Advice for Fresman Aggie Son - Biomed/Business

2,903 Views | 9 Replies | Last: 6 yr ago by OnlyForNow
Agilaw13
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My son is a Freshaman Biomed Major. He's had a good first semester 3.78. He's up in air over being Doctor or Attorney/Business. I have been told that he could get into med school with a business degree as long as he took certain biomed/medical courses. He's trying to decide if he wants to switch to Mays at end of semester (counselors indicate good chance due to grades). Any advice is greatly appreciated.
Lone Stranger
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Med/Dent/Pharm schools don't require any specific degree. Some don't even require a degree, just that certain college courses be taken, grades are good and the score on the professional school exam is good. My daughter's med school class had psychology, business, engineering and animal science grads mixed in with a large number of biochem types. Many pharmacy schools accept students with only 3 years of college and no degree if they've met the requirements for courses, grades and exam score.

Some alternate strategies that seem to make sense and you see kids being successful with include; engineering or business degree mixing in the required med school courses so if you don't get into med school or decide not to go you have a higher demand degree than maybe a bio degree to go into industry or liberal arts degree mixing in the required courses in case they decide to go to law school, etc.

TexasAggie73
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AG
My wife had a degree in English from Vanderbilt and decided to go to medical school after a few years.. went to LSU and got her sciences and had no problem getting into med school.
Agilaw13
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Thanks for the replies.
missinAggieland
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AG
Major in anything and take the prerequisites for Med school. I teach at Vanderbilt and advise undergrads. Make sure he stays on top of med school requirements with a pre-med advisor.
H. aggiensis
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AG
I teach at the UNT med school. While the overall GPA is important, the grades in prerequisite science courses count more heavily in the overall evaluation process. If these courses are going to be taken outside of the student's major, make sure these are not done at a less rigorous institution (summer school at a community college, etc.) as this will look suspicious.

Also, recognize that most medical schools are extremely concerned with students dedication towards being a physician (med schools cannot afford drop-outs, they can't just replace a 2nd year burnout with a random person off the street). While it is not unusual to have students with "non-typical" majors apply to medical school, these students generally need to explain why they decided to transition from business or engineering to medicine in their application essays since it can look like they've previously waffled on career choices.

Additionally, to demonstrate dedication to becoming a physician, volunteer and shadowing experiences are now essentially required by all medical schools. Ideally, such experiences are accumulated over time and not right before applying to medical school.

I cannot over emphasize the value of an MCAT preparatory course. An MCAT score of less than 500 is pretty much a deal breaker regardless of GPA. A great MCAT can go a long way in compensating for a lower GPA. A 4.0 GPA, even from a highly regarded school like A&M, can't compensate for a bad MCAT score.
OnlyForNow
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AG
Hard to do at A&M, specifically with BIMS (in my experience).

Being a student of BIMS he will have an advantage on getting into spots of certain classes. If he drops BIMS and only is business the advisors of the business school can't secure him spots in certain classes so if he misses one he could end up being 2 semesters delayed on taking it (some of these classes are only offered every spring or fall).

BUT the overall concensus that he can major in something other than BIMS is 100% correct and I'd encourage it.
FTACof2011
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AG
I graduated from BIMS and was on the admissions committee at my med school while I was a student there and I'll agree with what most people here say- majoring in a non science major is definitely not a negative and some/many places will see as a positive as long as science grades are good. BIMS has a lot of science classes so one bad grade won't kill you if on balance your science grades are good. But if you only take the prerequisite science classes and have a bad grade in one, then it'll hurt you a lot more.

I'll also say after going through medical school, if I could do it again I would major in something other than BIMS. It helped me get into a good medical school and I was very well prepared for medical school, but after finishing the first year of medical school we had practically covered everything I learned in BIMS. so once through medical school my BIMS coursework really didn't broaden my knowledge base or experiences as I covered it all in med school anyways. So I'd say if you feel like you need the extra science courses either to make your resume look better or to better prepare for med school then BIMS is a good major. But if you are confident in your ability to get accepted to med school and pick things up when you get there, then doing a different major would have a lot of utility.
peanut000
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AG
Basic Exercise Physiology (Kinesiology degree at TAMU) is a great route for students who are wanting Medical School. It will build in most if not all the prerequisites for medical school. A business minor could also be a good option.
biobioprof
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My impression is that, as others have said, Med School admissions care more about what a student has taken than what major is on the diploma.

Unfortunately, IMO, where it can hurt at A&M is in how the growth in the size of the student body is leading to more courses having majors only sections and viewing nonmajors as second class "service teaching".

Personally I hate that students end up getting tracked based on choosing a major before they even set foot on campus. But it's complicated and I understand why it happens.

Edit to add: in BICH we claim to have one of the highest success rates for premeds getting accepted.
OnlyForNow
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AG
This... so much this.

I'd second that as a "hard core scientist" that got out of BIMS and into something else.
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