Double Major or Minor?

COLLEGE! · 07-12-2007, 01:36 AM

Hey guys, I am currently and engineering major, but due to AP/transfer credits I have enough space to do a double major (my schedule will be full, but it's possible). However, I was debating whether to do a double major (in a non-science area), or whether to do a minor in that area and then become a TA at my university. I reallly wanted to show interest in this area outside my major, but do med schools distinguish that much between double majors and minors? If I did a double major, I would probably not be able to TA. Thanks!

bluedevilmike · 07-12-2007, 01:48 AM

Medical schools do not care about either, so (I suppose) they don't distinguish between the two of them.

That is to say:
They matter equally, but only because neither of them matters at all.

COLLEGE! · 07-12-2007, 11:39 PM

Really? I thought it was good to show some sort of diversity, to show that you are not just a stereotypical science/engineering student.

shades_children · 07-13-2007, 09:10 AM

There are other interesting ways of doing that other than double/triple majoring/minoring.

santabanta · 04-07-2008, 09:06 PM

so double majoring is not a way of standing out as unique? lets say immunology and computer science at UCB...those as double majors will not be unique? med schools will turn a blind eye to them?

norcalguy · 04-07-2008, 09:21 PM

I'm going to be honest here: med schools have a pretty narrow view of diversity. When they say diversity, they mean racial diversity. Things like major diversity, geographical diversity, age diversity are very very secondary.

The tradeoff of a second major is that you'll have less time for EC's and possibly a lower GPA. In the end, med schools would prefer more/better EC's and a higher GPA over a computer science double major. Computer science isn't a major that's likely to help you become a better physician. The reason med schools like humanities majors is that they often improve your oral and written communication skills and you get practice in critically analyzing what you read.

student14x · 04-08-2008, 09:18 PM

Quote:

Computer science isn't a major that's likely to help you become a better physician.

Computer science relies on critical thinking skills and logic and can even develop these skills while a humanities major can't or won't as much. This comes in handy for the MCAT. Don't get me wrong, having a humanities major certainly helps one become a doctor only in the sense that med-schools prefer humanities majors over science majors and that its easier to get A's.

shades_children · 04-08-2008, 11:55 PM

Quote:

Computer science relies on critical thinking skills and logic and can even develop these skills while a humanities major can't or won't as much.

Yes, because history or econ majors throw all their critical thinking skills and logic out the window when they declare a major. Good grief.

Quote:

having a humanities major certainly helps one become a doctor

It can help with board scores. I don't know if it helps with admissions.

Quote:

only in the sense that med-schools prefer humanities majors over science majors

Is it really a clear-cut preference?

Quote:

and that its easier to get A's.

Wrong.

student14x · 04-09-2008, 09:01 AM

Un, well I got an A+ in my first humanities class and I didn't even try. Everyone passed. I don't think anyone got below a B. Maybe one person, but he rarely showed up. Now when I took a harder(by my definition) subject, there was almost always higher failure rates. For instance, my physics mechanics class failed up to 70%(of 100 students) of the class. In the end, about 5 people received A's. But this just isn't my school, it occurs in just about every school across the nation.

To quote sakky from a previous thread,

Quote:

Consider the following excerpts from reports at the following schools:

Berkeley:

""The physical sciences and engineering had rigorous grading standards roughly in line with the recommendations from 1976," stated Rine, "while the humanities and social sciences in many classes had all but given up on grades below a B, and in many courses below an A-,"

Undergraduate Education Colloquium, The College of Letters and Science, UC Berkeley

Harvard:

"But there is one undisputed difference between two realms of academia. The mean grade for humanities courses is higher than that in the natural sciences, according to O’Keefe. And with the new honors GPA cutoff applying across the board, science concentrators may be at a disadvantage when Latin honors are handed out. "

The Harvard Crimson :: News :: ?A?s Still Abound Headline 4.0 Years Later

Stanford:

"The natural sciences division of H&S
assigns the smallest proportion (43%) of combined A's and the largest
proportion of C's, followed by Earth Sciences, Engineering, and the
social sciences division. More than 55% of the letter grades assigned
by the humanities and language/literature departments are A's; these
divisions assign about half as many C's as do other divisions of H&S...The natural sciences division of H&S and the
School of Earth Sciences have the lowest average grades"

http://facultysenate.stanford.edu/ar...80/104195.html

Pitt:

"A's were most common in the humanities,..."There was a general feeling among the humanities faculty that the only grades [faculty should give] were A's and B's," Campbell recalled. When Campbell declared that a C should be the mean grade in a class, "some of them were shocked," he said. "There was a fair bit of flack aboard the ship over that.""

Format File Not Found

One can also consider the following report:

Let me mention one other thing the data reveal: Grade inflation has proceeded more rapidly in the humanities than in the natural sciences, in part, no doubt, because of the absolute, objective, and quantifiable measures of student mastery that exist in the sciences. The relative integrity of academic standards in the natural sciences in comparison with the humanities, education, and the social sciences acts as an incentive for students to avoid the sciences in favor of the softer, grade-inflated alternatives. Today, as University of Virginia professor Mark Edmundson wrote in Harper's ("On the Uses of a Liberal Education," Harper's Magazine, September 1997, 39 ff), "The rigors of Chem 101 create almost as many English majors per year as do the splendors of Shakespeare."

Find Articles 404 File not found

Now, if you would like, I can delve into the academic literature where this topic has surely been discussed at length.

But at the end of the day, there does seem to be substantial evidence that humanities classes do tend to be graded easier than science classes.

