What would I have done in Undergrad...

[FLY]

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....if I had a chance to do it all over again?

 

[An Yong]

Major in something that already included the pre-req's so I could have a social life and finish college faster.

 

[rae-chill]

applied early decision to med school (for sure!), taken more physics classes, eliminated a couple of boyfriends (boys=waste of time! 😛), drank less coffee and alcohol (hmm... maybe not the latter 😉), gone to class...
and the list goes on and on - kinda makes me wonder how i've made it this far... heh.

 

[Samoa]

Gone to class. Majored in Philosophy. Done the pre-med thing. Worked a little harder, played a little smarter.

 

[chopsuey]

applied to Mt Sinai's Humanties Scholars (or whatever it's called) program! that is definitely number 1, so that i could have gone to France for an entire year instead of one semester and finished a French major. that's the biggest academic regret, without a doubt.

gone to class more as a frosh and gotten better grades- though for the amount of fun i had, i guess it was worth the grades (they weren't terrible..and you gotta love the upward trend that results!).

taken physics at any other school but my own (stupid physics profs at my school...🙁 ).

worked more so i would actually have money to afford a quality senior year and med school apps and contribute to tuition!

i'm not sure why this is mostly academic...i definitely have social regrets, but i can't think of any big ones right now. guess they kind of resolved themselves over the years 🙂

 

[Woots32]

1. Studied for my freshman year calc final. I didn't understand why everyone was so worked up about this "finals" thing...🙄

2. Not been so dependant on my long-distance boyfriend. It's sad to think of all the friends I could have made had I not relied so much on him.

3. Lived it up! I mean, how coherent do you really need to be for 8am orgo lectures? A little hangover never killed anyone... 🙂

 

[Adcadet]

hmm....what SHOULD I have done?

-gone to the U of Chicago and worked my butt off (as opposed to the college I went to where I developed a social life)

-not listened to my pre-med advisor; I should have just come to SDN

-asked upperclassmen which profs were sadistic and which were good

-not gotten mononucleosis in early April of my junior year!

-complained about my interviewer at the U of MN and requested a new one

-turned in my AMCAS in June and start filling out secondaries immediatly (no use waiting for them to be mailed/emailed to you)

-switched premed advisors to somebody who wasn't trying to coerce me into a PhD program

 

[pathdr2b]

Attended a school with far less than 35,000 students (UFlorida).

 

[ocean11]

I would have gone on meds and to a shrink ALOT earlier LOL

JOKES🙂

 

[jwin]

i would have studied and gone to class my freshman year. i would have put a little more time into that thing called finals that everyone else thought was really important. i would try to get better than a 45% on my gchem final...oh wait, NO I WOULDN'T, that was the only year i had any fun!

 

[Sonya]

* made better use of summer (americorps, now when on earth else would i get such opportunities)
* had more of a social life, and discovered all the wonders of college BEFORE senior year.
* met the awesome people i did senior year, as a soph.
*taken my major sequence earlier.
* not totally f*ucked myself over and mess up everything junior year.
* not enrolled in material science (#1 mistake)
*left volunteering in ER sooner, once i realized it was so boring (or better yet, made it interesting)
* put more thought into ECs i did, and f ind stuff i really enjoyed (rather than what i was s upposed to).
*not take three tough upper division bio together.
* taken cell bio before any upper other upper division bio.

umm, yada yada. mainly the 1st 5.

Sonya

 

[gooloogooloo]

any of you ever regret dating? any of you ever regret being a premed?

 

[LoveDoc]

1) never attempted to join a sorority.

2) never dated a loser. (who came back 5 years later telling me he was getting a divorce too - ladies beware of the scrubs)

3) padded my gpa 1st semester freshmen year with something other than calculus and gchem

4) never changed my major like it was the cool thing to do

5) never asked my parents to co-sign for a car. now i know they never trusted me.

6) never been an RA

7) never worked 20+ hours a week

8) never lost my virginity

ok...im done

 

[2badr]

If i had to start over again I would major in an allied health program stay there for about three years,save MASSIVE amounts of my income from those three years,apply to med school and so on.But since I'm in the middle of it all now and haven't finished undergrad...anything can happen 😀

 

[latinfridley]

I think this thread is counterproductive. Thinking about regrets and "what i would have done", isn't what the original poster ought to have asked. Instead, perhaps a "WHat advice would you give to new undergrads?" thread would be better. Talking about regrets can serve only to bring you down emotionally, and don't help in any way. Life is good, ALL of it. Being alive , it seems to me, is better than being dead. So screw thinking about regrets, and take everything in stride that happens in your life.
....i need to eat breakfast and stop preachin...way to early to be posting....

the j-rod

 

[Random Access]

Originally posted by LoveDoc
6) never been an RA

Hey, what's wrong with being RA?

-RA 😛

 

[jot]

i would have gone skydiving more often😀 wait ... there is still time ...

