[quote]
Hi I am a junior in high school and I am almost certain I want to go into medicine to become a doctor, specifically an immunologist.[/quiote]</p>
<p>And I’m almost certain that you will change your mind. Picking a specialty in high school is laughably early.</p>
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<p>We need a GoldShadow beacon, sort of how Batman has a Bat-Signal. </p>
<p>So you want a school that has few pre-meds so the competition isn’t so intense, small classes, easy classes, and a decent amount of prestige. Good luck with that. A school that doesn’t send many people to medical school may have terrible advising, which can sink you come time to apply. Most schools don’t offer small pre-med courses because there are so many pre-meds taking those classes. And most people find pre-med to be challenging because of the standards and the competition from classmates. If you’re not willing to accept a certain amount of hard work and struggle, then it’s unlikely you’ll make it to application time, let alone medical school.</p>
<p>8-hydroxyquiline:</p>
<p>The standard line around here is that one W won’t kill you. Frankly, you might not even be asked about it during interviews. You will have to retake that class, since it’s required, and it would be a bad thing if you didn’t do well since you withdrew from it once. Overall, your GPAs are excellent, so retake the class, get an A, and stop worrying about it.</p>
<p>Reece2008:</p>
<p>Bite the bullet and study hard. General chemistry is a significant portion of the MCAT. You will need to know the polyvalent ions for the test and medical school.</p>
<p>I got into GOucher College and I want to do Pre-Med. But Goucher has a really poor ranking and is not well known at all. I’m not even sure if you guys have heard of it. Will this hurt my chances of getting into a prestigious or even decent Med School?</p>
<p>I plan on graduating with my Associates of Science Degree this May and I also plan to go to VCU next year for thier pre-med program; however, I would really like to start an internship or some time of volunteer work. Possibly shadowing a doctor over the summer. Does anyone know how I go about this?</p>
<p>at least business is recession proof. look at the amazing careers that are possible thru business. accounting and finance > doctor/pharmacist/etc.
its a proven fact. accounting is recession proof :)</p>
<p>Actually in this specific instance (accounting) liore might be right. All the economic literature seems to imply that people spend money on health as if it were a luxury item – it’s bizarre, but that’s what the empirics say.</p>
<p>Of course, medicine is a lot more stable than the rest of the financial world, but stability really is a poor reason to choose a job. There’s such a thing as taking too many risks, but there’s also such a thing as being too scared of risk.</p>
<p>Someone asked this question earlier - which schools in Florida were good for pre med studies. Here’s how the FSU Med Class of 2013 (120 students) looks. I did a quick review and your best chances look to come from FSU and UF:</p>
<p>What schools supplied the most students for the FSU Med Class of 2013?</p>
<p>UF: 36/120 students
FSU: 35/120
FAU: 6/120
U Miami: 6/120
UCF: 6/120
UWF: 4/120
USF: 3/120
SMU: 2/120
Auburn: 1/120
College of Charleston: 1/120
Eckerd College: 1/120
FAMU: 1/120
FIU: 1/120
FL Mem: 1/120
Haverford: 1/120
Johns Hopkins: 1/120
NCF: 1/120
Palm Beach Atlantic: 1/120
Pensacola Christian: 1/120
Penn State: 1/120
Spellman: 1/120
Springhill Coll: 1/120
UGA: 1/120
U South Carolina: 1/120
U Penn: 1/120
U of the South: 1/120
U Tampa: 1/120
Wake Forest: 1/120
Xavier: 1/120
Unclass: 1/120</p>
<p>so whatever happened to mr. patel? did he ever get into med school? i read the first few pages of this thread (from back in 2004) and apparently mr. patel was really arguing his case for getting into med school with some very low stats. a lot of other CCer’s were downgrading his chances. it seemed like a pretty heated discussion.</p>
<p>It appears that he hasn’t been active in nearly five years. Judging from his post history, I have to say that I think most others (such as sakky) were being way too positive about his chances – and they were already being pretty harsh.</p>
<p>MP apparently scored a 14 on his ACT and went on to get a 2.87 at his community college. Apologies to him, but that’s not medical school material.</p>
<p>He seemed to think that volunteering at a hospital would be the magic bullet to get him in. Apparently he didn’t understand that basically every applicant does this.</p>
<p>Hi I am pretty sure I would love to become a doctor. I have helped people ever since I was a little girl.I love helping people and love working with children so a doctor who works with children will be my dream job one day. My stats are low sat score is high it went up out of a 1600 its a 1430. Now my gpa is a 3.4 I belive, but it isn’t because I am stupid. My freshman and junior grades are all a and bs but my sophmore year I was bully very very bad, it ws all three years but sophmore took the beating. So my gpa dropped. How do I show colleges this or explain to them? i am taking alot of online classes to repeat the sophmore classes to show i am dedicated</p>
<p>I read all 50 pages of this, and boy it has helped.</p>
<p>Okay so I have some questions of my own.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Any advice/info on grade inflation for University of Florida (UF). I don’t like the idea of 30,000 freshmen and weed out courses on every pre-req for pre-med.</p></li>
<li><p>So a -A is going to lower your GPA? What is the cut-off mark for A and does every school do this (UF?)</p></li>
<li><p>What is a good line-up for four years. I saw one post for this only. ?</p></li>
<li><p>I dont understand the scope of a schedule. I dont have that perspective. Like the pre-req in mind, od you also have plenty of time to take embryology, genetics, histology, inorganic chem (req of FSU med school), immunology?</p></li>
<li><p>I still dont know, and very undecided what to do. Take my AP AND IB credits for biology + chemistry and go int ohigher classes, or just do the normal classes? </p></li>
<li><p>I thought a 4.0 was like a feasible goal. Now I have to think about how wil I even earn a 3.6 or less.</p></li>
</ol>
<ol>
<li><p>No grade inflation esp with the new +/- system. A = 4.0 A- =3.67. There are ~7000 freshmen, not 30,000.</p></li>
<li><p>Grade systems is dependent on the school. You indicate that on your AMCAS application, which system your schools uses.</p></li>
<li><p>Varies. Depends on your strengths. Some finish in 2 years, while others spread it out to 3. </p></li>
<li><p>When a med school says inorganic chem, it means general chem. However, there is a inorganic chem class, but only chem majors/minors take it. Embryology, genetics, histology, and immunology are not required for med school. Popular majors for premeds at UF include: nutrition, health sciences, biology, and microbiology. No histology class at UF, immunology is usually taken by the microbio majors, most premeds take genetics, and embryology is a possibility but not offered often, from what I remember.</p></li>
<li><p>Do you plan to take higher level bio (genetics, microbiology, etc) or chem (analytical, etc) classes? If so, then you can probably use them if you feel comfortable with your knowledge. If not, retake.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>6.High GPA is feasible. I knew many with 3.75>.</p>