MidwestMom2Kids_ · 04-09-2008, 09:17 AM

santa banta, I think you will find helpful info about medical school on studentdoctor.net

student14x · 04-09-2008, 09:37 AM

Quote:

Yes, because history or econ majors throw all their critical thinking skills and logic out the window when they declare a major. Good grief.

Strawman fallacy. You lose.

read my sentence again. I said that computer science can develop critical thinking skills and logic MORE(note the more) than humanities majors. Now if someone already has great logical reasoning skills, then it doesn't matter what he/she majors in.

shades_children · 04-09-2008, 12:37 PM

Quote:

Computer science relies on critical thinking skills and logic and can even develop these skills while a humanities major can't or won't as much.

read my sentence again. I said that computer science can develop critical thinking skills and logic MORE(note the more) than humanities majors.

Strawman, fair enough. Then I modify my question: where is the evidence that computer science requires MORE development of critical thinking skills and logic?

Quote:

Un, well I got an A+ in my first humanities class and I didn't even try. Everyone passed. (...)

I don't have enough time to research this, but here's what I've found by searching Google.

Quote:

Institutions also report an increasing disparity in grades between humanities courses and science courses. At Penn, for example, average course grades range from an A-minus/B-plus in small humanities classes to B/B-minus in large natural science classes. That is prompting concern not just about grade inflation, but also about grade fairness.

Kent Peterman, Penn's associate dean for academic affairs, attributed the discrepancy to differences in the ways science and the humanities are taught. He said humanities classes are generally small, allowing students and professors a greater opportunity to develop personal relationships, and grading is based on writing assignments that can be revised or rewritten. Science classes, on the other hand, tend to be larger and generally award grades based on one-time exams.

Source: In a Change of Policy, and Heart, Colleges Join Fight Against Inflated Grades - New York Times

The implication is that science classes have lower average grades because of teaching styles, not because of difficulty. Unless not getting as much teacher attention and one-shot exams are the true measures of difficulty.

Quote:

In the next few days, Columbia College will admit a select group of the senior class into Phi Beta Kappa on the basis of the strength of their academic records prior to senior year. These students deserve to be commended for their academic achievements. The award itself, however, will be skewed toward math, economics, and physics majors, whose professors give out more grades of A-plus than do those in other departments. The University takes pride in its ability to distinguish its top students, but it does a disservice to those who just miss the cut. This disparity in grading is part of a larger problem in the ranking and honors of Columbia students, both within the University and with respect to other top-tier schools.

Although both science and humanities classes award grades of A-plus to a small fraction of students, quantitative courses lend themselves more readily to this top distinction. Where performance is measured by correct solutions to problem sets and exams, students can effectively earn grades of A-plus simply by scoring very well. Where students are graded on class participation and papers, however, there is no concrete way for a student to earn an A-plus. When graduation honors are conferred, humanities students who are no less deserving than the top physics or math students will be less likely reach the highest ranks. Columbia College should eliminate the A-plus from all courses in order to remove this inequity.

Source: Down-grading | Columbia Spectator

And I guess this is saying that more top grades are handed out in science classes as opposed to humanities classes.

student14x · 04-09-2008, 06:12 PM

Quote:

The implication is that science classes have lower average grades because of teaching styles, not because of difficulty. Unless not getting as much teacher attention and one-shot exams are the true measures of difficulty.

Ok, lets make the assumption that theres no difference in inherent difficulty( hence logic development) between the hard sciences and social sciences. Even then, my logic still holds. That is, its harder to major in a hard science than a soft one. This is due to all the factors that you have mentioned. Majoring in the humanities means getting more personal teacher attention as humanities classes are almost always smaller. And because there are more room for assignments, the student can get a sense of the teacher expectation early on. By the time a science student gets the teachers' standard, it may be too late as that last midterm could have been worth 35% of his grade. Take all of this in addition to bell curving in science, and what we have to the salient fact that it is more difficult to earn good grades in science than it is in humanities. This is relevant because med schools care about grades.

Moreover, that initial assumption that theres no difference in inherent difficulty is wrong. There is a difference. Science majors are more intellectually challeging than non science majors. According to (The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life by Richard J. Herrnstein and Charles Murray), the top echelon of cognition(ie IQ of 120 and higher) correlates to these careers, chemist, physists, mathematicians, doctors and top CEOs. Almost all of these careers have something to do with science, except the CEO. Not only that, look at all the geniuses out there. Most of them are in science, Newton, Einstine, Feynman, Euler. Granted, there are some nonscientists, i.e Mozart.

Quote:

And I guess this is saying that more top grades are handed out in science classes as opposed to humanities classes.

Thats not germane to the discussion because Med schools don't care much for A+s. Not only that, but that still doesn't address the fact that theres more students failing out of science programs than nonscience. Hence, science is still more risky.

Emily2007 · 04-09-2008, 09:51 PM

Ohh midwestmom, trying to get people addicted to ANOTHER forum? SDN is the reason I don't do homework!

student14x · 04-09-2008, 10:33 PM

Here a quote from a poster on the site you mentioned

Quote:

In 5 minutes of searching, I found this...If you rank the average GRE scores by department, physics/astronomy rank 1st in quantitative, verbal, and writing. LSAT scores ? Physics/math takes it again. GMAT? Physics is first again. If you look at the combined scores for the three tests, and add in the average salary for graduating seniors, the top three are physics, math and economics. Surprise?

source:Down-grading | Columbia Spectator

His source is:Why Economics?