 

[carmell1981]

If I could do it all over again I would have majored in marine biology but still premed...that way I would have been able to do really cool internships during the summers and go scuba diving everyday!
I would have joined the Ballroom Dance Club earlier and gone all the dance sessions.
I should have paid attention during physics and inorganic chemistry classes instead of just getting a good grade and didn't really learn anything so I ended up studying the stuff for the MCAT all over again! So this is my advice for the freshmen and sophs - just don't take physics, inorganic, and other MCAT subjects just to get by and get a good grade. Think about their application in real life...it'll make it a lot easier.
Oh and yeah, I'm an RA and I like it! I would have regretted it if I hadn't applied for the job. It's good practice especially having to listen to people's problems, no matter how petty they might be, since I'm sure we'll need lots of patience to deal with our future patients. 😉

 

[Kovox]

Originally posted by latinfridley
I think this thread is counterproductive. Thinking about regrets and "what i would have done", isn't what the original poster ought to have asked. Instead, perhaps a "WHat advice would you give to new undergrads?" thread would be better. Talking about regrets can serve only to bring you down emotionally, and don't help in any way. Life is good, ALL of it. Being alive , it seems to me, is better than being dead. So screw thinking about regrets, and take everything in stride that happens in your life.
....i need to eat breakfast and stop preachin...way to early to be posting....

the j-rod

Word up. Major koodles to you, I totally agree.

My advice:

1). Major in something you ENJOY and do your pre-med pre req

2.) Join activities which you like and EXCEL in them rather than joining activities because you think they look good on your resume (Why be an "everybody" when you can be a "somebody"

3.) Get to know your pre-med advisors. Talk to them like every week or two about how you're doing in class, your concerns. That way, when it's time for them to write a committee letter they won't just write a generic one.

4.) Get to know a lot of people. Different types of people. You'll learn a lot from them, not to mention that most of them might have old exams they can let you borrow to prepare for your classes.

5.) Start working on your MCAT verbal or try some science passages. It's never too early to start studying for the MCAT. Research on campus so that you can get to know a faculty member personally, thereby obtaining a good letter of rec.

6.) Check out programs at different universities who give you automatic acceptance to their medical school if you attend their undergraduate. Some of them let you transfer into sophomore year and still let you enter their automatic acceptance program.

7.) Start volunteering at the hospitals or shadow a doctor, KNOW what you are getting yourself into. Don't go into medicine BLIND because it will hurt you.

8.) Most importantly, enjoy yourself. Be happy. If you need help, ASK for it. Don't freak over your FIRST C OR D OR F. Learn from it. Have faith in yourself. Failure is not FALLING down but STAYING down.

Be HAPPY!!!! If you don't live your life...then you're dying.

 

[exigente chica]

Originally posted by carmell1981
I would have joined the Ballroom Dance Club earlier and gone all the dance sessions.

Cool...ballroom rocks? Have u danced at the Harvard invitational? What school? Silver, bronze or gold, and what style..american or international

Ballroom rocks

 

[exigente chica]

Failure is not FALLING down but STAYING down.

Be HAPPY!!!! If you don't live your life...then you're dying. [/B][/QUOTE] I totally agree, but to join in on the fun:

1. Being oblivious to my admirers freshman year🙁
2. Getting involved with that boy, and staying with him for too long.
3. Taking pysics at my school
4. Picking the "wrong" guys
5. Not traveling as much as I wanted
6. Doing terrible on all my finals(I get so burnt out on the end)


No need to go on, there have been many more positives then negatives in my life. Let us not concentrate on only the bad, and remember there is a lesson that can be learned from everything that we go through, and it makes us stronger!

Keep ur head up and it's never to late to do nething😱

 

[Dynastar]

Man, Kovox is completely right.

To all people going into undergrad wanting to go pre-med:

1. Have fun. College is more than grades and resume building.

2. Try all areas of study. I would advocate taking at least one class in as many different subjects as you can to find out what interests you may have that you don't know about.

3. Get involved. Don't sit in your room and study. Go out, have fun, and make a few mistakes.

4. Don't take pre-med too seriously. I know it turns into this machine that makes you cram for good grades, worry about volunteering enough, etc. But go shadow a doc or two. Do the EC's you enjoy, not just the ones that you think make you look good.

5. Read, read, read. Find things you enjoy reading. It will help not only for MCAT but for everything you do.

6. If you get the chance to study abroad. Do it. It's a blast.

7. Don't worry.

 

[pbehzad]

Originally posted by Kovox
Failure is not FALLING down but STAYING down.

Quality quote.

 

[pbehzad]

Originally posted by Kovox
Failure is not FALLING down but STAYING down.

Quality quote.

 

[chopsuey]

Originally posted by Dynastar
Man, Kovox is completely right.

6. If you get the chance to study abroad. Do it. It's a blast.

7. Don't worry.

GO ABROAD!!!!!! that's how i got to #7....it's amazing how much my stress level went down after spending some time being waaay more independent that i've ever had to be.


in case i didn't emphasize it enough, FIND A WAY TO GO ABROAD or at least do a domestic exchange. if you need ideas on programs or grants or whatever that will let you go abroad, PM me.... 🙂

 

[abw]

Hey!

I agree . . . studying abroad not only makes you more independent, but it gives you a whole new perspective on everything (esp. if you can visit a 3rd world country)!

That said, my advice is to follow your own dreams,and not to get caught up in anyone else's. For the first two years of college, I got caught up with what my dad and what my (at the time) boyfriend thought I should do. Both were very against me becoming a doctor. I learned a lot on the round about route to pre-med, but it would have saved so much time and worry if i just believed in myself and the possibility of medicine.

 

[Cerberus]

whiners😛