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<p>Probably not. Real analysis has nothing to do with advanced calculus. Typically, 4th semester of calc is differential equations. </p>
<p>I don’t know if the quantum mechanics comparisons hold, but rigorous real analysis classes do tend to be difficult.</p>
<p>I’m an electrical engineer, and found real analysis to be a killer. I thought I was good at math, until taking real analysis in grad school. Stochastic processes was not nearly as bad, for me.</p>
<p>My daughter is a math/econ major. She thought she was smart until she took real analysis. Her math grades did bring her overall GPA down, but most employers were quite impressed with her math background. She always knew she wanted to go into banking, it would have been easier for her to major in econ or UG business school, but I suggested for her to major in math instead. I thought it would give her greater flexibility later on.</p>
<p>My son is going to major in Math with plans to start as a HS math teacher. I think it’s a good fit for him, but also acknowledge that while he’s very good at math, he also works very, very hard to be good at it - so lots of studying, self-teaching etc. He is by no means a math “nerd” or prodigy though, so I hope when he gets to college he can still handle the math load.</p>
<p>My S is interested in Pure Math, what can you do with a degree in it?</p>
<p>What if you are not good at math? What if you are down right bad at math?</p>
<p>I am planning on majoring in Chemistry with the goal of getting my PharmD, is there really that much of an overabundance of pharmcists?</p>
<p>Also my personal belief: to major in math you should be good at math and enjoy doing it - everyday.</p>
<p>D1 said on the first day of class, when her math professor said “try to envision 5th dimension,” she knew it was going nowhere good.</p>
<p>CM, my D had a double in Math & Government and her first job out of college was as an Econ research assistant. Her Math was on the “pure” side, not applied. </p>
<p>For those who find real analysis insufficiently challenging, there’s always complex analysis.</p>
<p>D1 is taking it this semester. Lets see if this one will do her in.:)</p>
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<p>Many many students who would do badly in pre-med are not capable of majoring in math even if they wanted to.</p>
<p>There is nobody out there who is “down right bad at math”, there are those, who had bad math teachers. Math is just another language that could be taught to anybody by person with sufficient skills who enjoys the subject and could make learning experince to be great fun.</p>
<p>I’ll have to disagree with MiamiDAP. I was a Den Mom to a great gang of guys. One of the boys had a tough childhood and it left him with some memory/processing challenges. You wouldn’t know it to talk to him. He is a sweet and hard working kid – but there was no question that some stuff just didn’t register and/or did not stick no matter how hard he tried. </p>
<p>I’ve known some gals with similiar processing problems. At first I thought they were playing at being a “help me, I’m Cinderella waiting for a strong prince to rescue me” bit but it came clear that they were truly “lost in the woods” when it came to some basic math abilities. They were actually a bit terrified because of the inability to process. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, I am glad everyone posted. I have read sections to DS. He is a very logical kid and math major might be a good choice.</p>
<p>I am with oldfort, but my son is a bit younger. He is a HS senior with really good options next year and we are trying to excite him with all the different options he has if he goes for the Math + something major. DH and I are both actuaries, but we have worked with many different kinds of quantitative people over the years, so we are encouraging him to get a good base. </p>
<p>I can’t tell if he would be better at applied or pure math, but based on people I have met in the working world, either approach is a great start.</p>
<p>The comparison with quantum mechanics came up in posts #20 and 21, and I couldn’t pass it up. Quantum mechanics–at least the junior or senior level introductory course at most universities–is a lot easier than many people think. There is a lot of problem-solving that is like calculus and early diff eq courses. At my university, we have more people in the quantum classes than in the rigorous analysis classes: 80 in lower-level qm, 40 in the higher-level undergrad qm, and about 10 in analysis. Further along toward research, the difficulty levels become more comparable–but still, I look with great respect on anyone who does research in analysis.</p>
