Any Opinions Appreciated [re: major]

Pre-Med & Medical School
1

I’m currently enrolled at WVU as a biomedical engineering major, but I’m having some second thoughts. I initially chose this major because of its strong non-pre-med job prospects and the great research opportunities it offers. However, I’m considering switching for a few reasons.

Biomedical engineering is a challenging major, and while I enjoy it, I worry that its rigor might take time away from my passion projects and extracurriculars. Additionally, many med school applicants choose easier majors, allowing them to maintain higher GPAs and build stronger extracurricular profiles.

Right now, I’m leaning toward biology since it’s one of my strengths and an excellent pre-med major. However, I recognize that biology alone doesn’t offer the best career prospects outside of medicine, which is something I’m keeping in the back of my mind. That said, I am fully committed to going to medical school—it’s my clear goal. There’s just the tiniest part of me that would like the reassurance of a solid backup plan, even if I never end up needing it.

I consider myself a well-rounded student who could succeed in almost any field, so I’m open to unique and less common majors that still align with my interests in healthcare and leadership. If I had to decide today, I’d choose orthopedic surgery as my specialty, but that’s definitely not set in stone.

If anyone has suggestions for interesting, non-traditional pre-med majors that could also provide a strong foundation and a solid backup plan, I’d love to hear them.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

2

You might want to look at this website. It gives a lot of health care related careers.

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3

Regardless of the major you settle on(biology works if you enjoy it), hopefully one of your ECs at WVU is the Mine Rescue Team. That would catch a person’s attention on an application.

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4

Was there any aspect of your engineering classes that you enjoyed? Math, chem, physics, etc?

I’m fairly certain WVU offers pre-med advising. Go talk to an advisor.

Good luck

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5

You can major in anything and be pre med.

So if something in the extensive WVU majors catalog interests you and it won’t add significant time to what you’ve already completed, go for it.

Perhaps some of these.

If you decide on something, meet with an advisor for more info.

Good luck.

Biology: Pre-Medical BS Major - West Virginia University

Biomedical Laboratory Diagnostics BS Major - West Virginia University

Environmental, Soil and Water Sciences BS Major - West Virginia University

Forensic Biology BS Major - West Virginia University

Health Informatics and Information Management BS Major - West Virginia University

Immunology and Medical Microbiology BS Major - West Virginia University

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Would you still want to work in health care in the event medical school does not work out?

I know somebody who was a biology major and then trained as an EMT and worked their way up. They worked for a few years, saved money, and returned to school.

I would talk to a premed advisor.

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Both my daughters had a math major (one was math & physics; the other was math & biological neuroscience)

Math gives you the opportunity to go in a variety of different directions should med school not work out for you. Take probability and a couple of programming classes (like R or MatLAB) or/and learn how to use statistical software packages… and you now have skills that can be applied to a broad variety of industries–finance; public health, medical software sales, insurance underwriting, quality control, biotechnology, bio-ag research & manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, airline scheduling, power industry, cell phone technology.

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