester lol. I'm sorry you didn't get into UCSF but hopefully you'll rock San Jose State!

Biodude - Don't you just despise pop quizzes lol. At least she's dropping the lowest tho! Wow...how in the world do you have time to fit in 4 clubs + volunteering at the hospital and the soup kitchen on top of school?? lol...I'm just trying to fit in like 2 or 3 ECs and don't know if I can even manage that lol. I did Circle K at my CC in IL too. That was definitely one of my more fun experiences. Of course almost all the people that were part of it were prior friends lol. I definitely agree with Climberchick about learning calc tho....there wasn't a whole lot that my profs added to my learning from the book...they just helped figuring out what exactly we'd be doing on exams. (Course our exams totally sucked even with study guides to help lol).

Hope y'all have a good evening!
--Jessica, UCCS
 
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