<p>Whether a student who is not succeeding as a pre-med could major in math or not depends on the nature of the student’s difficulty with pre-med. Someone who lacks the patience for memorization required in organic chemistry (or has a hard time coping with underivable “rules”) could still be a successful mathematician. Someone who faints at the sight of blood might not really be cut out for pre-med, but could be a successful mathematician. A student does have to be bright and hard-working (in some combination) to get through a math major, though.</p>
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<p>I urge you to think about becoming a pharmD VERY CAREFULLY. The BLS and lots of media sources don’t know what they are talking about when they say that job growth for pharmDs looks better than average. In the 90s there were less than 80 schools of pharmacy. Now there are close to 120 schools! The pharmD degree is becoming somewhat of a joke because all these universities keep pumping out pharmD degrees like candy. A lot of these institutions will accept anybody, even students with sub 2.8 GPAs. All they care about is tuition money and don’t care if their graduates won’t be able to find jobs. Schools can keep getting away with this because they can keep pumping up the whole “not enough pharmDs because of the oncoming wave of old baby boomers” and “guaranteed 100+ K salaries” and new students keep falling for it. The bubble has burst. Don’t fall for the trap and be saddled with $150 K debts while having trouble finding a job. </p>
<p>Walgreens, the largest pharmacy retail chain in the country is implementing a new program called POWER. It is basically just a process of centralization so that they can fatten their bottom lines by hiring less pharmacists and less pharm techs. Patients will soon drop off their prescription, the prescription will be sent to a main distribution center, and the prescription will be delivered overnight to the store where the patient will pick it up the next day. If the patient has a question about their medication they will simply call an off site center. This way Walgreens doesn’t need to have a big staff of pharm techs and pharmacists at every site. They can consolidate and save $$$, so they are going to lay of LOTS of pharmDs soon. CVS another big pharmacy retail chain has been buying up other pharmacy chains left and right and has been bringing in foreign pharmacists to work for less money. CVS has also been laying off lots of pharmDs. Put the 40 new pharmacy schools, plus Walgreens’ new POWER program, and CVS all together and you have a TON of new pharmD students and laid off pharmDs looking for an increasingly limited amount of available jobs and you have a big glut of pharmDs in the market. I know of a recent pharmD grad from Temple and another from the University of the Sciences in Philly and they have not been able to find a job in 9 months. Soon the laws of economics are going to kick in and salaries are going to start falling for pharmDs because of the fact that they is so much supply for such little demand.</p>
<p>Pharmacy is a great field, I wanted to do it. It has been completely ruined though by all these POS new universities that just want tuition money and by big retail chains. It’s unfortunate that Pharmacists don’t have a powerful lobbying group to protect their profession and that can dictate whether schools are even allowed to open up for pharmacy like how the AMA protects doctors and the MD degree. The pharmD degree has been severely cheapened. But, if you still decide to do pharmacy, math really helps you out a ton on the PCAT. High quant scores will help you dominate the PCAT if you have just mediocre reading and verbal abilities. I destroyed the PCAT, a lot of it was because of the math section. Students typically do the worst on the math and chemistry sections of the test, so if you can do well on those two parts, you can beat out a lot of the majority.</p>
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<p>Depends on the university I suppose. Advanced calc where I went to undergrad was the same as real analysis. We also called abstract algebra modern algebra for some reason.</p>
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<p>Doesn’t really matter too much at the undergrad level. Just minor in something useful like computer science or economics.</p>
<p>This is VERY helpful and thank you very much! i was thinking about a mathematics and chemistry double major and this helped to backup my own argument in doing so! This is now a high possibility for me to do and now i have less doubts to do so. Thank you very much for this post!!!</p>
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<p>Yeah unless you have dsycalculia. [Dyscalculia</a> - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyscalculia]Dyscalculia”>Dyscalculia - Wikipedia) Then you really are down right bad at math. (Which I am.)</p>
<p>Math is great for some people, but not everyone is good at something and some people truly do have a hard time with it. If you’re good at math, or like math, be a math major, or consider it. But not everyone is able to do everything.</p>