S24 has a meeting with college advisor for Friday right after school ends. He has some questions prepared on how to best use the space freed up by the AP credits. I am trying to stay out of the planning as parents are definitely not invited to the meeting plus it’s a good intro to adulting. Only worry is he will forget to ask the important questions as we are coming back from a family vacation late Thu.
S24’s class will do the elementary walk through mid June but no parents allowed. They probably didn’t want the teary eyed parents to set off the little ones…
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our HS didn’t allow parents there for the senior walk either!
Us too! I actually rented one for this summer as we are flying down for orientation in a couple weeks and I plan on doing all his dorm shopping there and then leaving it in storage until move-in.
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Final report cards came out today which really brought home the message - he is really done. Was proud that he finished high school just as strongly as he began - not easy to maintain high grades with encroaching senioritis. Graduation next week and it’s farewell HS and hello college.
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Truthfully I was thinking the same but debated about voicing it. Those classes are going to be A LOT of work and very different from HS level. Sounds like the advisor is okay with it though?
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D24’s advisor is ok w/her having both bio & general chem. Each of those lecture classes are 25-26 students with an equal # in the lab. Professor does the lab sessions, not a grad student. It’ll be work, but she can do it. Even at U of A, they have bio & other pre-health majors take biology & general chem at the same time right out of the gates in freshman year.
Dropped D24 off at the airport at zero-dark-thirty this morning for her 5-day choir trip to NYC. I’m doing her 1st yr seminar course registration on Saturday so she didn’t have to lug a laptop w/her on the trip. I previously got the course titles wrong…apparently that was a list from LAST year’s seminar classes. Out of THIS year’s list, her top 3 choices in priority order are:
- AI in Film & TV
- Transcultural Health
- Cross-Cultural Communication
You can pick just one. I’ve been instructed by The Child to start at the top and go down. So if choice #1 is full, do #2, etc.
I think it’s cool that she put Transcultural Health as her #2 pick. D24 has been talking a lot lately about 1 of her BFFs (who’s Muslim and purposely is seeing a female Muslim dr) has PCOS and is very frustrated because the Dr is blasting her for being overweight, when some of that is totally related to the PCOS. When she brought it up at first a few days ago, we ended up having this interesting conversation about how it’s often very difficult for non-Caucasian women to truly be listened to by their medical providers, how too often, their health concerns are ignored or blown off and then it can result in stuff like not getting regular preventative screenings for things like cancer & other stuff.
The professor who teaches the Transcultural Health class is from Africa and every year or every other year, leads a 3-week Jan Term class to Ghana on the subject of public health. I kind of hope the AI class ends up full. 
But I’m gonna stick to The Child’s requirements as instructed!
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FWIW, double labs freshman year was the norm at my D’s school too for both engineers and pre-health students. It was the same for me back in the day too ; )
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Same for my D’s school. She and her friends got through it just fine. It does require strong time management skills but definitely manageable.
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I think the spacing of lab classes depends on whether or not the student plans on a gap year before continuing with medical/PA school. My dd’s suggested pathway is one year of just chemistry before adding biology but that’s the extended plan.
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Double science was also the normal when I was premed. However, if the student is not a very strong science student it may be a lot, especially with the added pressure of having a very high GPA to apply for health science programs
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I agree with this, adding it has become difficult for students who don’t take gap years to be competitive in med school admissions where the average age of accepted students is 24/25. It’s just not an academic issue but one of getting the clinical hours to be competitive with those who spend a year or two post college working full time in clinics, hospices, as EMTs, etc.
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The norm is also that only about 40% of students going in pre-med actually stick it out and even fewer than that get accepted to med school.
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My D19 took both bio and chem her first semester of college because she was advised that would allow her to study abroad spring of junior year (only taking electives). It was good advice.
And agree with others that many kids now take two gap years between undergrad and med school. My daughter works in a large lab and everyone applying this cycle graduated in '23.
But if you are in a pre-health track it’s pretty common and you can’t really dwell on the success rates if you’re all-in. Our D22 took 2 labs freshman year so she could take org chem her sophomore year (just completed).
Dealing with this right now with my oldest D who graduated in May 2023. Applied with a very high GPA and solid MCATs and only got one interview. This time around, she will have a full year of clinical work when she re-applies.
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I do appreciate the feedback, even though some comes across as very doom & gloom. Parents on the FB parent group for the college have had nothing but positive things to say about the pre-med/pre-health advising, coursework, mentoring, internships, research experience, etc.
Right now at least, this is something that D24 really wants to pursue. So we are purposely taking a step back and letting her make the decisions about what to take and when. As the college told us parents, your kid, not you, is the one going to college.
She knows full well what the requirements are in order to get a guaranteed interview to her college’s physician assistant graduate program. She knows it’s going to be hard work.
- must start at the college as a freshman
- all PA prereq courses must be taken at the college
- must work w/the college’s pre-health advising people
- 3.5 overall & STEM GPA
- 3 LOR - 1 from a healthcare professional, 1 from a professor
- min of 200 hr paid or volunteer direct healthcare experience (200, not 2000)
- NO GRE or other standardized tests required for admission
required courses for admission to their PA program:
- 1 yr general biology
- 1 yr general chem
- 1 semester in genetics
- 1 semester anatomy & physiology
- 1 semester systemic physiology
- 1 semester microbiology
- 1 semester medical terminology
- 1 semester organic chemistry
- General Psychology or intro to Sociology
- 1 semester statistics, but you have to get ok from pre-health advisor before you sign up for it
The college also has a similar guaranteed interview program for a PA grad school at a different university and it has similar requirements.
If she wants it to happen, she’ll figure it out and will make it work. If she changes her mind and decides to do something else, then she’ll figure that out, too. 
Lots of change is in store. It’ll all work out in the end.
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for example, let’s say D24 decides she does want to still pursue a career in healthcare, but maybe not PA. What if she wants to pursue nursing? Her school has guaranteed acceptance agreement w/another university for an accelerated bachelor’s-to-BSN program. Or after her bachelor’s degree, she could move back to her home state and do that here at any of the 3 in-state public universities here.
Or maybe she goes a different direction and decides she’s interested in, I don’t know, being a physical therapist. The college has special agreements w/DPT programs. And pharmacy schools. And guaranteed interview agreements for a couple of different med schools. Guaranteed interview agreements for different public health grad programs. Same for grad programs in healthcare administration. For healthcare administration, there’s an alumnus who’s a senior executive at a large hospital system in Ohio who works w/ D24’s college to get healthcare admin majors internships there, for example.
There’s also similar either guaranteed interview or guaranteed acceptance for grad programs in a whole range of other subjects.
It’ll be ok.
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First day of UGA orientation is done for parents! Students are going to have dinner in the dining hall, and then have a silent disco. Other Gen Xers—doesn’t the “silent disco” strike you as horrifying? They all supposedly dance to their own headphones!!!
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They have this in Lincoln center as part of the summer for the city events. There are hundreds of people by the fountain dancing in the silence. It is a much better idea than playing the music to annoy all the upper west siders, ha!
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Meh, my son took bio (1,2) and gen chem (1,2) together during his first 2 semesters. It was fine.
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